rjkclarke's Carnival of Diamonds and Rust

[rjkclarke]

On 20/11/2021 at 8:21 AM, Copanele said:

I'll start with this one, because I am 100% sure you will find it hilarious. I actually downloaded Hitman 2 Silent Assassin and Hitman Contracts on 17th November(as you will see), planning to play them in the nearby future. Your review doubled my conviction now

 

 

 

That's awesome to hear man....

 

..... Although is it wrong of me to be more pumped that I can see Yakuza: Dead Souls sitting there? ?

 

I'm really interested to see what you think of that one - don't go into it expecting too much and you should have a great time.

 

 

On 20/11/2021 at 8:21 AM, Copanele said:

A fantastic review! I can't wait to revisit this game. If I remember correctly St Petersburg revisited mission is one TOUGH mission, you started with the fiber wire only ? I remember spending so many days on that mission, had no internet back then so when i finally did it, it was a thrill.

 

I really plan to catch up to this series, definitely want to reach the game that is no1 on @DrBloodmoney's list I played Hitman Agent 47, Silent Assassin and half of Contracts, so I have the tutorial in stealthiness already.

I have to say...I am kinda glad they didn't remaster the first game Agent 47 though the final level in that game was probably one of the hardest levels that I played in a videogame to this day, I legit was forced to use cheats in order to pass through it.

 

Again, thanks for taking up my request, now I'm really motivated

 

Thanks dude! I always appreciate the kind words.

 

I'm pretty sure you start with just the fibre-wire in in St Petersburg - I think on top of that - you get like a boatload of 47 clones on your arse for the whole mission too, that one was definitely a toughy in Silent Assassin.

 

I always used to suck at a level called The Hidden Valley (I think that's what it was called) it's a snowy one,right before the Hashimoto targets, it's really put together, but I was just never good at the execution side of it, where in one section you have to run alongside a moving van to maintain your cover, I was never good at getting Silent Assassin rating in that one.

 

That satisfaction you get from nailing something hard by yourself in those pre internet games, seems all the more satisfying sometimes right? Back when we didn't have the internet to rely on, and we had to figure out our own methods and strategies for games, or just fail miserably at them until we were older like I often did 

 

I'm kind of glad they didn't remaster the first game too - I watched a speedrun of it a couple of years ago - and I was just like ???.... Are you a monster? The guy was absolutely trivialising something that I know I struggled with a whole lot, and it seems like you did too.

 

Thankfully you gave me a nice long list - so I still have plenty of those requests to be getting on with, after I've reviewed the other games in the HD trilogy - looking forward to eventually reading your own write ups of them in your own thread, those should be a good time.

 

On 20/11/2021 at 8:45 AM, DrBloodmoney said:

Loved this one man!

 

 

 

Totally agree here - Hitman 2: Silent Assassin was my introduction to the series too - and I'm glad of that. I did eventually go back and play Agent 47 years after the fact, and while it's an interesting thing to play knowing where the series went (I played it after Contracts, so I'd even seen some of the re-made original game stuff), I think it would have been enough to put me off, more than intrigue me, as it was pretty ropey!

 

 

Cheers mate - much appreciated as always.

 

I played Agent 47 after Blood Money I believe - so I think you probably had a better time in that regard. After all there's a pretty huge leap in quality of life improvements from Contracts to Blood Money. Even if Blood Money did still have a fair bit of jank to contend with.

 

I'm pretty sure I would have been the same too, had I played Agent 47 first - I don't know if you felt like this when you played it, but I went in thinking it was going to play fairly differently to how it did, so I expected a bit more focus on stealth, something which they don't put all too much importance on in the game from what I remember.

 

I remember thinking that was really cool in Contracts - where it contained some remade stuff from the original - especially as those levels are some of my favourites from Contracts - I'm always a sucker for the Hotel levels in Hitman games - and that one has so many cool elements to it.

 

I guess that kind of proves IO have always been sort of perfectionists too right? That even back then - they wanted to show the best possible versions of their previous output, so they remade in a modern title, much like how Hitman 1 and 2 are in Hitman 3. I'll have to remember to focus on that in the Contracts review I think, as it's an interesting little avenue I think - well to me anyway ?.....

 

On 20/11/2021 at 8:45 AM, DrBloodmoney said:

You're not wrong here - and frankly, the awkwardness with controls, and the laborious and finicky way some of the animations would work against you really are annoying. They did get better as the series went on, but really, even in Blood Money, it feels like you are fighting against the game to get it to do what you want! Some of that is the age, of course, but I do think that is what elevates the new Hitman games as much as anything - the fact that the controls are finally so simple, smooth, responsive and context correct, that you can execute a plan with confidence, knowing that it isn't going to be scunnered by you happening to be 1 nano-millimetre too far away from a guard for the fiber-wire to catch him at the right angle!

 

I mean, I played Silent Assassin and Contract to death on PS2, but I've never been able to bring myself to go back to the HD remasters, especially now, after playing so much modern Hitman, because even dipping back to Blood Money reminded me of how infuriating those controls could sometimes get!

 

That's a great point yeah...... Blood Money at the very least had that feature where even if you weren't quite correctly in place with the fibre-wire they still died anyway, the animation just looks really awkward.It's that same animation you get when you use the fibre-wire in an enclosed space.

 

But what you mentioned is exactly why I think the recent ones are the most satisfying ones to actually play...... You essentially don't have to compromise do you - it's one of the things I like least about Silent Assassin and Contracts - is the fact that you don't really have too much room for manoeuvre in what works and what doesn't, whereas practically everything is an option in the recent games. If you can think of it you can probably do it...... Plus you don't have to wrestle with the clunky and awkward movement controls either - so you aren't having to constantly watch as 47 fumbles around like a cat that's gotten its head stuck in a plastic shopping bag.

 

I totally get why you've never dragged yourself back to the remasters either by the way. Do you truly never see yourself going back? Not even for science? Or you just content to "Leave the memories alone" As that terrible song by Fuel goes. 

 

I think fortunately for me I played them before the new Hitman titles came out -otherwise I feel like I might be in a similar spot to you. Although, as I seem to really like completing game series, as best as I can - I might have forced myself to brave that janky frontier of the HD trilogy, because I still had a colossal amount of fun with them. So I'd like to think I could still have gotten some form of positivity out of it.

 

On 20/11/2021 at 8:45 AM, DrBloodmoney said:

That's something I hadn't really though of, but yeah - for all that Hitman games are about staying quiet, they have always had some of the most satisfying gunfire of any games - just to tease you I suppose! 

Because guns are so deadly in the games (how many games out there can a guard take a shotgun to the chest, and keep on trucking? In Hitman, a single, deafening blast sends them flying!) the sound design really adds to it - you fire a shotgun, and you know you just did some damage... to the enemy, and to your rating 

 

 

They absolutely do yeah - in fact one of my favourite escalations in Hitman 1 and thankfully it was back in Hitman 2 - was the one where in I think Marrakesh - where you have to plug a guard with a shotgun, whilst disguised as a guard, and all the other things that - well escalate alongside that.

 

That one almost felt like solving a puzzle, especially if you're going for Silent Assassin every time - which I always do out of habit - it's too addictive a concept to ignore right? But it's satisfying being able to actually use some of the guns in that contract. As you say - they absolutely feel lethal - and those bodies flying, yep that's just as satisfying.

 

1 hour ago, det_gittes said:

From the line-up of the semis, Trump vs. Higgins is no doubt the best match-up, and I imagine it's gonna be a great battle. However, t's not like like Higgins beat Bingtao with ease, at least the final score does not suggest it. Now for the final, I'd pick Trump skill-wise, but as we know, the mental game is equally important and at least in the past I remember it was Higgins' strong suit. In any case, it looks like there won't be too much gaming for you today  

 

It's going to be interesting that's for sure - I feel like I should have more faith in Higgins - but Trump has only dropped one frame the entire tournament, so it's kind of tough to see Higgins stopping him in his tracks! Add to that the fact that Trumps had a full day off - whereas Higgins and Bingtao were playing until about 12.15 AM I think, and as he's 46 he's probably going to feel absolutely tired as hell today you'd think.

 

As you say though - Higgins still has a really strong mental game.So that might come into play quite a bit. He sure showed it last night - that was a hard fought match that he won. one of those frames went 51 minutes I think. Bingtao is just so bizarre man. He's 21 but he plays like a player from the 80's. He's fascinating to watch, because he's so unlike any of the other younger players.

 

I don't think I will be doing too much gaming no ?..... Ironically I got up at 6AM today thinking - yep, get up nice and early, get some gaming in, and then enjoy the snooker - but so far I've managed to do ZERO amount of gaming. Just drank a lot of coffee and scrolled through YouTube a lot ?...... so much for finishing off Afterparty this morning, and getting a review out before the afternoon session starts, but I might be able to finish Afterparty off at least.

 

Can't complain too much - I'm hoping for a decent Final today.

 

1 hour ago, det_gittes said:

 

The UK Championship is up next and I am pretty sure that this one is covered by Eurosport (it was in the past). I don't mind the larger field as you get to see some fresh faces, which often makes for a much needed break from the players you get to see all the time

 

I'm pretty sure you get the better deal with the UK championship on Eurosport - the main TV coverage on the BBC skips the first round entirely, so you should get an entire week more snooker. So I guess that's one upside to missing out on some of the ITV events that Eurosport don't seem to cover, which I still think is cruel - so I'm glad you'll get to see a bit more of it. 

 

I quite like that about the larger field too - plus you also get to see some old faces alongside the fresh ones - that's about the only time you get to see players like Jimmy White and Hendry these days, as they hardly get to the latter stages of tournaments these days.

 

[Copanele]

21 hours ago, rjkclarke said:

 

That's awesome to hear man....

 

..... Although is it wrong of me to be more pumped that I can see Yakuza: Dead Souls sitting there?

 

I'm really interested to see what you think of that one - don't go into it expecting too much and you should have a great time.

I need to play Yakuza 4 first, then I'll approach this one so it will take quite a while. Heard it's the true black sheep of the franchise but I am still decided on playing it, no matter how bad it is.

 

21 hours ago, rjkclarke said:

I always used to suck at a level called The Hidden Valley (I think that's what it was called) it's a snowy one,right before the Hashimoto targets, it's really put together, but I was just never good at the execution side of it, where in one section you have to run alongside a moving van to maintain your cover, I was never good at getting Silent Assassin rating in that one.

 

That satisfaction you get from nailing something hard by yourself in those pre internet games, seems all the more satisfying sometimes right? Back when we didn't have the internet to rely on, and we had to figure out our own methods and strategies for games, or just fail miserably at them until we were older like I often did 

 

Oh god the entire Japanese section was a pain. But yeah the Hidden Valley was a pain in the ass level. And that one was supposed to be super short! This is where the old style of gaming jank comes into play.

But yes, it was equally satisfying to figure it out without help like in the old days (although you'll excuse me if I use a guide nowadays, I don't have the patience of the ancients anymore hahah)

 

I also forgot to mention, I kinda miss the old Hitman Codename 47's voice acting. Something about "Ah the Piano Wire, the choice of a real pro" was so soothing and yet menacing  

Edited November 22, 2021 by Copanele

[YaManSmevz]

On 11/19/2021 at 6:12 PM, rjkclarke said:

Classic Review

 

Platinum #77

Hitman 2: Silent Assassin 

 

 

Excellent work as always, my dude!

 

It's funny because there's things I completely forgot about SA that subconsciously informed how I play the new Hitman games - I ALWAYS make sure to match my disguise with its weapon, never get too close to NPCs wearing the same thing as me, and never run while in disguise. When I found out those weren't really necessary, I was like "wait, where did I get that from..." but now I know!

 

I still do those things though, can't help it?

 

I also forgot what a joke sneaking was! SO FREAKIN SLOW. You wouldn't be able to assassinate a sloth with movement like that! Then to have to line them up perfectly or otherwise end up garrotting thin air.. that was certainly frustrating. The issue of options with a fallen NPC is still funny for me - it may just be me but it feels like "Snap Neck" always pops up first, even before "Drag" or "Take Disguise." I wonder if that's deliberate. Like inside 47's head he's just like "YEAAHHH SNAP HIS NE- actually, his clothes could be pretty useful. And shit, let's get him out of the way before somebody finds him!"

 

Agreed on the music - St. Petersburg's theme is synonymous with the game for me. I mentioned the triumphant music in my Manhunt review and it was specifically this that I had in mind! Speaking of which -

 

On 11/20/2021 at 0:21 AM, Copanele said:

If I remember correctly St Petersburg revisited mission is one TOUGH mission, you started with the fiber wire only ? I remember spending so many days on that mission, had no internet back then so when i finally did it, it was a thrill.

 

Oddly I remember having difficulty with the first St. Petersburg mission rather than the second. From what I can recall, that one took me a while to get the hang of, but it was the last time I was really hung up on a level.

 

Have fun with your revisit, dude! You're a bigger person than me... it's definitely on my mind but still a big maybe for me... the new games may have spoiled me too much control-wise!

 

On 11/20/2021 at 0:45 AM, DrBloodmoney said:

You're not wrong here - and frankly, the awkwardness with controls, and the laborious and finicky way some of the animations would work against you really are annoying. They did get better as the series went on, but really, even in Blood Money, it feels like you are fighting against the game to get it to do what you want! Some of that is the age, of course, but I do think that is what elevates the new Hitman games as much as anything - the fact that the controls are finally so simple, smooth, responsive and context correct, that you can execute a plan with confidence, knowing that it isn't going to be scunnered by you happening to be 1 nano-millimetre too far away from a guard for the fiber-wire to catch him at the right angle!

 

I mean, I played Silent Assassin and Contract to death on PS2, but I've never been able to bring myself to go back to the HD remasters, especially now, after playing so much modern Hitman, because even dipping back to Blood Money reminded me of how infuriating those controls could sometimes get!

 

THIS. I played SA so much way back when, and had an absolute blast, but what with the current version available, I feel like getting frustrated with the controls would eventually sully my fondness for the game. Although, I would love to get a trophy for 47 kills?

 

On 11/20/2021 at 0:45 AM, DrBloodmoney said:

That's something I hadn't really though of, but yeah - for all that Hitman games are about staying quiet, they have always had some of the most satisfying gunfire of any games - just to tease you I suppose! 

Because guns are so deadly in the games (how many games out there can a guard take a shotgun to the chest, and keep on trucking? In Hitman, a single, deafening blast sends them flying!) the sound design really adds to it - you fire a shotgun, and you know you just did some damage... to the enemy, and to your rating 

 

Real talk! I forgot (you've refreshed my memory quite a lot with this one, Mr. Clarke!) how loud the guns were. If i got made and somebody fired at me, I remember thinkin "Welp. Looks like we're killin everybody again."

[rjkclarke]

After The Party I found This Platinum Behind The Sofa

Platinum #338

Afterparty (PS4)

 

 

Thanks For Not Reading A Book Instead
Get all trophies.

 

A Few Trophy Stats

 

Platinum Earned - 22 November 2021 : 12:31:50 AM

Time Taken to Platinum :  3 days, 11 hours, 46 minutes

Platinum Rarity  - 21.08%

Trophy Number - #16,201

 

 

In much the same way it wasn’t the easiest thing in the world to define Oxenfree – that could also be said of Afterparty – so with that in mind, I don’t think I’m even going to try. Much like with Oxenfree, describing this game as an experience seems to be the most appropriate approach – so let us go with that.  

 

Something I think is important to disclose before really diving into this review is how much I do actually like the game. I’m going to be quite critical of a few points going forward however, but I don’t want anyone to lose sight of the fact I very much enjoyed this; it just has a fair few pitfalls that I can’t quite ignore. Pitfalls which at times might metaphorically at least make this game look like a hallway from an early PS1 Tomb Raider title. Despite those shortcomings I still think this game is very much worth people’s time, but it might require a specific approach to really get the most enjoyment from it, but I’ll go into that further in.

 

Released in 2019 and created by the developers that brought you Oxenfree, Night School Studio – Afterparty takes a lot of elements found within Oxenfree but uses them to tell a wholly different, yet similarly interesting story. The basic premise is this. You take control of two characters, Milo and Lola as you traverse hell with the intention of beating Satan in a drinking contest to win your freedom. That’s a basic description I know – but the story and themes on offer here are excellent, and contain some really introspective and thought provoking content that is rarely covered in video game form. I don’t want to get too much into the specifics and spoil any elements for anyone, so I’ll leave it at that, the most I’ll do is cover some character details later on.

 

On a visual level Afterparty is spectacular – it’s a truly impressive sight to see how interesting the art-design elements actually are. Afterparty contains one of the most interesting depictions of Hell that I’ve ever seen across a lot of different forms of media. Every location is unique and interesting for different reasons; the striking neon colours and crimson everywhere are such an interesting aesthetic. Almost every character design feels satisfyingly unique too – Milo and Lola don’t exactly have too many discernable features – but they look distinctive and memorable, because of how they were designed –it’s also an element that feels true to their characters.

 

Whilst practically all of the dialogue across the board is excellent in Afterparty – the actual sound itself isn’t. The sound effects and things of that nature are fine, don’t get me wrong. I fully expect this to just be an issue for me – but the sound mixing in parts of this game are pretty abysmal – some of the sections where you’re riding with Sam for example contain background music so loud that anything the characters are saying ends up being drowned out completely, to the point where you almost have to play with subtitles on.

This doesn’t happen too much but I found it very jarring on occasion, alongside that – there’s just a lack of ambient sound very often. There were a few noticeable sections where there’s just no discernable ambient music or anything – you just run from place to place in pure silence. This was a huge contrast to Oxenfree – where at least one character was always puncturing the silence with some speech.

 

Both games deal with death, yet deal with them in entirely different ways. Much like with Oxenfree there is a pretty limited amount on offer as far as gameplay is concerned.  So I’ll mention it now – there’s at least a few added areas of note with Afterparty, even if those new additions do come in the form of mini-games. Which take the form of drinking games, that I’m sure many of us are fairly familiar with.  Whilst these are quite short, and few and far between, you do end up feeling more in control than perhaps you did in Oxenfree – where at least in my case here I’d argue you felt like a passenger along for the ride, instead of the person piloting the ship/car.

 

As alcohol consumption is one of the driving forces of the narrative – the drinks on offer themselves end up giving the player extra dialogue options depending on what they’re drinking – conceptually this is brilliant, as is its execution to be perfectly honest. These are for the most part entirely optional aspects of the game – but some of the drinks range from hilarious to just downright unusual.

There’s plenty of great examples – but one or two that particularly made me chuckle was the drink that gave you the ability to respond to everything with Vaudevillian style humour, or another that meant you delivered all your lines like a pirate. Something which honestly reminded me of some of Elaines dialogue from Tales of Monkey Island where she’s got the Pox of LeChuck and she’s just wandering around, and every drink she sees proclaims “ARRRRGH LIBATIONS.” The unfortunate side effect is that they take away one extra potential dialogue choice. Which leads me onto this.

 

The dialogue choices from Oxenfree return here – and with the drinks available those take up a third option of dialogue. As funny as they can be – they actually unfortunately highlight one of the games issues, which is the lack of meaningful choice that comes along with that dialogue. I really don’t feel as if they quite wrote enough material for this game to really cover everything – at least not in the same organic way that it was done in Oxenfree.

In Oxenfree you could say three different things, or say nothing at all and pretty much get a different response each time. For me this added a huge element of replayability to the experience – as it essentially means any number of different replies and responses could lead to learning something you hadn’t learnt yet about the story. Whereas in Afterparty choosing either response will net you the same response regardless, this is a shame really. As you have to do at least two playthroughs for the platinum I decided to pretty much make all the opposite decisions when I played through it the second time – and unfortunately every response was pretty much the same apart from a few exceptions.

 

So in essence my choices and my responses felt a little less meaningful as a result of this – it might not be an issue for some, but I thought it was an unfortunate side effect of there being a very specific story that Night School Studios wanted to tell – and I don’t think they wanted to compromise by giving you as much freedom of choice, as they perhaps should have done.

 

The dialogue itself is excellently written – arguably even better than in Oxenfree to be fair. Both Milo and Lola the two main characters very much feel like believably real people. This is unusual because most of the time – be it in film, television, video games or any other type of storytelling media, a lot of dialogue has the tendency to slip into being very thinly veiled exposition dumps.

This is not the case here; there exists a palpable, real chemistry between the two characters. If you’ve played Oxenfree but not this – it’s a similar dynamic to that of Alex and Ren, just in much more detail. In Afterparty there’s a real believability to the fact the two characters have been friends for years – most long time friends do tend to talk like that, with just vague references and in-jokes to things that only the two of them understand – it was a really well done element of the game, that I think really added an extra layer of depth to the two characters.

 

I personally preferred Lola as a character – by a whole lot too, I think she’s better developed and she’s far more interesting. It isn’t to say that Milo is boring, because he isn’t; I just think Lola’s personality ends up drowning him out a bit in a few sections. Both are voiced very well, with only a few areas where I had to pause for a moment and think “Really that’s the take they went with?”

Many of the characters that you meet during your time with Afterparty end up being some of the aspects that really elevate it – especially on a subtextual level. Characters like Sam (voiced by Ashley Burch of Life is Strange and Horizon fame,) Apollyon and Satan himself end up driving the narrative forward and I ended up becoming just as interested in them as I did any of the main characters themselves. I also thought the fact that Sam was a psychopomp (a soul guide) that they reconceptualised into being a cab driver, instead of the usual ferryman that you’d usually come to expect from representations of Hell was an inspired idea.

 

Herein lies part of the problem – its story. The easy thing is to say that the story is excellent, because it is. It’s intelligent, it’s funny, it’s thought provoking, and it does make you invested in the outcome. Where’s the problem I hear you ask? It honestly doesn’t have much replay value – unlike Oxenfree for the most part this is very much a one and done kind of experience – and I think that was the intention all along from Night School Studios, that’s how it felt at least. It does have multiple endings, and the one you probably think is the true ending, the one you get pushed towards isn’t actually the most satisfying one. There are options on how to complete your tasks and make your way through the game – but as I alluded to earlier the dialogue practically doesn’t change regardless of what you do, so the small branching paths that are open to you end up only offering you about an hour and half of fresh gameplay on a second playthrough.

 

I think I can just about accept that though – the story Night School Studio wanted to tell was an important one – and one that doesn’t get told often if at all in video game form. Which is accountability – I guess this is a mild spoiler, but Satan has some – I’ll just say addiction issues, which are handled in a pretty sensitive way by Night School Studio to be perfectly honest. I found that in some aspects Satan in this game reminded me of modern day Bam Margera of Jackass fame. In so far as he always surrounds himself with enablers, with a select few around him who seem to want to get him the help he needs. There was a time when he would literally pay people thousands of dollars for people to come and party with him. In much the same way Satan in this game wants to appear to be the life and soul of the party.

The clever thing Night School Studios does is it plays with your own personal sense of morality and guilt – in much the same way This War of Mine does (player control) – you directly become one of Satans enablers in essence, so it becomes an element of player choice on how that really makes you feel, and how you’d personally react to the situation. There’s plenty more I could go into – but I won’t just to keep this as low on spoilers as possible, but I think the overarching narrative of Afterparty is its strongest feature.

 

The route to the platinum in Afterparty is a fairly straightforward one – you need to play through the game a minimum of two times, making different choices each time, see all the endings, as well as perform a few mini-game  related, and repetitive tasks. I think I probably struggled the most with playing a perfect round of beer pong. The aiming mechanics are fairly imprecise, so that one took quite a few attempts, other than that, everything is fairly simple.

 

My main piece of advice is to leave a bit of a gap between your first and second playthrough – I know I keep using the Oxenfree comparison, but Oxenfree remained fresh throughout all three of my playthroughs of it. Whereas on my second time through in Afterparty I was finding myself pretty disengaged from certain sections because I’d just come to accept they were going to play out exactly the same way – so I think letting a little bit of time lapse between playthroughs would really help keep the game fresh in that department.

 

If you enjoy narrative focused video games then this would absolutely be up your street. It’s also worth looking into if you’re a fan of Oxenfree – I understand that I was probably overcritical of a few areas of the game. However, I do think this is an experience worth having and an excellent story to boot – I just feel as if they didn’t quite find the right balance between telling a good story, and also making you feel like you are in control of it, it just doesn’t quite feel as interactive as Oxenfree did.

 

That might not be an issue for some people though, so it’s definitely something to be aware of – that just because I felt like that, doesn’t necessarily mean that you will. I have no idea how this plays on a PS4Pro or a PS5, but those might better choices for this game – as I had quite a few stuttering and framerate issues with this game on my regular PS4 so I don’t know if those are alleviated a bit by superior hardware, but I thought it was worth mentioning.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Thanks @YaManSmevz - for his excellent review of this game a couple of weeks back - I don't think I would have gotten around to it quicker if I hadn't have read that, so nice going with that one. I did enjoy it too - even if that review might seem slightly overcritical of certain aspects.

 

Also it's funny how @DrBloodmoney, literally posted his review batch whilst I was in the process of writing this into my own thread - so at least neither of us can be accused of plagiarising each other, as they are going to get released minutes apart .... I'm looking forward to reading your thoughts on it myself actually.

 

On 21/11/2021 at 4:08 PM, Copanele said:

I need to play Yakuza 4 first, then I'll approach this one so it will take quite a while. Heard it's the true black sheep of the franchise but I am still decided on playing it, no matter how bad it is.

 

You'll probably breeze through 4 quite easily, it's pretty simple compared to even some of the platinum's that come after it.

 

I guess it probably is the black sheep of the franchise yeah. I still really enjoyed it though for what it is. I would have thought it would have been Like a Dragon because of the switch to turn based, but that seems to have been met with pretty much unanimous love. I'm not so convinced I'll like a turn based Yakuza game, but I won't know till I try I guess.

 

On 21/11/2021 at 4:08 PM, Copanele said:

Oh god the entire Japanese section was a pain. But yeah the Hidden Valley was a pain in the ass level. And that one was supposed to be super short! This is where the old style of gaming jank comes into play.

But yes, it was equally satisfying to figure it out without help like in the old days (although you'll excuse me if I use a guide nowadays, I don't have the patience of the ancients anymore hahah)

 

I also forgot to mention, I kinda miss the old Hitman Codename 47's voice acting. Something about "Ah the Piano Wire, the choice of a real pro" was so soothing and yet menacing  

 

 

Nothing wrong with using a guide man - why sit there banging your head against a brick wall if you don't have to. I prefer not to if I'm playing a puzzle game, but that's more because looking up the solution beforehand takes away most of the fun of working it out.

 

It's been so long I can barely remember the difference between the voice acting in Codename 47.... I might have to fire up a video later and see the difference.

 

On 21/11/2021 at 11:15 PM, YaManSmevz said:

 

Excellent work as always, my dude!

 

It's funny because there's things I completely forgot about SA that subconsciously informed how I play the new Hitman games - I ALWAYS make sure to match my disguise with its weapon, never get too close to NPCs wearing the same thing as me, and never run while in disguise. When I found out those weren't really necessary, I was like "wait, where did I get that from..." but now I know!

 

I still do those things though, can't help it

 

I also forgot what a joke sneaking was! SO FREAKIN SLOW. You wouldn't be able to assassinate a sloth with movement like that! Then to have to line them up perfectly or otherwise end up garrotting thin air.. that was certainly frustrating. The issue of options with a fallen NPC is still funny for me - it may just be me but it feels like "Snap Neck" always pops up first, even before "Drag" or "Take Disguise." I wonder if that's deliberate. Like inside 47's head he's just like "YEAAHHH SNAP HIS NE- actually, his clothes could be pretty useful. And shit, let's get him out of the way before somebody finds him!"

 

Agreed on the music - St. Petersburg's theme is synonymous with the game for me. I mentioned the triumphant music in my Manhunt review and it was specifically this that I had in mind! Speaking of which -

 

Thanks man!

 

Don't worry I doubt you're the only OG Hitman player that did that - I definitely did when I started playing the recent ones - it still feels weird the fact that you can just run around like an Olympic sprinter and nobody bats an eyelid.

 

You'd have to be a real cold hearted bastard to assassinate a sloth - I don't even think 47 would go through with that one - he'd look at their perpetually smiling faces and go " you live, just this once."  Or something like that.

 

Don't - I know exactly what you mean about snap neck or take disguises - I don't know if you've done any of the Master difficulty challenges yet on Hitman 2 where you can only save once or twice, but the amount of attempts I lost to accidentally snapping a civilians neck that way had me mess up so often. Almost like when one of my friends would restart Assassin's Creed games because he felt guilty about accidentally killing a civilian haha. 

 

That St Petersburg theme is the musical theme I probably associate most with this game too  - I think they put it into the level it's in in Hitman GO as well - but I'm not too sure, it's been a while since I've actually played that.

Edited February 2, 2022 by rjkclarke

[DrBloodmoney]

Great write up as ever man - seems we fell into fairly similar camps on Afterparty, (and reading this had me cursing myself for not including a bunch of stuff in mine ?)

 

I think the biggest difference in our take-was though, was probably this:

 

14 hours ago, rjkclarke said:

Where’s the problem I hear you ask? It honestly doesn’t have much replay value – unlike Oxenfree for the most part this is very much a one and done kind of experience – and I think that was the intention all along from Night School Studios, that’s how it felt at least. It does have multiple endings, and the one you probably think is the true ending, the one you get pushed towards isn’t actually the most satisfying one. There are options on how to complete your tasks and make your way through the game – but as I alluded to earlier the dialogue practically doesn’t change regardless of what you do, so the small branching paths that are open to you end up only offering you about an hour and half of fresh gameplay on a second playthrough.

 

 

it's funny that you say you felt Afterparty felt more prescriptive than Oxenfree, because that's the area I really thought it outmatched Oxenfree ?

 

Whereas in Oxenfree, you had choice in the sense of how you dealt with characters, and who you took with you at times, I always kind of felt the shadow of the overarching narrative boxing it in a little - not in a bad way, and obviously not in the first playthrough, but in subsequent ones, I could feel the way the story was keeping me on track with the overall narrative 'set points'.

 

With Afterparty, I didn't find that as much, because there were whole scenes and sections that were different - the second playthrough never felt like a drag for me, because a good chunk of it I was doing wholly different stuff. Of course, I suspect that a third playthrough would probably suffer a bit - Afterparty being a two-hander, means there isn't a compounding relationship mix-and-match factor - you are basically choosing to favour Milo or Lola, and that's your lot though.

 

Having said that, because it's comedy, I did find a lot of value in seeing different responses, purely because if there was a good new laugh somewhere in a dialogue section, it made up for the rest being quite similar, in a way that a single changed line in a 'series' tale like Oxenfree couldn't match with just a line or two different...

 

but stellar write up, and I agree an basically everything else! ?

 

In the words of Wormhorn.... Byeeeeeeeeeee!

[rjkclarke]

11 hours ago, DrBloodmoney said:

Great write up as ever man - seems we fell into fairly similar camps on Afterparty, (and reading this had me cursing myself for not including a bunch of stuff in mine )

 

Thanks man - I did think about going back and editing parts of that review. I might still yet. I just feel like I meandered all over the shop, and kind of went back to the same point far too many times, or just didn't commit to a few things I should have done - but then again I think it represents how conflicted I was after playing it. So I might leave it as is, I just got so hung up on the obvious Oxenfree comparison - it's unavoidable right? and I very much did enjoy Afterparty, I just worry it doesn't come across like that in the review after reading it back earlier.

 

I must admit I've cheated with your latest scientific batch - I did go and read your Afterparty review already, you know that I'll read the others so, I'll get to them either later today or early tomorrow. After reading yours I felt the same way you seem to have done with mine (where I was thinking damn I should have included that too,) I think I really undersold how funny Afterparty is - so I'm really glad yours did a great job of highlighting that, whereas mine kind of skimmed over it a bit too much.

 

I'd read your scientific batch now - but I've inadvertently created a problem for myself, in that I'd forgotten    left it completely to the last minute ?, then forgot about the fact I was going to post a very specific review today, but A) I actually forgot to write it and  B ) I did mean to write one for Hitman Contracts today, so I'll have to interrupt the Hitman Time Travel shenanigans with some separate actual Time Travel related ones,so I better get to that now. C) You know - boring real world stuff that gets in the way ?.....  So once I've done that I'll be free to have a nice readathon.

 

 

11 hours ago, DrBloodmoney said:

I think the biggest difference in our take-was though, was probably this:

 

On 22/11/2021 at 6:24 PM, rjkclarke said:

Where’s the problem I hear you ask? It honestly doesn’t have much replay value – unlike Oxenfree for the most part this is very much a one and done kind of experience – and I think that was the intention all along from Night School Studios, that’s how it felt at least. It does have multiple endings, and the one you probably think is the true ending, the one you get pushed towards isn’t actually the most satisfying one. There are options on how to complete your tasks and make your way through the game – but as I alluded to earlier the dialogue practically doesn’t change regardless of what you do, so the small branching paths that are open to you end up only offering you about an hour and half of fresh gameplay on a second playthrough.

 

 

it's funny that you say you felt Afterparty felt more prescriptive than Oxenfree, because that's the area I really thought it outmatched Oxenfree 

 

Whereas in Oxenfree, you had choice in the sense of how you dealt with characters, and who you took with you at times, I always kind of felt the shadow of the overarching narrative boxing it in a little - not in a bad way, and obviously not in the first playthrough, but in subsequent ones, I could feel the way the story was keeping me on track with the overall narrative 'set points'.

 

With Afterparty, I didn't find that as much, because there were whole scenes and sections that were different - the second playthrough never felt like a drag for me, because a good chunk of it I was doing wholly different stuff. Of course, I suspect that a third playthrough would probably suffer a bit - Afterparty being a two-hander, means there isn't a compounding relationship mix-and-match factor - you are basically choosing to favour Milo or Lola, and that's your lot though.

 

Having said that, because it's comedy, I did find a lot of value in seeing different responses, purely because if there was a good new laugh somewhere in a dialogue section, it made up for the rest being quite similar, in a way that a single changed line in a 'series' tale like Oxenfree couldn't match with just a line or two different...

 

but stellar write up, and I agree an basically everything else! 

 

In the words of Wormhorn.... Byeeeeeeeeeee!

 

That's a great point you bring up.

 

I appreciate the bit of perspective you've given me  on that one, I really do. I hadn't quite though of it that way. 

 

I think it's partially a problem I created for myself too, because I spent much of my second playthrough of Afterparty feeling as if I had a massive ticking stopwatch floating above my head. in bright neon letters saying "You have x amount of time before the Snooker starts up again today, so you'd better make some progress - oh and you haven't eaten yet so you'd better do that" So in a way I do worry that I didn't quite connect with the second playthrough so much because I was constantly thinking about other things, then the audio issues started to bug me (again I fully expect that to bother me more than it would most,) but I just didn't quite get the same enjoyment from it as I did the first playthrough, because I really loved it at that point and was pretty pumped for the second one.

 

You're absolutely on the money about Oxenfree too, but for some reason that really didn't bother me with that game, I kind of just accepted it. I guess Oxenfree drew me into its world a little bit more perhaps. I really wanted to know everything that was going on. 

Whereas in Afterparty's case I found the fact you only interact on the regular with one person with only two real dialogue options (that often result in the same response too,) I found certain sections in the second playthrough a bit less impactful.

 

I did find myself wanting to go back and go through some of the dialogue choices using some of the funnier drink options though - so it isn't like I went away from it not wanting more.  Like a jacket stuck on a fence, I just got caught up in how I felt with Oxenfree, and I think I - rightly or wrongly, thought I'd come away from the experience still wanting more - instead of just being content that I'd had a good time, which I absolutely did with Afterparty, I can't stress that enough.

 

I feel like I probably - over praised the visuals in Afterparty too, they're great, but not Oxenfree (shit, I should have just renamed the review "It's Awesome but it's not Oxenfree ?)....

 

...... One bit of yours, that you went into, that I wish I'd included in mine - is the aspect of Mila and Lola's friendship, the twist that you didn't give away - you know the one I mean, no specifics here that they too might be treading a path that's unhealthy for both of them, because I thought that was one of the best written parts of the game,especially how it's gently baked into the plot - especially with how it pertains to everything else going on with Satan. I didn't even mention it - DOH...

 

Thanks for the feedback though man, I really appreciate it. Looking forward to jumping into some scientific analysis soon! That will be awesome to read I'm sure.

 

 

Edited November 23, 2021 by rjkclarke

[rjkclarke]

Happy 58th Birthday Doctor Who - Have a Classic Review

 

Platinum #24

Doctor Who: The Eternity Clock (PS3)

 

Time Lord
Collect all Trophies

 

A Few Trophy Stats

 

Platinum Earned - 15 October 2012 : 10:36:58 AM

Time Taken to Platinum :  4 days, 7 hours, 2 minutes

Platinum Rarity  - 14.11%

Trophy Number - #1,438

 

This may surprise some of you – or it may not, I’ve hardly hidden the fact I’m a huge Doctor Who fan, in fact I’ve actually mentioned it in a few checklists. So here in mine, on Doctor Who’s fifty-eighth birthday it only feels right to throw out a Doctor Who themed classic review. I can currently only do one Doctor Who review, as I’ve not played any of the other games available yet, but I will be playing the Non VR one at some point in the future I would have thought.

 

Now – I love Doctor Who, almost a silly amount. I’ve even cosplayed as at least one Doctor before (yes I was that much of a NEEEEEEERD). I have loved the show since I was about five years old. I was one of the Doctor Who fans who grew up in the wilderness years. Which is essentially the time between the show being cancelled 1989 (or rested if you’re a BBC spokesperson,) and its revival in 2005.

So my introduction to Doctor Who was in the form of VHS tapes. My Dad would often either straight up buy them, or if money was a little bit tight that month, borrowed them from the local library for me to watch. Watching Doctor Who with him was my introduction to the show – and it’s one of the most pleasant gifts he could have given me, and even to this day it sometimes feels a little wrong if we don’t watch the show together, even now at 31.

 

I don’t think I’ve ever instantly been drawn into the concept of a show like I was with Doctor Who, even since I was very young I always liked new and exciting things (some things never change huh,) but being introduced to the idea that this show could have more than one actor as the lead character almost blew my – at the time childmind.

 

It was such an exciting time back then, having a new video to try out, very often with a completely new Doctor in that I’d never seen before – new companions I hadn’t seen, monsters or villains that I’d yet to experience and almost everything about it felt fresh and exciting.

An old episode of Doctor Who is absolutely my happy place, and still is to this day. If ever I’m feeling down, or depressed or like things are getting to me a little too much – a good episode of Doctor Who is enough to make all the worries I have melt away, for at least a while anyway. For me the wondrous nature of the show –all the exciting possibilities that that brings along with it, have always, to me at least, felt like one of the truest of forms of escapism in Television form.

 

It is a truly universal show – there are elements of it that can be enjoyed whatever age you are. Even now as adult watching back older episodes, I have a deeper appreciation for some of the subtextual elements of a lot of them. I think – nowadays the show has a tendency to put the its message at the forefront instead of organically crafting a story around it. Even as far back as 1972 and 1973 the show were writing stories dealing with pertinent matters at the time. There’s several stories about climate change from that time period – that really make you think, why on earth weren’t we listening to these people – this was nearly fifty years ago now, and people are only now starting to pay attention. So even as an adult I can always appreciate that the show often has something to say – it really plays into John Reith’s original intent for the BBC. The idea was to inform, educate and entertain – Doctor Who has always done that, and still continues to do that to this day.

 

Okay, there’s my love letter to Doctor Who, or a fairly scaled down version of one I could write. Onto the actual review part – Doctor Who: The Eternity Clock.

 

Imagine my surprise when I was walking around a supermarket one day and I saw Doctor Who: The Eternity Clock on the shelf, and I thought “When did this happen,” but I can’t think of many times I’d been so eager to play something. I wasn’t expecting much, but the idea of earning a platinum from a video game based on one of my favourite television shows, was an opportunity I wasn’t willing to pass up. I didn’t look into how difficult it was, or what the platinum entailed – I just knew that I wanted it.

 

One of the strangest things to think about in hindsight – is the fact this game was developed by Supermassive Games, yes the very same company that have brought you some of the  Spooky McSpookerington tales like Until Dawn and the recent Dark Pictures anthology series of games. But in the same way Until Dawn was crafted in a very specific way to stay true to, and pay homage to a specific subgenre of film – Supermassive, did a fantastic job here of staying true to Doctor Who.

 

A happy accident was finding out the games genre – when I also found out that this was a puzzle game, I was even more excited – realistically a puzzle experience is the only thing you can do with a Doctor Who video game to be fair. But it was a pleasant surprise nonetheless, as many of you will probably know by this point; I’m very fond of puzzle games. I’ve played a few other Doctor Who games before, none of them are great – and to be perfectly honest, neither is this one, but it is better than most.

 

The gameplay itself is fairly simple – you control The Doctor or River Song depending on the level. This game takes place during the tenure of the Eleventh Doctor (Matt Smith,) but nearer to the end of River Songs timeline (Alex Kingston,) so if you specifically like that Doctor more than others (I don’t,) you’ll probably have an even more enjoyable experience with this one.

You scan various objects to progress and each level essentially consists of various forms of: puzzle solving, stealth sections, or sometimes a combination of both. All the while you’ll be fighting off a rogue’s gallery of fan favourite Doctor Who foes.  It’s functional and it works, but nothing about the gameplay itself is really that stand out or memorable.

 

Aside from the puzzles that is – these are for the most part really well done, none of these are reinventing the wheel or anything of that nature, but they’re fairly fun to solve, and there aren’t really any that have solutions so obtuse that you’d probably need to consult a guide. If you’ve played any of the Frogware Sherlock Holmes games, or even Artifex Mundi games you’ll know what to expect from some of the sliding image puzzles, and things of that nature. Along with a few that are a little reminiscent of the pipe puzzles from the first Bioshock game.  

Also the game contains a selectable puzzle difficulty and thankfully due to trophies you are forced to play on the hardest setting, which I always feel gives the best experience in a puzzle game, as I usually I find I get the most worthwhile time from them that way.

 

From a visual standpoint Doctor Who: The Eternity Clock looks good enough – it won’t blow your mind that’s for sure. It’s patently obvious that this didn’t have the highest budget, and even by 2012 standards, I remember thinking, this looks like it could safely run on a PS2.  If graphical fidelity doesn’t bother you too much, like it doesn’t with me, then that’s not a problem, but it's certainly not bright or vivacious. Elements of the scenery are nice, and in certain places look very good – the Doctor Who lore specific enemies and characters that appear, very much look like they should, so in that area it absolutely deserves some praise. Both Matt Smith and Alex Kingston lend both their likeness and their voice to the proceedings too, so that’s another nice layer of authenticity that really makes this game feel like part of the Doctor Who universe.

 

Whilst sound is limited in this game, there are very few instances of real dialogue – most of it is told in the form of narration, or the characters themselves internal monologues, but they are by the actors themselves.

These are provided by the actors though, so as I alluded to earlier, they absolutely feel like the characters should. It’s a personal pet peeve of mine when licensed video games can’t get voice actors that can do a good enough approximation of a character, so thankfully that’s not a problem here.

 

Sound design itself is actually a personal highlight – I’m sure they probably had access to some of the BBC’s sound effect library for the game, but all of the various elements you’d expect to sound a certain way: Dalek guns, the Sonic Screwdriver, The Tardis and smaller subtle things feel nice and crisp and absolutely satisfying.

Now the soundtrack itself – and this might be a contentious thing, but I’m not the biggest fan of Murray Gold’s work, as far as composition for Doctor Who goes. So your enjoyment of the soundtrack very much hinges on that. He’s a very good composer, don’t get me wrong, but I feel like his scores are often very emotionally manipulative – and as a result absolutely feel as if they’re trying to make you feel a certain way, instead of you perhaps getting to that point of emotional response yourself.

The soundtrack also loops very often, so if you aren’t fond of hearing the “I am the Doctor theme” the one closely associated with Matt Smith’s Doctor, like me, you might start to get a little bit sick of it. I think it got overused in the Television show, so to have to hear it on a loop in a video game basically turned me into Arnold Schwarzenegger circa Kindergarten Cop and just scream “ SHADDDAAAAAAP!”

 

In the pursuit of the platinum trophy in Doctor Who: The Eternity Clock, you’ll probably have to play through the game twice. Well – in truth you don’t, you can do it in one if you have  a collectibles guide open, but I chose to play it blind first, as I wanted to have the freshest experience possible. You essentially have to beat the game in less than three hundred minutes, beat it on the hardest difficulty and complete a few time trials during some of the levels, which mean getting fairly proficient at the games stealth.

 

This is one of the very best examples of collectibles in a video game I can think of – they don’t really add anything to the story, but for a Doctor Who fan, it's easy to tell they were clearly created with a lot of love, both the Diary Pages and the hats (the two collectible types,) are interesting for different reasons. The hats were clearly an inclusion by someone who both loves the show, and loves the entire history of the show too. Many of them harkens back to obscure episodes from as far back as the 60’s where the Doctor might have worn that hat once, as part of an adventure, but it’s lovely reading all of the descriptions, and hearing Matt Smith narrate them, saying things like “This reminds me of the first time I did this.”

Or various similar things, it’s especially nice when you find the Santa hat and you hear him say “And a Merry Christmas to all of you at home.” This was a nice little nod to the now lost episode The Feast of Steven from December 25 1965 – where William Hartnell (The First Doctor,) broke the fourth wall and directly addressed the audience saying those exact words. Even nine years on these are some of my most favourite collectibles I’ve ever gotten in video games.

 

Recommendation is a tough one here – I feel like to get the most out of it you probably have to be a Doctor Who fan. The game itself is a decent puzzle game sure, but outside of that it doesn’t really offer anything revelatory, or mind blowing, it’s just a fairly low-key but enjoyable affair.

However, if you’re a fan of puzzle games and you’re running a bit low on options, and wanted something different to play this could very much scratch that itch. That aspect of it is pretty strong. I’m well aware this isn’t one of the greatest games ever, but I absolutely enjoyed my relatively short time with it. I know this is another one of those reviews that delves into me a little bit more – but my love for Doctor Who was always going to have to somewhat play into this review, so I hope it isn’t too much of a pain to read.

 

Edited February 2, 2022 by rjkclarke

[The_Kopite]

On 11/19/2021 at 3:19 PM, rjkclarke said:

Let me know what you think of it if you do!

 

Always nice to hear another perspective on The Witcher as a TV series.

I will do! 

 

Sorry for the slow reply btw, been busy.

 

On 11/19/2021 at 3:19 PM, rjkclarke said:

If you like anime - and you want a little anime spin on that whole John Titor thing you might like Steins;Gate. I'm hardly the most knowledgable person about anime - in fact I'm probably the furthest thing from it, but that is a very high quality one too. It's based on some visuals novels that I'd also recommend (again I'm not the biggest visual novel person,) but those are good - so you if you liked it those might be worth your time too, and I guess there's platinum's involved also.

 

The anime itself is on Netflix (I assume it still is,) though if you ever wanted to give it a go. It's got a little bit of a slow start - but once it gets going it is paced brilliantly - I literally watched about 13 or 14 episodes in one sitting I was that enthralled, and it's an absolute emotional rollercoaster...

 

... Wait how did this descend into a love letter to Steins;Gate

I've heard a lot of good things about Steins Gate, but you're trying to add to my ridiculous backlog of games, TV and films here lol it's all good but sadly that would be right down the bottom of the pile simply because of that. No doubt it's good.

 

On 11/19/2021 at 3:19 PM, rjkclarke said:

I'd buy that..... Although Tarzan Boy would be getting all of the fatalities and Short Round would only ever get Friendships from me

 

In fact Short Rounds Friendship animation should just be **Insert Character Name** I LOOOOOOOOOOOVVVE YOU

 

That, would be DLC worth paying for!

Neverrealm could be making a fortune haha make it so!

 

On 11/19/2021 at 3:19 PM, rjkclarke said:

Those are two of the ones I haven't seen actually. I actually went to see the Lion King one with one of my friends at the cinema, and man did that leave a lot to be desired.

 

There were some very audible groans and cringes from us throughout the whole thing - it's just a bit of a mess. Timon and Pumba were actually really good in that film - Seth Rogen was really good as Pumba, but other than that, it just lacks so much - I don't know..... Ooomph? compared to the original.

 

At least Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin are halfway decent going on what you've said - so I might have to give those a look when I'm next trawling through Disney+

 

Disney just buy everything - that's their new license to print money - buy an IP they know people like, that have a rabid fanbase - do what they like with it knowing that hoards of peoples are going to go and see it regardless.

The Lion King is a film I've got to give a watch as the animated original is fantastic film, but I don't ever expect these live action remakes to match them which can help me to enjoy them more in a way.

 

Yes I would recommend both Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin if I had to recommend any of the live action remakes of theirs. 

 

That's very true about Disney. I just hope they don't ever buy any of my favourite franchises as they would probably fleece them to death.

 

On 11/19/2021 at 3:19 PM, rjkclarke said:

I'm definitely going to have to play through one of the games you've made a guide for -realistically it'd probably be Sonic or Golden Axe. Then I can be like " hey my buddy wrote the guide for this, it's awesome! You should all go check this out and use it if you ever play it."

 

Although I'll try and be more eloquent than that!

Haha thanks! I wasn't trying to tout my trophy guides to you lol Hey if you want to recommend my guides to others though, feel free! I always appreciate it but if they aren't good in parts then just let me know.

 

The Sonic Colours one is coming along at quite a pace now so hopefully I'll be submitting it for review soon enough. Really fun Sonic game. Well worth playing.

 

On 11/19/2021 at 3:19 PM, rjkclarke said:

Not the best thing in the world to have as a milestone is it? Although I've always just played things I've wanted to, so it isn't like I look at any of them and feel ashamed or anything - but I sometimes see Final Fantasy X-2 there and think " WHY DID IT HAVE TO BE YOU!" Haha..... I just looked out of curiosity on the first page of this thread to see what 174 and 176 were and they were Bully and Steins;Gate 0 respectively, which might have been better alternatives haha.

 

They can't all be winners I guess.

 

I don't blame you for not going for the platinum though - it's definitely a lot of double, triple, and then quadruple checking guides - and even after all that I still needed another playthrough for that 0.02% I missed off of the 100% - not my proudest moment

Haha well you have talked up Steins Gate already so yeah I'd imagine for you that it would have been a better milestone. Bully I've never played.

 

No way! 0.02% off the 100%! How is that even possible?! That's a story I need to hear. Honestly that's all I've read about the platinum for FFX-2, and I thought X seemed daunting but it sounds like X's was the really straightforward one in comparison (Probably why I was able to get it haha)

 

On 11/19/2021 at 3:19 PM, rjkclarke said:

Yep random and esoteric humour is kind of their thing - so Monkey Island is just more of the same - but arguably I'd say it's probably even more unusual than even Day of the Tentacles.

 

I'd definitely love it if you did end up playing a Monkey Island game - I always smile when I see or hear about someone playing it in various places on the site.

More unusual than Day of the Tentacle, I'm intrigued.

 

I've got Grim Fandango as another game on my PS4 (must have been a free PS Plus game) so might give that a go sometime, but yeah I'll certainly think about a Monkey Island game. It being an easy platinum and not too long would make me more inclined to play.

On 11/21/2021 at 10:57 AM, rjkclarke said:

I quite like that about the larger field too - plus you also get to see some old faces alongside the fresh ones - that's about the only time you get to see players like Jimmy White and Hendry these days, as they hardly get to the latter stages of tournaments these days.

One won an amazing 7 World Championships, and the other probably still doesn't know how he didn't win any!

On 11/22/2021 at 6:24 PM, rjkclarke said:

Also it's funny how @DrBloodmoney, literally posted his review batch whilst I was in the process of writing this into my own thread - so at least neither of us can be accused of plagiarising each other, as they are going to get released minutes apart .... I'm looking forward to reading your thoughts on it myself actually.

Plagiarism! Plagiarism! It's definitely plagiarism! Clearly you have plagiarised each other's work and The Plagiarism Police will be knocking on each of your doors and giving you a good talking too, using someone else's words......

[YaManSmevz]

Apologies for the reponse delay! There was a lot of conversation I missed out on, and you know how that can go - you tell yourself you'll get to it when you can give it the proper time, then next thing you know there's a gigantic pile of things you want to join in on!

 

On 11/21/2021 at 2:57 AM, rjkclarke said:

I'm pretty sure you start with just the fibre-wire in in St Petersburg - I think on top of that - you get like a boatload of 47 clones on your arse for the whole mission too, that one was definitely a toughy in Silent Assassin.

 

I always used to suck at a level called The Hidden Valley (I think that's what it was called) it's a snowy one,right before the Hashimoto targets, it's really put together, but I was just never good at the execution side of it, where in one section you have to run alongside a moving van to maintain your cover, I was never good at getting Silent Assassin rating in that one.

 

That satisfaction you get from nailing something hard by yourself in those pre internet games, seems all the more satisfying sometimes right? Back when we didn't have the internet to rely on, and we had to figure out our own methods and strategies for games, or just fail miserably at them until we were older like I often did 

 

I'm kind of glad they didn't remaster the first game too - I watched a speedrun of it a couple of years ago - and I was just like .... Are you a monster? The guy was absolutely trivialising something that I know I struggled with a whole lot, and it seems like you did too.

 

Yo that shit with the 47 clones was freaky! I'm enjoying the path that the current Hitman games are taking, feels like a more grounded version of that may be around the corner. Ahh!! Can't believe I forgot how good these games are. I wanted to make completing The Challenge for The Witness being the trophy that got me to level 310, so it could be cemented on my profile, but I got carried away and it ended up going to my Sapienza revisit in Hitman 2?

 

I totally forgot that the trip to Japan was multiple missions, I think I blocked out Hidden Valley and just remembered the first mission where you kill the son. So much fun! The following ones, eh... not so much.

 

Never played the first, and especially now hearing about how rough it could get, I'm glad! Also I'm completely with you on the days of just figuring the game out yourself - my GTA3 revisit in particular, I remember having difficulty in spots and thinking "I figured it out before YouTube even launched, how did I do that??"

 

On 11/21/2021 at 8:08 AM, Copanele said:

But yes, it was equally satisfying to figure it out without help like in the old days (although you'll excuse me if I use a guide nowadays, I don't have the patience of the ancients anymore hahah)

 

Saaaaame. I try to go blind with first runs and with some games go without altogether (The Witness being a great example), but eventually I know I'll be consulting somethin. Methinks we got spoiled!

 

On 11/22/2021 at 10:24 AM, rjkclarke said:

Don't worry I doubt you're the only OG Hitman player that did that - I definitely did when I started playing the recent ones - it still feels weird the fact that you can just run around like an Olympic sprinter and nobody bats an eyelid.

 

I kinda wish they kept that! Saying that out loud (rather typing it and posting it for all to see) makes me feel like the kid who reminds the teacher about due homework or a pop quiz, but that did wonders for the immersion! On the new games, I'd feel like an NPC's dad! "Yes, I'm in a soldier's uniform, but what's wrong here?? I'm holding a silenced pistol, and everybody else is holding an assault rifle. And why are you letting me walk so closely to you?? Be suspicious, stupid!"

 

On 11/22/2021 at 10:24 AM, rjkclarke said:

Don't - I know exactly what you mean about snap neck or take disguises - I don't know if you've done any of the Master difficulty challenges yet on Hitman 2 where you can only save once or twice, but the amount of attempts I lost to accidentally snapping a civilians neck that way had me mess up so often. Almost like when one of my friends would restart Assassin's Creed games because he felt guilty about accidentally killing a civilian haha.

 

I have, but the single save feels like a luxury to me, chiefly because after the trophy bug I encountered in the first game, I assumed that saving during missions caused it so I avoided it like the plague. Now I'm like "ooh, I DO get to save?? Hell yes!" And yeah, I too accidentally snapped far more necks than I meant to - a sentence up until today only said by people on death row!

 

On 11/22/2021 at 10:24 AM, rjkclarke said:

After The Party I found This Platinum Behind The Sofa

Platinum #338

Afterparty (PS4)

 

Awesome!! So happy to read this, but I'm the tiniest sliver of a tad bummed that Night School hasn't quite hit the same high notes with you as it has with me. I just don't ever want to recommend something that gets another person thinkin "yeeeaahhhh buuut..."

 

Definitely agreed on the choices. I liked how there were entirely different places to go, and even in each different place, there were different ways to go about things, but you could say some aggressively awful things that would garner the exact same reaction as a polite comment. I feel they progressed as far as making the subsequent playthroughs feel more necessary from Oxenfree to Afterparty, but there's undoubtedly still work to be done.

 

Didn't notice the mixing job, though. The sounds seemed fine to me, but perhaps your ear was a bit sharper with this one. Far be it from me to tell you how your experience went!

 

Loved that your favorite was the vaudevillian drink too?  My favorite was something along the lines of "I called in to my job with an eye problem - told 'em I couldn't see myself working today."

 

On 11/23/2021 at 0:49 AM, DrBloodmoney said:

In the words of Wormhorn.... Byeeeeeeeeeee!

 

Uugghhhhh how did I forget to mention Wormhorn in my review???!!!!

 

Dah dadadah dadaDAAAHHHH!

 

On 11/23/2021 at 0:05 PM, rjkclarke said:

I think it's partially a problem I created for myself too, because I spent much of my second playthrough of Afterparty feeling as if I had a massive ticking stopwatch floating above my head. in bright neon letters saying "You have x amount of time before the Snooker starts up again today, so you'd better make some progress - oh and you haven't eaten yet so you'd better do that" So in a way I do worry that I didn't quite connect with the second playthrough so much because I was constantly thinking about other things, then the audio issues started to bug me (again I fully expect that to bother me more than it would most,) but I just didn't quite get the same enjoyment from it as I did the first playthrough, because I really loved it at that point and was pretty pumped for the second one.

 

Aw man, I know that feeling all too well! Between sharing the television with Lady Smevz and having limited gaming time early in the day before it's time to run errands and go to work, I absolutely identify with this. It's an odd double edged sword because it can diminish my enjoyment of an entire game, but it can also make me all the more hungry for another. One specifically positive memory was me doing the pull-up mini-game in FF7RM - it was almost time for me to leave for work, but I wanted that freakin trophy, and I knew if I couldn't pull it off I'd leave the house in a shitty mood. Last second though, I got it - and lemmetellya, I was all smiles for the whole shift?

 

On 11/23/2021 at 0:05 PM, rjkclarke said:

You're absolutely on the money about Oxenfree too, but for some reason that really didn't bother me with that game, I kind of just accepted it. I guess Oxenfree drew me into its world a little bit more perhaps. I really wanted to know everything that was going on. 

Whereas in Afterparty's case I found the fact you only interact on the regular with one person with only two real dialogue options (that often result in the same response too,) I found certain sections in the second playthrough a bit less impactful.

 

I did find myself wanting to go back and go through some of the dialogue choices using some of the funnier drink options though - so it isn't like I went away from it not wanting more.  Like a jacket stuck on a fence, I just got caught up in how I felt with Oxenfree, and I think I - rightly or wrongly, thought I'd come away from the experience still wanting more - instead of just being content that I'd had a good time, which I absolutely did with Afterparty, I can't stress that enough.

 

I feel like I probably - over praised the visuals in Afterparty too, they're great, but not Oxenfree (shit, I should have just renamed the review "It's Awesome but it's not Oxenfree )....

 

...... One bit of yours, that you went into, that I wish I'd included in mine - is the aspect of Mila and Lola's friendship, the twist that you didn't give away - you know the one I mean, no specifics here that they too might be treading a path that's unhealthy for both of them, because I thought that was one of the best written parts of the game,especially how it's gently baked into the plot - especially with how it pertains to everything else going on with Satan. I didn't even mention it - DOH...

 

I'm in the same boat - Afterparty was always going to come in second to Oxenfree. Reminds me of when Road to Perdition came out - I remember thinking "Sam Mendes kicked off his career with American Beauty.. how the hell was he ever gonna top that??" and sure enough, while I thought Perdition was a stupendous film, it just didn't stand a chance.

 

One absolute consistency with Night School though is the character development. They are so well crafted, and watching them interact is fantastic.

 

Anyway, I've taken up enough of the thread with my blathering! Great review and great convo?

[rjkclarke]

On 24/11/2021 at 10:12 PM, The_Kopite said:

Sorry for the slow reply btw, been busy.

 

No worries man - I know how it is, I'm replying to these pretty late myself - I realised the other day that I hadn't had more than 10 hours sleep over a whole week. I'm pretty used to insomnia, but that was bad. I literally had to keep throwing water on my face to stay awake.

 

On 24/11/2021 at 10:12 PM, The_Kopite said:

I've heard a lot of good things about Steins Gate, but you're trying to add to my ridiculous backlog of games, TV and films here lol it's all good but sadly that would be right down the bottom of the pile simply because of that. No doubt it's good.

 

That's fair - but if for some reason you manage to decrease all of those things - you should definitely consider it.

 

On 24/11/2021 at 10:12 PM, The_Kopite said:

The Lion King is a film I've got to give a watch as the animated original is fantastic film, but I don't ever expect these live action remakes to match them which can help me to enjoy them more in a way.

 

Yes I would recommend both Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin if I had to recommend any of the live action remakes of theirs. 

 

That's very true about Disney. I just hope they don't ever buy any of my favourite franchises as they would probably fleece them to death.

 

 

 

I think making it photo-realistic really hurt The Lion King. There's scenes in the newer one which in the original carried loads of emotional weight and just all round oomph, but because you're essentially just looking at a realistic CGI lion - their faces aren't animated to be expressive or sad like they were in the original. So what you get instead is just cold and rigid. 

 

I didn't hate it - but it I think they could have done a better job with it - they definitely messed up Hamlet with Lions (which is what I always call Lion King ?).

 

I'll check out Aladdin and Beauty and the Beast at some point.

 

The one I'm really dreading is Hunchback of Notre Dame - it's got the potential to be the best of the live action remakes - they really ought to double down on the dark imagery, and satanic cinematography - but I'm fairly sure they won't, and it'll get watered down.

 

Plus no Tom Hulce as Quasimodo makes RJ a dull boy.

 

On 24/11/2021 at 10:12 PM, The_Kopite said:

Haha thanks! I wasn't trying to tout my trophy guides to you lol Hey if you want to recommend my guides to others though, feel free! I always appreciate it but if they aren't good in parts then just let me know.

 

The Sonic Colours one is coming along at quite a pace now so hopefully I'll be submitting it for review soon enough. Really fun Sonic game. Well worth playing.

 

I know you weren't haha - but if/when I do - I'll be sure to mention that you were the one to write it - I got the 100% in a game today, that I'm a little tempted to write a guide for myself.

 

So I might have to join you in the old writing of a guide thing.

.

Nice to see your Sonic Colours one is progressing along nicely - I guess you can't say that about too many modern Sonic games that they are worth playing haha.

 

Poor Blue Spikyman

 

On 24/11/2021 at 10:12 PM, The_Kopite said:

No way! 0.02% off the 100%! How is that even possible?! That's a story I need to hear. Honestly that's all I've read about the platinum for FFX-2, and I thought X seemed daunting but it sounds like X's was the really straightforward one in comparison (Probably why I was able to get it haha)

 

I think it was 0.02% - I came to the conclusion that the only thing it could have been was one of the Commsphere scenes - and if it wasn't that it was a scene really late into the game, where a guide I was using conflicted with another guide, saying the choice didn't matter for completion %. What a nightmare.

 

X's is definitely more straightforward - but I'd probably argue X-2's trophy list is slightly more enjoyable. I only mean the trophies too - I think Final Fantasy unfortunately suffers from having quite a few duff trophy lists amongst its best games ironically. IX's trophy list is plain arse.  The actual getting of the trophies tends not to be that fun, even if the game itself is excellent.

 

X is my favourite Final Fantasy title - but that trophy for maxing out EVERY character's sphere grid - is just offensively bad. It's so boring - and it adds at least ten hours onto your playtime.

 

On 24/11/2021 at 10:12 PM, The_Kopite said:

More unusual than Day of the Tentacle, I'm intrigued.

 

I've got Grim Fandango as another game on my PS4 (must have been a free PS Plus game) so might give that a go sometime, but yeah I'll certainly think about a Monkey Island game. It being an easy platinum and not too long would make me more inclined to play.

 

Grim Fandango is great - that's definitely one I'd recommend diving into. I think it's pretty short as well, so you could probably thrash that out in a couple of days - great story, great characters, can't go wrong really.

 

Well some of the Monkey Islands are on PSNow - I don't know if they all are, but that's probably the best way to play them, as they aren't on the PS4 - and unfortunately there's no platinum's, just the 100% lists, but if that doesn't bother you jump on in.

 

On 24/11/2021 at 10:12 PM, The_Kopite said:

One won an amazing 7 World Championships, and the other probably still doesn't know how he didn't win any!

 

Are you a stealth Snooker fan and only just revealing that? ?

 

I think the one who didn't win any didn't because of the guy who won 7 - he came so close that one time, and then he just couldn't keep his composure.

 

On 24/11/2021 at 10:12 PM, The_Kopite said:

Plagiarism! Plagiarism! It's definitely plagiarism! Clearly you have plagiarised each other's work and The Plagiarism Police will be knocking on each of your doors and giving you a good talking too, using someone else's words......

 

 

That should have been my answer for why I took ages to reply - getting questioned by the plagiarism police.

 

One day I'm sure Doc and I will have a massively different opinion about something - I mean I guess we do on Final Fantasy VII to an extent. He loves it, I love it slightly less. See worlds of difference haha!

 

On 25/11/2021 at 8:58 AM, YaManSmevz said:

Apologies for the reponse delay! There was a lot of conversation I missed out on, and you know how that can go - you tell yourself you'll get to it when you can give it the proper time, then next thing you know there's a gigantic pile of things you want to join in on!

 

No worries man, I mean it's nice that you even take the time to do it, so I appreciate it.

 

Yep - I'm sitting in that boat right this very minute hoping that it will take me to where I need to go,so perhaps it will. I need it to take me somewhere where I can replenish my mental strength. I need to loads to write the review that I'm posting on the 28th. It's really important (to me anyway,) so I feel like I need to do it justice. A good portion of it is not game related either. So I'll just field the  "how is this dead person related to Tales of Zestiria?" well read on and find out ?.... People here are too nice to say that anyway. 

 

On 25/11/2021 at 8:58 AM, YaManSmevz said:

Yo that shit with the 47 clones was freaky! I'm enjoying the path that the current Hitman games are taking, feels like a more grounded version of that may be around the corner. Ahh!! Can't believe I forgot how good these games are. I wanted to make completing The Challenge for The Witness being the trophy that got me to level 310, so it could be cemented on my profile, but I got carried away and it ended up going to my Sapienza revisit in Hitman 2

 

 

I mean you've still got an awesome game marked on your profile now for that 309-310 transition anyway - so it isn't all bad.

 

No doubt we'll have another  awesome review of The Witness to read once you've gotten it written too - so all in all I'd say everybody wins. 

 

On 25/11/2021 at 8:58 AM, YaManSmevz said:

Hidden Valley and just remembered the first mission where you kill the son. So much fun! The following ones, eh... not so much.

 

Never played the first, and especially now hearing about how rough it could get, I'm glad! Also I'm completely with you on the days of just figuring the game out yourself - my GTA3 revisit in particular, I remember having difficulty in spots and thinking "I figured it out before YouTube even launched, how did I do that??"

 

Hidden Valley can get in the sea.....

 

..... So can some of the more obtuse missions in GTA III - I remember thinking some pretty similar things when I was going for the platinum. That game is sort of one of the first of its kind though I guess. So I can understand why it doesn't exactly do a good job of making things clear.

 

Oh and the map obviously - I think I've told you this before, but when I went back to play it for trophies, I could have sworn blind that the game had a map in the pause menu, but nope.

 

On 25/11/2021 at 8:58 AM, YaManSmevz said:

I kinda wish they kept that! Saying that out loud (rather typing it and posting it for all to see) makes me feel like the kid who reminds the teacher about due homework or a pop quiz, but that did wonders for the immersion! On the new games, I'd feel like an NPC's dad! "Yes, I'm in a soldier's uniform, but what's wrong here?? I'm holding a silenced pistol, and everybody else is holding an assault rifle. And why are you letting me walk so closely to you?? Be suspicious, stupid!"

 

Haha! Great point man ?

 

I do think the original way makes a lot more sense as far as immersion goes, I agree. It certainly keeps you on your toes, instead of just looking out for any people wearing the same clothes as you, but having a big white circle around their heads.

 

On 25/11/2021 at 8:58 AM, YaManSmevz said:

I have, but the single save feels like a luxury to me, chiefly because after the trophy bug I encountered in the first game, I assumed that saving during missions caused it so I avoided it like the plague. Now I'm like "ooh, I DO get to save?? Hell yes!" And yeah, I too accidentally snapped far more necks than I meant to - a sentence up until today only said by people on death row!

 

What I wouldn't give for a save system in the Sniper Maps in Hitman 2 - those are so well designed - and the A.I scipting as I've mentioned before is incredibly detailed and quite well programmed, but waiting around for some of the specific events to happen for the challenges, can be a bit of a nightmare at times.

 

Nah use and abuse that one save you get man - you'll  probably need to for some of the later levels that contain multiple targets.

 

 

On 25/11/2021 at 8:58 AM, YaManSmevz said:

Awesome!! So happy to read this, but I'm the tiniest sliver of a tad bummed that Night School hasn't quite hit the same high notes with you as it has with me. I just don't ever want to recommend something that gets another person thinkin "yeeeaahhhh buuut..."

 

Don't be bummed out - Did you think I didn't like them from the reviews? I really hope not, I loved Oxenfree, like really loved it - and I really liked Afterparty too, just not quite as much. I'm not even 100% sure why either. I might been a little overcritical in places I suppose as well. If I did x out of 10 ratings, I don't think there'd be too much between them.

 

I'm really glad you recommended them - and Night School themselves are great, I'll pretty much play almost anything they put out, just based off of what I've seen from Oxenfree and Afterparty going forward. 

 

On 25/11/2021 at 8:58 AM, YaManSmevz said:

Definitely agreed on the choices. I liked how there were entirely different places to go, and even in each different place, there were different ways to go about things, but you could say some aggressively awful things that would garner the exact same reaction as a polite comment. I feel they progressed as far as making the subsequent playthroughs feel more necessary from Oxenfree to Afterparty, but there's undoubtedly still work to be done.

 

That was honestly probably the thing that frustrated me the most (not a huge frustration, but it was there) - and I hate to do the Oxenfree comparison again, but in that game whatever you said (or didn't say,) would illicit a different reaction - whereas in Afterparty it didn't seem to matter, the characters would react the same anyway - and that made me feel really aware I just wasn't that in control.

 

Hopefully they manage to balance the necessity for repeat play, and multiple responses  for Oxenfree 2, it'd be hard to throw any criticism their way if they managed that one. As I said I might have been being overcritical on this one.

 

On 25/11/2021 at 8:58 AM, YaManSmevz said:

Didn't notice the mixing job, though. The sounds seemed fine to me, but perhaps your ear was a bit sharper with this one. Far be it from me to tell you how your experience went!

 

Loved that your favorite was the vaudevillian drink too  My favorite was something along the lines of "I called in to my job with an eye problem - told 'em I couldn't see myself working today."

 

The sound mix is fine most of the time - it's whenever you're on the taxiboat thing with Sam and the dialogue often gets drowned out a bit by the background audio, and the noise of the taxiboat - so it's tough to make out exactly what was being said. It's not difficult to isolate audio and bring one or more parts of it down, so the dialogue (the important thing in this games case,) could be better heard.

 

So I think I just got a little irked by that, its a small thing, and it isn't present throughout the whole game - but I can't say it didn't bother me a little bit. Especially as I really liked all the stuff with Sam, so I wanted to hear as much of it as possible.

 

You know - I definitely wouldn't have minded a trophy where you had to do a whole playthrough where every time you are in a place where drinks are available you can only use the drink answers for a whole playthrough - that could have been interesting, because so many of those were absolutely hilarious.

 

On 25/11/2021 at 8:58 AM, YaManSmevz said:

Uugghhhhh how did I forget to mention Wormhorn in my review???!!!!

 

Dah dadadah dadaDAAAHHHH!

 

Well I didn't either....... I forgot as well, and I remembered afterwards......

 

....... At least Doc did though, so one out of three of us managed to remember, I don't know why either, because some of her stuff really cracked me up - especially the bit where she's doing Milo's parents voices and she does a little aside and goes something like " Oh great, awesome, I had another voice I was trying, but it was SUUUUUUPER racist, so I had to stop."

 

On 25/11/2021 at 8:58 AM, YaManSmevz said:

Aw man, I know that feeling all too well! Between sharing the television with Lady Smevz and having limited gaming time early in the day before it's time to run errands and go to work, I absolutely identify with this. It's an odd double edged sword because it can diminish my enjoyment of an entire game, but it can also make me all the more hungry for another. One specifically positive memory was me doing the pull-up mini-game in FF7RM - it was almost time for me to leave for work, but I wanted that freakin trophy, and I knew if I couldn't pull it off I'd leave the house in a shitty mood. Last second though, I got it - and lemmetellya, I was all smiles for the whole shift

 

 

Well that memory proves that in a way it definitely has its upsides then that's for sure..... I bet even the most obnoxious drunk people turning up to your shift wouldn't have bothered you that day.

 

True though isn't it - double edged sword is absolutely the best description of that.

 

I am worried that I definitely sullied my time with Afterparty's second playthrough because I didn't quite give it the concentration that it deserved, or if I did, I was constantly thinking of other things.

 

 

On 25/11/2021 at 8:58 AM, YaManSmevz said:

I'm in the same boat - Afterparty was always going to come in second to Oxenfree. Reminds me of when Road to Perdition came out - I remember thinking "Sam Mendes kicked off his career with American Beauty.. how the hell was he ever gonna top that??" and sure enough, while I thought Perdition was a stupendous film, it just didn't stand a chance.

 

One absolute consistency with Night School though is the character development. They are so well crafted, and watching them interact is fantastic.

 

Anyway, I've taken up enough of the thread with my blathering! Great review and great convo

 

 

Again - that's a pretty perfect comparison point - that's absolutely it for me too, I can't stress enough that I really did like..... I respect Night School a whole lot for not just diving straight into an Oxenfree sequel - I like that they did Afterparty, and I expect I'll almost certainly play it again in the future.

 

That's so true about their ability to do character development - a small part of me thinks they should just not do games at all - and just make audio dramas, because they have got a really rare gift for being able to write almost seamless dialogue, that just feels natural. But then we also wouldn't get games from them, which would be equally sad - because Oxenfree and Afterparty look amazing too. Dilemmas........ Dilemmas..... Haha

 

Blather my friend - it's usually me doing that anyway ?....

 

 

.... Which reminds me, I've got a new completion I need to go write about quickly - this might be end up being the shortest review I've written in literally months, that I'm going to post up soon.

Edited November 27, 2021 by rjkclarke

[rjkclarke]

Bobert's Billiard Bonanza - A New 100%

Disclaimer: Bonanza not guaranteed - Only Billiards.

Brunswick Pro Billiards (PS4)

 

A Few Trophy Stats

 

100% Achieved - 26 November 2021: 9:59:26 PM

Time taken to 100%: - 9 hours, 2 minutes, 37 seconds

100% Rarity - 2.7%

#4 Person to Achieve 100%

#1 Fastest 100% Achiever (At time of writing)

 

 

Before anyone asks - no, my name isn't Bobert, (I'm sure some unfortunate fellow is though, so let's send some positivity that poor souls way,) I did get called that a fair amount by one of my friends though. However,  If I was going to start a checklist purely dedicated to just Pool/Snooker/Billiards games, then that is probably what I'd name it though.

 

So I'm going to assume at least a few people are familiar with Kenan and Kel - well every time I read about a new Pool or Snooker game coming out, I turn into Kel when he spies some Orange Soda...... I'd be right there proclaiming " I LOVE SNOOKER AND POOL, I DO, I DO, I DO-OOOOOOOO"

 

I said this one would be short right? Well it will be - no reams and reams of writing to sift through here. No minutiae about the specific story elements to unpack, unravel and ponder on,no detailed analysis of sound design, visuals and art design. That's all perfectly good in this game.

 

I'm not even writing this in a separate word document like I usually do, this is straight from my head,and straight onto the forum, just like I used to do. 

What there is worth discussing I will. I very much enjoyed my time with this, but that time was short - yet very satisfying and it scratched the itch that I had of playing another Pool game, so with that in mind it absolutely did its job.

 

The real question that has to be asked, and really the most important of all with a game like this, is it a functional and decent Pool experience? Let us find out.

 

I'd had my eye on this game for quite a while, but for some reason, I'd just neglected to pick it up so far. Until today when I was scrolling through the recent Indie Sale on the PSN store. I saw this and thought to myself " I don't have that yet, and £4 isn't exactly going to break the bank." So into my cart it went. Then, about fifteen minutes later it was downloaded and ready to play.

 

Even the name alone, Brunswick Pro Billiards - I think there's something to be said about the name value involved here - Brunswick as table makers to me at least carry a little bit of weight - so I assumed from that alone that the game would at least be half decent. After all, most people associated with high quality aren't that likely to want to associate themselves with a bad game - I said that, and then I instantly remembered that Tony Hawks Pro Skater 5 existed. Still with that in mind, if the people that create absolutely gorgeous tables like this one (seriously look at that lovely ornate wooden patterning).......

 

 

 

.......are happy enough to put their name on it, I felt fairly confident that it would be at least decent. That table is seriously gorgeous, if I could spend $16,000 on just a Pool table and had a suitable space for it, I'd love one like that. 

 

To answer my question from earlier - it is decent, and it is a perfectly functioning Pool game. Sounds simple enough right? Okay, so I'm going to have to level with you here, this game is actually very good for what it is, not just decent - the problem is, I think it is built primarily with Multiplayer in mind. So whilst I did dabble with the multiplayer a little bit - I played a few games of 9 Ball online, which were pleasant enough,and I've kept the game installed, so I'll probably fire it up again at some point and play it some more.

 

The only real downside that I can think of, is that It has barely any single player components at all, which is a shame. In no small part to the fact that this games ball physics and general feel, could have been brilliant if paired off with a fully integrated career mode with licensed players. 

It almost has the right scope for that too - because, the game has cues with various levels of stats on them, so if there's an ability to integrate cues in that way, you could absolutely do that with players too. I did hear the sequel to Pure Pool was possibly planning to use licensed players, so if that game happens, fingers crossed on that one.

 

One day I'd love to be able to just play a Pool game where you can play as your favourite Pool players. So hopefully that happens, and one day I'll be able to take to the table as one of my favourite players of all time.

 

"The Black Widow" Jeanette Lee

 

 

 

Even though you can't do that in Brunswick Pro Billiards - what you absolutely can do, is feel like you're playing Pool, or at least a realistic virtual version of it. The balls are heavy - I mean they should be, American Pool balls are heavy, if you've ever played on an American Pool table yourself, you'd likely be aware of how hard you actually need to hit the balls to generate a lot of pace and move the cue ball around the table effectively - and that absolutely feels like the case here, I did encounter one or two bugs where the cue ball and the object ball collided with one of the rails in a pretty odd way and the white ball went careering after the object ball like a runaway train, but aside from that it was an overall positive experience. 

 

There are only really two single player modes to speak of - Practice matches against an A.I Opponent and Challenge Mode (where you'll spend the bulk of your time). Challenge mode consists of Time Attacks, 9 Ball Solitaire (Pot 1-9 in order) and Call your Shot (where you have  random pockets that are highlighted to make your shots into).  The A.I is actually quite realistic (I believe it has an adjustable setting too,) unlike Pure Pool, where the opponent A.I really detracts from the overall experience, here it feels pretty natural, and plays shots that a human would play. An aspect that I really enjoyed was the feeling of progression - and how every new increase in cue quality (so stat increases too,) absolutely feel earned, and the better you get, the quicker you become able to buy the better cues too. These can generate tremendous amounts of power and spin compared to some others.

 

It's hard to have much of an idea of how difficult the trophies in this game are. The 100% consists of winning one online match, a practice match, Potting the 9 off the break (seriously why does every Pool game or Pool in a game have this as a trophy,) Run out a whole rack of 8- Ball (pot all your balls in a row from the break) and buy every cue, table cloth, and ball set. Along the way you'll also  unlock all of the tables to play on.

I finished this in a day over two separate sittings, but some of the challenge mode types can be a bit tough and I think it does a require a little bit of working knowledge of how positional play works in Pool to make some of them easier, but I don't feel like most people would struggle too much. My advice is to find a challenge mode type you enjoy and are good at, and stick to that one, buy cues when you can afford them, because the extra stats will really help too.

 

If you like Pool or Snooker games then I think it's pretty much a given that you'd like this one - whilst I really enjoyed my time with it - I couldn't help but come away wanting more, and I think my overriding feeling right now, is how good this could be if they'd just made a few adjustments, or balanced the single player and multiplayer elements a bit better. Maybe with Brunswick Pro Billiards 2 if it happens eh?

 

Okay - so that went longer than I expected it to, although the first third of that review was definitely me just trying to have some fun - but, what can I say Brunswick Pro Billiards was enjoyable, and it turned out I had more to say than I thought.

 

I'll be interested to see how long I can hold onto the top spot on the Fastest Achievers list - that certainly wasn't something I was really aiming for going into it.

 

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Aside from the fact I watch Snooker practically whenever I can - I think it was @det_gittes, using the Cue Signal (Cueman would be an effing terrible superhero I'm saying it now, blows chalk and turns you into green baize, by force ?) to summon me to @DrBloodmoney's recent Status Update that got me wanting to actually play a Pool game. So thanks for that I guess? I suppose on my Encyclopedia Snookeria, great name Doc ? - this game might also make it onto a list of good Snooker/Pool games, so long as you went in not expecting too much.

 

This one's been fun, kind of needed a pick-me-up like this.

 

Bobert out

 

 

Edited December 8, 2021 by rjkclarke

[rjkclarke]

A Tribute & A Tales of Zestiria Classic Review

(These Are Both Linked)

 

 

 

Goran Stefanovski

27 April 1952 - 27 November 2018

 

 

 

I’ll  leave a link to this lovely man's Wikipedia page where I’ve listed his name (just click the link there,)if any of you wanted to find out more about him – it is actually quite detailed as far as Wikipedia articles go. So I’m glad someone went to the trouble of telling his story on there.

 

I’m not quite sure how to start this one – this is very much me shooting from the hip and writing from the heart. So if the structure for this is ever so slightly off, then I apologise for that.

 

This is going to be tough – but three years to the day since he died, I feel like I ought to let you all know how much this wonderful person meant to me. It might seem strange to do this alongside a classic review, but the two things are so intrinsically related that I can’t avoid linking them.

 

Over the last two months you’ve probably noticed that when I can I’ve only been playing games with pink or orange in the thumbnail, to keep in line with the wonderful Trophies to Fight Cancer Event. I have more than one reason for pushing myself pretty hard with that, one of them I’m really not comfortable going into, not right now at least. Goran’s passing is one of the big motivators for me with that event. I think about him so often, and it’s so cruel that cancer took this brilliant intelligent person away from the world – and I think plenty of other people he taught probably feel that way too. I was genuinely upset for days when I found out he’d died, he taught me for three years, so his family must have been absolutely devastated, a family that he dearly loved and never missed a chance to mention.

 

If you’ve ever wondered when I’ve posted in other peoples threads about “One of the wisest men I’ve ever known, always told me........” Goran was that wise man. The wise man that mainly spoke in vague metaphors and analogies, but hidden amongst them were some of the wisest and most prophetic words you could imagine.  James Thurber was the one who said “Don’t get it right, get it written.”  But I much prefer Goran’s unique take on it, with his Macedonian accent and his declaration of “don’t get it right mate, just get it bloody wrote.”

 

I don’t think I’ve ever gone into too much detail about the fact I studied Film, Radio and Television production at University (that’s where I learned how to become a “mole person” as Drbloodmoney accurately refers to sound people) – I’m not going to bore you with all of that either, but during that process I also studied screenwriting at great length.

Goran was the person who taught me practically everything I know about screenwriting – he was wise, funny, engaging and most importantly he was so passionate about his craft. If all goes to plan, eventually I’m hoping to become a film lecturer myself at some point down the line.

I know there’s the saying “Those that can’t do teach,” but that’s a load of rubbish, plenty of the lecturers who taught me were making films and writing books alongside their job, so I don’t see why I couldn’t theoretically do the same.

 

There’s a specific scene from the recent Tolkien biopic (which is excellent by the way, and anyone who’s interested in writing or literature should seek it out,) it’s a very small understated scene, but nowadays I can’t watch it without it making me immeasurably sad about Goran, yet still brings a smile to me at the same time. The scene involves Tolkien and his philology professor Joseph Wright played excellently by Derek Jacobi. Where they talk about the nature of writing, and how many stories are just slightly different variations of some of the same core principals. To which Tolkien basically says “isn’t that stealing?” to which Wright responds “Oh no no, dear boy, not steal, never steal, borrowing or repurposing, that’s all it is.”

 

Goran practically said the same thing to us, I have such a vivid memory of him saying this to us with a wry smile on his face and that hearty laugh that he had.  “HA - if you’re struggling for an idea, just borrow one from a film you like, you’re all so bloody creative none of you would do it the same anyway, Star Wars, Harry Potter, all the same thing, there is no difference between Luke Skywalker and Harry Potter other than one is a wizard in a cupboard and the other lives in a desert” – or at least words to that effect.

Remembering that I’m now sad again – sad that I’ll never be able to hear words of wisdom quite like that again or never be able to hear the story of how some moments in film made his love for the medium blossom. I can remember it though, so there’s at least that – to hear the passionate way he spoke about how his mind was blown when he first saw The Wizard of Oz as a child, and how that transition from Sepia to Technicolor was cinematic magic in one of its purest forms was always a treat. You can’t teach passion like that – you either feel it or you don’t, and he seemed to love every part of imparting his knowledge with all of us.  

 

Still, whatever comparatively short time I did spend with him, I learnt so much. I know for sure I’m not the only one he taught that thinks about him often; I think he was just one of those people.  There are plenty of positives to take away from that. I will be forever grateful for that too. It truly feels like an honour to have known him.

 

He absolutely was the Yoda to my Luke Skywalker – he always used to call me Doctor Rob – not because I liked Doctor Who or anything like that, but because I used to very much want to be a professional Script Editor (A Script Doctor) so as he was a Beatles fan, and there being a song called Doctor Robert – and my name being Robert (although I prefer Rob) so Doctor Rob was always his name for me.

 

If any of you have seen Dead Poets Society (if not, why not?) then you know the O Captain, My Captain scene – I would unwaveringly be the first person to stand on a desk for Goran and proclaim O Captain, My Captain.

 

Cancer is evil – I might miss him a lot – but I’ll make sure that I never forget him, I certainly don’t think I’d have a fraction of the passion that I have for writing if it wasn’t for him. I don’t mean review writing either, I mean all the other bits of writing I do when I’m not incessantly talking about games in here. I hope before he died he got to see his feature film that he wrote a script for, because he hadn’t when I’d last seen him.

 

You might be gone – but you won’t be forgotten, not by me, or probably anyone else was lucky enough to have had you as a teacher or a mentor figure, a friend, a father, a brother or a husband.

 

Rest in peace you absolute hero.

 

 

 Classic Review

 

Platinum #235

Tales of Zestiria (PS4)

 

Master of Zestiria
This is proof that you've obtained all trophies. We're thrilled you like the game so much, and we hope to meet you again in future titles!

 

A Few Trophy Stats

 

Platinum Earned - 24 October 2019 : 4:49:53PM

100% Achieved - 25 October 2019 : 12:56:49 PM

Time taken to Platinum - 1 month, 2 weeks, 4 days

Time Taken to 100% - 1 month, 2 weeks, 5 days

Platinum Rarity   - 3.66%

100% Rarity -  2.28%

Trophy Number - #11,810

 

 

 

Now then – time to talk about a game, with Tales of Zestiria. At this point it’s probably becoming pretty clear how fond of JRPG’s I am. There are bigger fans obviously – but I can’t deny how fond of them I am, and I wouldn’t try to either.  Most of you know what to expect from a JRPG so I don’t really feel the need to go into too much detail on certain elements of the game, boss fights, treasure chests, those kinds of things are a given, so I’ll not explore those.

 

I’m not going to lie; it feels a little weird the fact that it’s Tales of Zestiria that I’m covering first in this thread. The Tales of’ series as most of you are probably aware is one that I absolutely love. So I did expect I would have at least covered Tales of Symphonia by now, but there’s plenty of time to get to that one in the future.

 

Hopefully you all aren’t too bummed out after reading through that little tribute piece I wrote about Goran – but my thoughts on this game and him are directly related. I found out that he’d died whilst I was in the midst of playing this game, so I can’t think of Tales of Zestiria without directly thinking about him.

 

There I was in the middle of October doing a bit of house sitting for my Mum – with only her lovely ginger Cat for company – so I thought I’d just dive head first into Tales of Zestiria, which I believe I was on my second playthrough of when I went there. For some reason I thought of Goran and went to find out if he was still teaching (I assumed he would be, but he’d reached retirement age) only to find out that he’d died. Worst of all, quite a few of my friends from University didn’t say anything at the time, because they thought that I already knew, and was just avoiding talking about it. So I didn’t actually find out he had died for almost a full year after the fact.

 

For that whole week Tales of Zestiria basically became my crutch and my welcome distraction – whether that was a healthy way of dealing with it or not, that was what I did. I didn’t sleep much, and I just played this, just so I didn’t have to think about anything else – I don’t think this game deserves half of the bad reputation that it seems to have.I’d never argue that this is one of the best entries in the Tales of’ series, but I would argue that it’s far better than people give it credit for.

 

I’m sitting here with a nice cup of green tea as I write this – I drink green tea a lot, but it’s something I specifically associate with the Tales of ‘series, as I’ve probably consumed my own body weight several times in green tea over the years whilst I’ve played the games – I’ve always found it really helpful for destressing if certain sections got particularly frustrating. So if I mention green tea in any future Tales of’ reviews like I inevitably will, you’ll at least know why.

 

Tales of Zestiria released all the way back in 2015 – and was actually envisioned as the twentieth anniversary title for the series. Something that usually comes alongside anniversary titles in this series – is a strong tendency to rely on story or character tropes pulled from the series rich history. That is the case here, but I wouldn’t exactly say there are a plethora of tropes they are mining from this time around. Zestiria is essentially its own beast for all intents and purposes. Unlike other titles in the series – this one actually only contains three playable human characters, Sorey, Rose and Alisha – the other party members are comprised of spirits – or seraphim as the game terms them, which adds another level of depth to the gameplay itself, but we’ll get to that shortly.

 

It’d be a little remiss of me not to mention the fact that Zestiria is actually a sequel story to Tales of Berseria – or I guess also, Berseria is a prequel to this. It’s sort of up to the individuals, which order they experience those events. Me personally? I played Zestiria first and then Berseria later, there’s certain plot elements of Berseria that I think have a little bit more emotional weight to them if you played Zestiria first – there’s a knowing bittersweet sadness that permeates through Tales of Berseria as a result of the knowledge gained from playing this one. Something that I personally think really fits in thematically with the story that game is trying to tell.

 

I feel like the fact that Tales of Zestiria released on the PS3 and the PS4 really stifled the potential this game might have had on a visual level – that’s not to say this looks visually poor, because it doesn’t. It’s just fairly unremarkable. It’s weird to think that the first Tales of’ game to be developed for the PS4 first also ended up releasing simultaneously on the PS5 at the same time, so if the next game is developed on older hardware then they have also fallen into the same trap a second time.   

The character designs are excellent though – this is probably where the games visual element is at its strongest. All of the characters look decidedly unique,  which in a game as long as this one is always a positive, as similar looking, or just plain jarring looking characters can really detract from the experience at times. Star Ocean: The Last Hope was a pretty big culprit in that regard. So in Zestiria’s case, I’m glad even the smaller scale characters have distinct appearances.

 

Audio is also pretty strong across the board – for the most part it contains some strong voice performances, Sorey is played by Robbie Daymond, the actor that played Prompto in Final Fantasy XV so if you’ve played that game, then you’ll recognise him. I think he’s far better as Sorey personally – I thought Prompto was – well, to borrow a phrase from the lovely folk of Scotland, I found Prompto to be a bit of a daftie. Sorey on the other hand was a very intriguing character. Some performances weren’t quite as stellar. Alisha does at times sound like she’d be pretty at home in a really awful English anime dub (you know the kind I mean,) so that’s an element that you’ll either be a fan of, or you won’t.

 

As with almost every entry in the Tales of’ series the musical score throughout the entire thing ranges from being triumphantly frenetic, to calmer and understated in places, it strikes a pretty good balance between those two things, in all honesty. There’s one very strange piece of music in particular that you hear very often in one of the huge desert areas later on. Now – feel free to think that I probably ought to be in a padded cell for thinking this, but there’s a specific track that I believe used a trumpet. But it doesn’t sound like a trumpet – it sounds like what I imagine an Elephant would sound like if stepped on a huge pile of LEGO blocks – everything is peaceful and relaxing, and then it ends on that – the only other noise I can compare it to is a really loud rapidly deflating balloon. If I can find it, I’ll link it in the review somewhere.

 

Zestiria itself was the source of a little controversy at the time – it’s one that one of my best friends and I have discussed at length very often, and that was Alisha. So I’ll address the elephant (and not the one that stood on LEGO either,) in the room now – Alisha was a source of controversy for most, as they felt mis-sold on Alisha as a concept, they felt like she was pushed as the heroine in the promotional material, but actually plays a fairly small role in the game overall – a very mild spoiler but she leaves the party and is replaced by Rose about a third of the way through the game, to later be expanded upon in her own DLC.

 

What tends to happen is people seem to get caught up in a battle of preference over who they prefer in Rose or Alisha – personally, and to use a Goran saying “for my money” I think all of this is pretty pointless, if Alisha’s DLC didn’t exist, then I’d argue that she’s little more than a shallow plot point to move the story forward – but as the DLC was allegedly always planned and in place, I think her fairly fleeting involvement is fine under those circumstances.

 

For what it’s worth – I do have a preference – I personally prefer Rose as a character, she’s far more compelling, she’s stronger natured, and for as much Alisha does have some strong points – she drifts a little too far into – and this is going to sound terribly harsh, a generic stock insipid anime girl. There are worlds of difference between the two, but I think that’s one of the stronger points to this games narrative – that huge disparity and difference between them means that Sorey’s naiveté contrasts very interestingly with either character.

 

Strong characters have very often been one of the things that make or break a great Tales of’ game for me – full disclosure, there aren’t actually any games that I’ve played in the series that I don’t like to some degree. I suspect that would be different if I played through some of the Vita titles, which apparently have some of the worst that have ever  appeared in the series, so that does make me almost a little glad that I’ve managed to avoid those ones.

 

Honestly – Zestiria, is a little bit of a mixed bag as far as strong characters go – I think there’s some absolutely fascinating characters in there – Sorey and Rose are very interesting and they’re a little more nuanced than I think a lot of people give either of them credit for – characters who are steadfast in their convictions are a pretty common occurrence in the Tales of’ series, but these characters take that to a new level of dedication.

I think the weakest of the cast are definitely in the form of the seraphim characters – who outside of Edna and Zaveid, feel a little bit too cookie cutter.

I personally found Dezel pretty insufferable, even after learning his back-story; he feels so out of place in a game released in 2015. He feels like he could have just stepped straight out of a portal for a meeting of international gaming arse-hole edgelords where he’d been out for drinks with pre God of War (2018) Kratos, Warrior Withins Prince of Persia and  Jak II’s Jak. He just feels so woefully out of place.

 

I don’t feel the need to go into too much detail on this one with the characters – anyone that plays the game would almost certainly have a wholly different response to them than I did, although as always I’m excited to hear others opinions on them. Except Edna – she might have the name of a ninety-seven year old lady you’d imagine to have blue hands and thick socks – but if you don’t like Edna – that’s a you problem. She is so hilarious, the voice actress just makes her effortless disinterest sound so funny – and it’s so fitting too for an easily bored spirit that’s lived for thousands of years.

 

Overall I’d say the cast of characters are probably some of the weaker across the series as a whole. But the franchise has so many strong ones that, that isn’t too much of a criticism really, just an endorsement of the quality on show in other titles. The villains are very interesting though, and Heldalf (the main villain) himself is fascinating once you understand his whole story.

 

So on that note, I’ll dive into some of the gameplay features that I think really set this apart from other titles across the franchise.  

 

I believe when I reviewed Final Fantasy VIII all the way back during the summer – I likened that titles place amongst Final Fantasy games to Tales of Zestiria’s place in its own series. What I meant by that, is that both of them are – for all intents and purposes doing fairly atypical things compared with the other entries in their respective franchises.

There are more similarities than just on a surface level though – both do fundamentally different things with their battle, crafting and progression system. These are things that were received in a pretty mixed manner in both series. Whilst I’m very much in the mindset of someone who enjoyed those changes to Final Fantasy VIII – in fact until I played Final Fantasy IX it was my second favourite, now it looks despondent on a pedestal clutching the bronze medal thinking, “I used to be so much more.”  In the same vein – I eventually grew to love the changed and new implementations that Zestiria brought in.

 

As the series is usually fairly synonymous with frenetic gameplay – that is one of the things that I expected going into this one – at first it actually seems fairly rigid. That is – until you unlock armitisation, which is introduced to you fairly early into the game. This essentially allows you to merge with the seraphim and attack as one. Personally I think you look a bit goofy in the armatised form, it was all a bit too “anime power levels” for me. I expect that’d be a positive thing for plenty of people though to be fair, just not me.

 

It really boils down to this – merge with Lailah you end up wielding an enormous sword, Mikleo you end up using a magic infused bow that shoots the water element, Edna ends up with what look like giant Golem fists, and Dezel I’m not even sure to be honest – he’s either unarmed, or you just fire wind projectiles, I used this one a lot too, it just moves so fast it’s hard to tell exactly what you’re wielding. This does change up the gameplay somewhat – but I did find as armatisation was always the most powerful option, that was usually what I’d use instead of using more traditional combat – so in giving you this awesome new thing, the game I think inadvertently funnels you into only using that new thing and not a whole lot else.

 

Much like Final Fantasy VIII does – Tales of Zestiria essentially discourages the player from power-levelling, which is a pretty alien concept for a JRPG. Ironically it’s one of the areas where the game shines the most I think – its equipment system.

 

This is outrageously deep – I was not expecting it to be that way at all, but it was. So to try and simplify this – I do still want working thumbs by the end of this review. There’s essentially a collectible in the game called Normins (I keep calling my cousin Norman, Normin and everyone finds it confusing,) these are little spirits that are given a specific name, which denotes a specific type of equipment bonus, think anti petrify or anti bird attacks, that kind of thing. Essentially if you decide to assign that Normin to a particular area, the equipment that drops in that area will usually contain one or more of that element that applies to the specific Normin.

Where it starts to really show its depth, is in the fact that each piece of equipment can be melded with another – which means you can either create new types of Normin powers for your gear by combining them, or you can stack pieces of one specific type multiple times to try and maximise your resistances or damage output. To put this into some perspective, I basically used standard starting gear with powered up items from the lindwer (gives attack buff and defence boost to dragon enemies,)  Normin  to beat the final boss on chaos difficulty (which is no joke, he’ll kill you in one or two hits if you don’t play smart). You can make yourself that overpowered – it’s one of the few times I can think of in a JRPG where you aren’t just aimlessly farming for experience, this game gives you a real purpose and a reason to do something specific, like situational building of equipment.

 

Alongside the equipment comes a really cool feature, that I was personally very fond of, and this was in the form of optional boss fights – these essentially unlock very specific stat boosts and health increases as a reward for getting them – once you start getting lots of them, they really begin to be noticeable too, so they are well worth going out of your way for. Some of them have got really fascinating lore attached to them too, so you’ll end up discovering a lot about the world as a result. For me that is always a plus, I’m one of those people that really enjoys drinking in the atmosphere found within the games that I play.

 

I’m not quite sure how to approach the trophies in Tales of Zestiria, honestly they are a bit of a mixed bag – you could probably finish the game, and have probably only earned a fraction of the trophies. Unless, of course you went out of your way to do specific things, otherwise you’d have a lot of clean up ahead. I’ll say this though it is paramount that you basically stick rigidly to a guide on at least one of your playthroughs. Thankfully the Tales of’ series always encourage multiple playthroughs though, so you can go through a second time with overpowered characters and grade shop bonuses to clean up anything you might have missed.

 

Here is the biggest advice that I can give you – MAKE SURE YOU WORK ON THE COOKING RECIPES EARLY for the Dieticians Nightmare trophy. I cannot stress that enough. Getting those final snacks to appear was infuriating. As far as I understand it they only refresh every set amount of steps that you take, and the last one for me was a 1% chance of appearing, and I was just running around listening to podcasts waiting for that to show up. I very vividly remember being overcome with sadness about Goran whilst I was playing this, that happened a lot obviously, but this was very specific, and I just remember putting the controller down and saying out loud “why am I even doing this, what is the point.” So, yeah, work on that one early to give yourself the best chance of not having to do that, because it is not fun at all.

 

DLC

 

Another Story: Alisha

 

 

I was honestly a tiny bit taken aback when I first noticed that Tales of Zestiria actually had a paid story DLC with trophies attached to it, thankfully though, my doubts were assuaged (as they are fairly often,) when I actually played it.

 

It isn’t a long DLC at all – but it’s I think at least, a very satisfying epilogue to the main story; it doesn’t introduce any deep new ideas that might have undermined what we’d seen previously. It doesn’t detract from the ending one bit, and it actually develops a lot of the characters in an incredibly positive way.

 

If this DLC didn’t exist, I feel like I’d firmly be in the “what is the point of Alisha camp” however, this DLC does a tremendous job of course correction with Alisha, and as this expansion was supposedly planned from the start, I think they always were going to resolve her story this way.

 

It does have some pretty bizarre choices for trophies though – there’s a trophy for clearing the malevolent crucible (arena fights) eleven times, which seems a little bit excessive. I’m fairly certain they could have replaced that with a trophy for attaining all of the items found in the DLC or something similar. They count towards your in-game item counter too (trophy related,) so it would have given you an extra incentive if there was a trophy at the end of it.

 

Alisha’s DLC is not just a very good add-on I also feel that it’s actually essential to getting the best experience possible from Tales of Zestiria. It’ll bring you a whole new level of appreciation to her character that you might not have had otherwise.

 

So then – now we come to the recommendation part. This is a tough one – I think there’s definitely better Tales of’ titles that you could potentially play, and I certainly wouldn’t ever suggest this as a “first” one. That being said, it is still worth playing if you ever got more than a passing interest in the series. But I can’t help but feel that in the same way Final Fantasy VIII is not really indicative of that franchise, not in the truest sense at least, the same can almost be said here.

Honestly though – just in terms of being a JRPG I’d still say it’s of a pretty high quality, and a worthy part of the Tales of’ series – I certainly think it deserved more praise than perhaps it got, even for the story itself, which seemed to be a lot of peoples main issue with it, but when you factor in the ties to Berseria, in that regard it is tremendously well realised.

 

At the very least I’ll always appreciate the fact this game helped to keep me focused in a time where I was desperately sad. He may have been my lecturer, but Goran was part of the reason why my perspective on so many things changed –  people who have that ability are few and far between, we should all treasure people like that in our lives – as clichéd as it sounds, tomorrow isn’t guaranteed.

 

 

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Wow, was that  cathartic to write - and I'm glad that I did. Although I might have to go lie down in a dark room for a bit. I'm fairly sure that's probably littered with grammatical errors and spelling mistakes in places, but I'll edit them if I spot them.

 

It's nice to finally get a Tales of title ticked off and reviewed in my thread too - even if it is one that's a little less than stellar.

 

I'll catch you in the next one folks - which hopefully won't be as heavy.

Edited February 2, 2022 by rjkclarke

[Platinum_Vice]

I'm so sorry for your loss, Rob. He'd probably be extremely proud of that eulogy and of you.

[YaManSmevz]

Man, I feel like in just two posts I learned so much about you!

 

That was a beautiful write-up. I'm sorry for your fallen friend, but very grateful for you sharing all of that. Frankly, I wish I could thank him for the exceptional effect he had on you. You did him proud with your words, trust.

 

So Realm got me to want to play a golfing game, and now you've got me thinkin about a pool game as well. I enjoyed the mini-game in GTA IV, but didn't think much of it beyond that. In the very least, maybe I'll go watch some Jeanette Lee videos. She looks so intimidating, I love it!

 

On 11/26/2021 at 3:50 PM, rjkclarke said:

Grim Fandango is great - that's definitely one I'd recommend diving into. I think it's pretty short as well, so you could probably thrash that out in a couple of days - great story, great characters, can't go wrong really.

 

I bought that quite a while ago... maybe I'll make that a December game!

 

On 11/26/2021 at 3:50 PM, rjkclarke said:

No doubt we'll have another  awesome review of The Witness to read once you've gotten it written too - so all in all I'd say everybody wins.

 

I hope so! There's a LOT of post-plat stuff to do, and i refuse to write a word until I've experienced it all. The Witness is nuts, man. Spoiler though - you, as a puzzle fan, are missing out?

 

On 11/26/2021 at 3:50 PM, rjkclarke said:

What I wouldn't give for a save system in the Sniper Maps in Hitman 2 - those are so well designed - and the A.I scipting as I've mentioned before is incredibly detailed and quite well programmed, but waiting around for some of the specific events to happen for the challenges, can be a bit of a nightmare at times.

 

Nah use and abuse that one save you get man - you'll  probably need to for some of the later levels that contain multiple targets.

 

Playing Hitman 2, I've started saving again (sounds like a commercial for a service, "I switched to Hitman 2 and noticed how much I was saving immediately!"), but only did that with Hawke's Bay, really.. I already know the Legacy maps so well that it hasn't really felt necessary. Figures, right?

 

On 11/26/2021 at 3:50 PM, rjkclarke said:

Don't be bummed out - Did you think I didn't like them from the reviews? I really hope not, I loved Oxenfree, like really loved it - and I really liked Afterparty too, just not quite as much. I'm not even 100% sure why either. I might been a little overcritical in places I suppose as well. If I did x out of 10 ratings, I don't think there'd be too much between them.

 

I'm really glad you recommended them - and Night School themselves are great, I'll pretty much play almost anything they put out, just based off of what I've seen from Oxenfree and Afterparty going forward. 

 

 

That was honestly probably the thing that frustrated me the most (not a huge frustration, but it was there) - and I hate to do the Oxenfree comparison again, but in that game whatever you said (or didn't say,) would illicit a different reaction - whereas in Afterparty it didn't seem to matter, the characters would react the same anyway - and that made me feel really aware I just wasn't that in control.

 

Hopefully they manage to balance the necessity for repeat play, and multiple responses  for Oxenfree 2, it'd be hard to throw any criticism their way if they managed that one. As I said I might have been being overcritical on this one.

 

 

The sound mix is fine most of the time - it's whenever you're on the taxiboat thing with Sam and the dialogue often gets drowned out a bit by the background audio, and the noise of the taxiboat - so it's tough to make out exactly what was being said. It's not difficult to isolate audio and bring one or more parts of it down, so the dialogue (the important thing in this games case,) could be better heard.

 

So I think I just got a little irked by that, its a small thing, and it isn't present throughout the whole game - but I can't say it didn't bother me a little bit. Especially as I really liked all the stuff with Sam, so I wanted to hear as much of it as possible.

 

You know - I definitely wouldn't have minded a trophy where you had to do a whole playthrough where every time you are in a place where drinks are available you can only use the drink answers for a whole playthrough - that could have been interesting, because so many of those were absolutely hilarious.

 

No, nothing like that - you had next to no negative points that I didn't have myself, and you had a good amount fo praise for things I even forgot to mention. Just that you mentioned feeling that they didn't hit on a certain emotional level, and it made me think that maybe they had been subpar in that regard. This is merely a case of me misinterpreting though, so don't dedicate too much thought to that!

 

I do remember how cool it was when the choices did make a difference, and when they wouldn't at such a high percentage of the time, it was easy to be like "but... can't we have more of that?" At the same time, I liked how choosing part of your path differently helped assuage the knowledge that you'll be playing the game more than once, as well as the different endings.

 

Which, agreed, all across the board Oxenfree handily came out superior! That game just nailed what it was going for, and I'm very excited to see what they do with the sequel.

 

I kinda wanna fire up Afterparty again just to see if I can hear what you're talking about - I probably just didn't notice. I loved Sam too - I remember seeing a trophy for going along with her for the side quest before the end (how sweet was that!) and thinkin bitch, I was gonna do that regardless - that's mah gurl!!

 

I would've been down for a trophy like that as well - some of those seriously cracked me up!

 

On 11/26/2021 at 3:50 PM, rjkclarke said:

....... At least Doc did though, so one out of three of us managed to remember, I don't know why either, because some of her stuff really cracked me up - especially the bit where she's doing Milo's parents voices and she does a little aside and goes something like " Oh great, awesome, I had another voice I was trying, but it was SUUUUUUPER racist, so I had to stop."

 

??????????

 

On 11/26/2021 at 3:50 PM, rjkclarke said:

I am worried that I definitely sullied my time with Afterparty's second playthrough because I didn't quite give it the concentration that it deserved, or if I did, I was constantly thinking of other things.

 

 

 

 

Again - that's a pretty perfect comparison point - that's absolutely it for me too, I can't stress enough that I really did like..... I respect Night School a whole lot for not just diving straight into an Oxenfree sequel - I like that they did Afterparty, and I expect I'll almost certainly play it again in the future.

 

That's so true about their ability to do character development - a small part of me thinks they should just not do games at all - and just make audio dramas, because they have got a really rare gift for being able to write almost seamless dialogue, that just feels natural. But then we also wouldn't get games from them, which would be equally sad - because Oxenfree and Afterparty look amazing too. Dilemmas........ Dilemmas..... Haha

 

That's how I feel about Control. It really is a cool game, but I remember just kinda having a bad attitude while playing it, like I wasn't in the right headspace but I kinda forced myself through it anyway. Funny how I couldn't apply that same stubbornness to some of the other games I have waiting to be finished!

 

I wonder if Night School will branch out eventually - you might wanna take a peek at this.

[rjkclarke]

On 28/11/2021 at 0:33 AM, GonzoWARgasm said:

I'm so sorry for your loss, Rob. He'd probably be extremely proud of that eulogy and of you.

 

I'm sorry for the late reply - when I finished writing that and posted it, I was like nope - no forums for you for at least a day. That was a bit emotionally draining.

 

Thank you so much though Gonzo - I truly do appreciate that.

 

I was a bit apprehensive about writing that - but I kind of just thought, why not - he meant a whole lot to me, and I feel like I owed it to him to explain exactly why. I vaguely referenced him quite a lot like I said in many other peoples threads, and probably will continue to. 

 

I'm sad he's not around anymore, but my memories of him are and always will be happy ones. It's his family that I feel the saddest for, he loved them so much, and of course they probably loved him dearly too,

 

11 hours ago, YaManSmevz said:

Man, I feel like in just two posts I learned so much about you!

 

That was a beautiful write-up. I'm sorry for your fallen friend, but very grateful for you sharing all of that. Frankly, I wish I could thank him for the exceptional effect he had on you. You did him proud with your words, trust.

 

So Realm got me to want to play a golfing game, and now you've got me thinkin about a pool game as well. I enjoyed the mini-game in GTA IV, but didn't think much of it beyond that. In the very least, maybe I'll go watch some Jeanette Lee videos. She looks so intimidating, I love it!

 

Cheers dude - I thought I'd continue with the theme of lets learn a little bit about me in this post that seems to be cropping up more and more often these days ?

 

As much as the phrase "Gone but not forgotten" might very well be a tired cliche at this point - that is very much the case with him.

 

If ever I have a moment like Luke in Return of the Jedi - where he looks on and sees all those people that meant so much to him.

 

 

 

Metaphorically at least - don't worry I know force ghosts aren't real - but if they were I know for sure I'd see him amongst them.

 

I don't know that Brunswick would be the Pool game to really get stuck in with - if it had a better single player experience I definitely would recommend it - I really liked it obviously, but I suspect the Pool game I would recommend, I haven't played yet, which is Pool Nation (PS4). So perhaps I ought to play that first and then actually review it - because I've been meaning to play it for well over a year at this point - it's the probably dead online that's putting me off, alongside a lot of Online trophies, but I'll just get those knocked out first if I can.

 

I was going to try and find a decent Jeanette Lee video to recommend but they are all full length matches - she does seem super intimidating when she's playing - but from all the interviews I've seen of her off the table she seems the complete opposite.

 

11 hours ago, YaManSmevz said:

I bought that quite a while ago... maybe I'll make that a December game!

 

I'd definitely recommend that one - you already have it too, so it makes sense to play it eventually - hope you like it though. Manny Calavera is one of my favourite characters from a Point-and-click game - and as you know I've played a lot of them, so there's quite a lot of good ones to choose from ?

 

11 hours ago, YaManSmevz said:

I hope so! There's a LOT of post-plat stuff to do, and i refuse to write a word until I've experienced it all. The Witness is nuts, man. Spoiler though - you, as a puzzle fan, are missing out

 

I know - I figured that I was...... I have literally no excuse to not be playing it - outside of having a massive backlog, but I am making decent-ish progress with that. So perhaps I'll get to it sooner rather than later.  But I really should just shoot it up the list shouldn't I.

 

11 hours ago, YaManSmevz said:

Playing Hitman 2, I've started saving again (sounds like a commercial for a service, "I switched to Hitman 2 and noticed how much I was saving immediately!"), but only did that with Hawke's Bay, really.. I already know the Legacy maps so well that it hasn't really felt necessary. Figures, right?

 

I get that yeah - I did safety save in a few of the longer Legacy Maps - like Sapienza, because I just wasn't comfortable potentially losing half an hour or something to a really stupid mistake,which I made lots of, usually involving security cameras ...

 

.... You're making super fast progress with Hitman 2 - it really hooks you in right? I ended up blasting through that pretty quickly myself.

 

The Hitman talk reminds me I need to get back and write those reviews for Contracts and Blood Money, I didn't forget them,I just had other things I needed to write about before getting back to them.

 

11 hours ago, YaManSmevz said:

No, nothing like that - you had next to no negative points that I didn't have myself, and you had a good amount fo praise for things I even forgot to mention. Just that you mentioned feeling that they didn't hit on a certain emotional level, and it made me think that maybe they had been subpar in that regard. This is merely a case of me misinterpreting though, so don't dedicate too much thought to that!

 

I think that's more of a me problem - the struggling to resonate with me on an emotional level part anyway - aspects of it did for sure. I'm also very much a visuals guy, and whilst I can absolutely be moved by the power of just a voice, that's happened on more than one occasion. With Oxenfree and Afterparty, that zoomed out aesthetic where none of the characters have complex facial expressions and you can't see their faces or specific reactions is probably part of the reason why it didn't really hit with me on an emotional level.

 

11 hours ago, YaManSmevz said:

Which, agreed, all across the board Oxenfree handily came out superior! That game just nailed what it was going for, and I'm very excited to see what they do with the sequel.

 

I kinda wanna fire up Afterparty again just to see if I can hear what you're talking about - I probably just didn't notice. I loved Sam too - I remember seeing a trophy for going along with her for the side quest before the end (how sweet was that!) and thinkin bitch, I was gonna do that regardless - that's mah gurl!!

 

I would've been down for a trophy like that as well - some of those seriously cracked me up!

 

Me too, me too. I would have been going along with Sam regardless too - she probably would have been my favourite character if Lola didn't exist.

 

One other thing I wish I'd mentioned was the Bingo Demon - that really cracked me up for some reason. He sounds like Joe Swanson from Family Guy. I don't mean he sounds like Patrick Warburton either, he just sounds like Joe, and for some reason that really cracked me up.

 

if you liked Sam though - her voice actor Ashley Burch is the one that plays Aloy in Horizon Zero Dawn, which I'm pretty sure you said was in your backlog over in Gonzo's thread. She's bloody excellent in that game. It's also very good too, but having a strong character and voice actress playing her, really helped keep me invested throughout that game.

 

She's even better in Life is Strange I'd argue - and the character she plays in that is not too dissimilar attitude wise to Sam from Afterparty, so you might enjoy those aspects of those games, because of her involvement.

 

11 hours ago, YaManSmevz said:

That's how I feel about Control. It really is a cool game, but I remember just kinda having a bad attitude while playing it, like I wasn't in the right headspace but I kinda forced myself through it anyway. Funny how I couldn't apply that same stubbornness to some of the other games I have waiting to be finished!

 

I wonder if Night School will branch out eventually - you might wanna take a peek at this.

 

That's such a frustrating feeling isn't it. When you kind of know you should be enjoying something more than you are - but for whatever reason you aren't. I don't know man, you're making pretty damn good progress with the games you have waiting to be finished - I keep picking up the ones I haven't started instead of playing the ones that I already have. I ought to take a leaf out of your book, and just commit to doing them.

 

I actually had a similar experience with Yakuza 6. It's probably a good thing I didn't have a space to air my thoughts at the time I finished it, because I think what my thoughts at the time were, and what they are now are completely different. So when I eventually do get to reviewing Yakuza 6 it'll be a little more positive than the ones at the time, which were basically "Was that it? That's how you end Kiryu's story.In a game that really doesn't feel all that much more than a tech demo for your shiny new Dragon Engine." I still feel a little bit like that, but I won't be so caught up on what I specifically didn't like.

 

oooooooo - Night School are hiring - that's interesting. That could be a hell of a fun job - I do think they'd do a potentially really good job of an interactive Netflix experience, in the vein of Black Mirror: Bandersnatch, so the sky's the limit for that company really.

 

 

Edited November 29, 2021 by rjkclarke

[rjkclarke]

Some Glass,Some Ink & A New Platinum.

 

Platinum #339

Clockwork Tales: Of Glass and Ink (PS4)

 

 

Platinum
Unlock every Trophy.

 

A Few Trophy Stats

 

Platinum Earned - 29 November 2021 : 2:31:42 AM

Time Taken to Platinum :  8 hours, 44 minutes, 51 seconds

Platinum Rarity  - 79.33%

Trophy Number - #16,235

 

 

I’ve said this before – but I’m fairly happy to say it again. Artifex Mundi games as much as I like them, and I really do. I always view them as a meal that you might really enjoy, yet could never eat on a regular basis. Or at least I couldn’t, as I’ve said before, it baffles me how people can play multiple ones of these a day, and not get a little bit jaded.

 

Upon firing up Clockwork Tales: Of Glass and Ink another Hidden Object puzzle game from Artifex Mundi. I was quickly reminded why I enjoy these games. They have a simplistic charm to them that – whilst they are all fairly similar, they can be one of the most satisfying types of games to just relax and get down to some good old fashioned puzzle solving.

 

I definitely don’t have to really delve into the specifics of the gameplay at all – it’s all rather simple. You have a cursor, you point and you click on objects and you solve puzzles of varying levels of difficulty and outside-of-the-box thinking. You also have access to a mechanical bird that can interact with the environment, which adds another layer of variety to proceedings. Who calls a mechanical bird Matthew though? What do I know; I had a Guinea Pig that I named Bruno, so I’m not the one to ask.

I’ve actually played a fairly decent amount of Artifex Mundi titles at this point, I believe this might be the twelfth or thirteenth, and there were some puzzle types in this game that I don’t think I’d encountered in other titles, so that was a very welcome surprise.  

 

As you’d expect from an Artifex Mundi title, the game is visually striking. Artists interpretations of certain genres or locations are always quite interesting to see regardless of exactly how they get handled. I’ll be honest though; they could have gotten a little more creative here I feel. For a bit of context, the game takes place in a steampunkified version of what would appear to be Germany.

 

Now – when you see the words steampunk – that usually conjures up a pretty specific image, yes? Well, whilst Clockwork is true to that typified steampunk image – it also doesn’t really deviate from that. It is precisely what you’d expect from it, it doesn’t try to do anything particularly new or exciting with that concept.

Unlike a few Artifiex Mundi titles there seemed to be a conscious effort to actually have some form of animation involved in the characters movements. I’m not sure that it quite works, but I can appreciate the effort nonetheless.

 

Audio is pretty good for the most part – the ambient soundtrack is subtle and relaxing, and the more foreboding pieces denoting danger, feel appropriate too. The voice acting is also fairly good for MOST of the characters outside of a few. The two leads Evangeline Glass and Doctor Ambrose Ink are both quite good. I couldn’t help but think the actress that played Evangeline sounded like a Tesco value Keeley Hawes (insert a stores, cheap own brand product, near you,) but overall she was pretty good, as was Inks voice actor.

 

So I said most voice performances were good, the ones that weren’t too stellar, were the ones given to Barber and his army. The best way to describe them is probably to say that they sound like your dad doing an impression of Rammstein. Well – maybe not yours, but definitely mine. I remember sitting there thinking, I hope this isn’t too offensive to any German people.  

 

The road to the platinum trophy in Clockwork, is in all honesty pretty straight forward and self explanatory, you only really have to go out of your way to get collectibles, and make sure that you finish one Hidden Object puzzle without a mistake (which for some reason are called FROGS in this game,) complete the game on Extreme puzzle difficulty, without skipping a puzzle and complete the bonus chapter (which is pretty good). Short sweet and to the point.

 

If you want a short and fairly straightforward puzzle experience to de-stress with and have a bit of harmless fun then I’d definitely recommend it. It’s not the best one I’ve played, but it is absolutely not the worst either, I very much enjoyed the ride. Just don’t go into it with particularly high expectations. If you don’t fancy dropping any money on it, I believe it is part of the line-up on PSNow, so you could find it there amongst some other Hidden Object titles if you felt the urge.

Edited February 2, 2022 by rjkclarke

[Platinum_Vice]

What sort of puzzles do Artifex Mundi games have?

[rjkclarke]

14 minutes ago, GonzoWARgasm said:

What sort of puzzles do Artifex Mundi games have?

 

I was thinking of being deliberately obtuse and saying Puzzly type of puzzles

 

But I'll refrain....

 

I'll give a serious answer.

 

It depends on the game really - what they are probably most known for is Hidden Object puzzles - so they boil down to finding a load of hidden objects in a pre-rendered environment (usually you need at least one of the objects to progress the story). One of their games and one of my favourite ones is My Brother Rabbit - that is entirely set within the confines of the Hidden Object puzzles - with a few regular ones thrown in for good measure.

 

They usually look like this - and have varying ranges of complexity

 

 

 

 

They do have others though - some games simpler than others (some of them are too simple,) but a few of them have sliding puzzles, a few logic puzzles, there's almost always a puzzle relating to fuses, where you have to make shapes out of the specific fuse slots.

 

I explained that pretty badly - but it's hard to really define those ones, but they look like this

 

 

Practically every game contains some sort of Jigsaw type thing too - where you have to piece together bits of a letter, or make a specific image to open a door that kind of thing.

 

The thing I personally really enjoy in Artifex Mundi titles is that they pretty much just throw things at you thick and fast - you'll practically be doing something new and different every ten minutes or so, and in a short-ish game, that sort of thing is very welcome to me. It means you almost never get bored. 

 

it isn't as if they are games with just one kind of puzzle either - I listed two or three but each game usually has at least ten or more different kinds that'll keep you busy. There's been a few where some of the logic puzzles have had me scratching my head for a while, especially ones that involved mathematics patterns and the like.

 

 

[YaManSmevz]

On 11/29/2021 at 9:40 AM, rjkclarke said:

Cheers dude - I thought I'd continue with the theme of lets learn a little bit about me in this post that seems to be cropping up more and more often these days

 

As much as the phrase "Gone but not forgotten" might very well be a tired cliche at this point - that is very much the case with him.

 

Good! I like it - and I'm certain I'm not alone there!

 

Nah, I don't think so. Sentiments like that only feel clichéd when you're just saying it for sake of saying something. When it's used as an honest, heartfelt expression, I feel it's exempt from the term!

 

On 11/29/2021 at 9:40 AM, rjkclarke said:

I don't know that Brunswick would be the Pool game to really get stuck in with - if it had a better single player experience I definitely would recommend it - I really liked it obviously, but I suspect the Pool game I would recommend, I haven't played yet, which is Pool Nation (PS4). So perhaps I ought to play that first and then actually review it - because I've been meaning to play it for well over a year at this point - it's the probably dead online that's putting me off, alongside a lot of Online trophies, but I'll just get those knocked out first if I can.

 

I was going to try and find a decent Jeanette Lee video to recommend but they are all full length matches - she does seem super intimidating when she's playing - but from all the interviews I've seen of her off the table she seems the complete opposite.

 

 

I'd definitely recommend that one - you already have it too, so it makes sense to play it eventually - hope you like it though. Manny Calavera is one of my favourite characters from a Point-and-click game - and as you know I've played a lot of them, so there's quite a lot of good ones to choose from

 

Maybe I'll take a peek then!

 

I love that! During the game she's like "I WILL FUCKING MURDER YOU" and then in the post-match interview like "with kindness!"

 

That settles it, I'll be paying Grim a visit this month! The only thing to determine is if I'll add it to the challenge or use it as a swap... starting to get a little worried - after this month, and the month after that, there's only one month left!

 

On 11/29/2021 at 9:40 AM, rjkclarke said:

 

I get that yeah - I did safety save in a few of the longer Legacy Maps - like Sapienza, because I just wasn't comfortable potentially losing half an hour or something to a really stupid mistake,which I made lots of, usually involving security cameras ...

 

.... You're making super fast progress with Hitman 2 - it really hooks you in right? I ended up blasting through that pretty quickly myself.

 

The Hitman talk reminds me I need to get back and write those reviews for Contracts and Blood Money, I didn't forget them,I just had other things I needed to write about before getting back to them.

 

Dude same. I went back to safety saving because I am playing that and San Andreas concurrently, and the vast difference in the controls messes with me at times - for example, in Bangkok I accidentally dropped my pistol because that was the reload button in SA, and of course someone saw me right away and it threw me right into one of those chaotic moments where all you can do is run and try to find a new disguise as quickly as possible?

 

Dude, it's so fun. And I'm very much looking forward to those reviews, but I'll happily read whatever you crank out, ain't no rush!

 

On 11/29/2021 at 9:40 AM, rjkclarke said:

 

I think that's more of a me problem - the struggling to resonate with me on an emotional level part anyway - aspects of it did for sure. I'm also very much a visuals guy, and whilst I can absolutely be moved by the power of just a voice, that's happened on more than one occasion. With Oxenfree and Afterparty, that zoomed out aesthetic where none of the characters have complex facial expressions and you can't see their faces or specific reactions is probably part of the reason why it didn't really hit with me on an emotional level.

 

 

Me too, me too. I would have been going along with Sam regardless too - she probably would have been my favourite character if Lola didn't exist.

 

One other thing I wish I'd mentioned was the Bingo Demon - that really cracked me up for some reason. He sounds like Joe Swanson from Family Guy. I don't mean he sounds like Patrick Warburton either, he just sounds like Joe, and for some reason that really cracked me up.

 

if you liked Sam though - her voice actor Ashley Burch is the one that plays Aloy in Horizon Zero Dawn, which I'm pretty sure you said was in your backlog over in Gonzo's thread. She's bloody excellent in that game. It's also very good too, but having a strong character and voice actress playing her, really helped keep me invested throughout that game.

 

She's even better in Life is Strange I'd argue - and the character she plays in that is not too dissimilar attitude wise to Sam from Afterparty, so you might enjoy those aspects of those games, because of her involvement.

 

That makes sense, I suppose the characters aren't really given the chance to emote as visually as they could - a good point, I hadn't thought of that!

 

You are correct - and it sounds like Horizon Zero Dawn just got a violent shove up the backlog, that's actually a huge motivator. And also I never really thought Life Is Strange would be my thing, but I might have that twisted...

 

On 11/29/2021 at 9:40 AM, rjkclarke said:

 

That's such a frustrating feeling isn't it. When you kind of know you should be enjoying something more than you are - but for whatever reason you aren't. I don't know man, you're making pretty damn good progress with the games you have waiting to be finished - I keep picking up the ones I haven't started instead of playing the ones that I already have. I ought to take a leaf out of your book, and just commit to doing them.

 

I actually had a similar experience with Yakuza 6. It's probably a good thing I didn't have a space to air my thoughts at the time I finished it, because I think what my thoughts at the time were, and what they are now are completely different. So when I eventually do get to reviewing Yakuza 6 it'll be a little more positive than the ones at the time, which were basically "Was that it? That's how you end Kiryu's story.In a game that really doesn't feel all that much more than a tech demo for your shiny new Dragon Engine." I still feel a little bit like that, but I won't be so caught up on what I specifically didn't like.

 

oooooooo - Night School are hiring - that's interesting. That could be a hell of a fun job - I do think they'd do a potentially really good job of an interactive Netflix experience, in the vein of Black Mirror: Bandersnatch, so the sky's the limit for that company really.

 

Thank you, I'm definitely trying to give it a solid go!

 

Yeahmann, it's definitely frustrating. Especially since we get such precious little time with this beloved hobby of ours, to find yourself not enjoying it is a unique kind of unpleasantness!

 

I wish I was a writer, just seems like Night School would be a great work environment. I remember when I was a kid, I saw interviews with animators and writers for Nickelodeon, and they were just goofing off and laughing and I just thought "wow, that's what I want to do when I grow up."

 

Knowing the truth now about some of the stuff going on behind the scenes back in those days though has soured that image a bit??

[The_Kopite]

On 11/26/2021 at 11:50 PM, rjkclarke said:

No worries man - I know how it is, I'm replying to these pretty late myself - I realised the other day that I hadn't had more than 10 hours sleep over a whole week. I'm pretty used to insomnia, but that was bad. I literally had to keep throwing water on my face to stay awake.

I know those kind of sleeping issues, not because of insomnia but lack of sleep over extended period is really hard to deal with.

 

On 11/26/2021 at 11:50 PM, rjkclarke said:

That's fair - but if for some reason you manage to decrease all of those things - you should definitely consider it.

I will try lol

 

On 11/26/2021 at 11:50 PM, rjkclarke said:

I think making it photo-realistic really hurt The Lion King. There's scenes in the newer one which in the original carried loads of emotional weight and just all round oomph, but because you're essentially just looking at a realistic CGI lion - their faces aren't animated to be expressive or sad like they were in the original. So what you get instead is just cold and rigid. 

 

I didn't hate it - but it I think they could have done a better job with it - they definitely messed up Hamlet with Lions (which is what I always call Lion King ).

 

I'll check out Aladdin and Beauty and the Beast at some point.

 

The one I'm really dreading is Hunchback of Notre Dame - it's got the potential to be the best of the live action remakes - they really ought to double down on the dark imagery, and satanic cinematography - but I'm fairly sure they won't, and it'll get watered down.

 

Plus no Tom Hulce as Quasimodo makes RJ a dull boy.

Well I'll try to remember to tell you my opinion on the film when I get around to it.

 

Yeah let me know about Aladdin and Beauty and the Beast when you watch them.

 

The live action remakes are certainly very family friendly so yeah Hunchback will most likely not be made in the way you would want.

 

On 11/26/2021 at 11:50 PM, rjkclarke said:

 

I know you weren't haha - but if/when I do - I'll be sure to mention that you were the one to write it - I got the 100% in a game today, that I'm a little tempted to write a guide for myself.

 

So I might have to join you in the old writing of a guide thing.

.

Nice to see your Sonic Colours one is progressing along nicely - I guess you can't say that about too many modern Sonic games that they are worth playing haha.

 

Poor Blue Spikyman

Yeah go for it! You would definitely write great guides! I'll look forward to it!

 

I just submitted my Sonic Colours one for review today after getting the platinum for it, 225 wooo. Certainly there have been some modern Sonic stinkers sadly, but Sonic Colours is one I really enjoyed and would recommend to you and anyone. Had lots of fun with it.

 

On 11/26/2021 at 11:50 PM, rjkclarke said:

I think it was 0.02% - I came to the conclusion that the only thing it could have been was one of the Commsphere scenes - and if it wasn't that it was a scene really late into the game, where a guide I was using conflicted with another guide, saying the choice didn't matter for completion %. What a nightmare.

 

X's is definitely more straightforward - but I'd probably argue X-2's trophy list is slightly more enjoyable. I only mean the trophies too - I think Final Fantasy unfortunately suffers from having quite a few duff trophy lists amongst its best games ironically. IX's trophy list is plain arse.  The actual getting of the trophies tends not to be that fun, even if the game itself is excellent.

 

X is my favourite Final Fantasy title - but that trophy for maxing out EVERY character's sphere grid - is just offensively bad. It's so boring - and it adds at least ten hours onto your playtime.

Oh no, that sounds like a real nightmare (gaming wise of course). That had to be super annoying when guides conflict with each other. Yeah the trophy lists could certainly be better in many ways for Final Fantasy games. If they do release the Pixel Remasters of 1-6, maybe they can correct that a bit. 

 

Can't argue with the comment about maxing out every character's sphere grid, that was not exciting at all.

 

On 11/26/2021 at 11:50 PM, rjkclarke said:

Grim Fandango is great - that's definitely one I'd recommend diving into. I think it's pretty short as well, so you could probably thrash that out in a couple of days - great story, great characters, can't go wrong really.

 

Well some of the Monkey Islands are on PSNow - I don't know if they all are, but that's probably the best way to play them, as they aren't on the PS4 - and unfortunately there's no platinum's, just the 100% lists, but if that doesn't bother you jump on in.

Grim Fandango I might give a go at some point. Your recommendation always helps.

 

I do appreciate Platinums personally but I'm not adverse to playing a 100% game so we will see about Monkey Island in the future.

 

On 11/26/2021 at 11:50 PM, rjkclarke said:

Are you a stealth Snooker fan and only just revealing that?

 

I think the one who didn't win any didn't because of the guy who won 7 - he came so close that one time, and then he just couldn't keep his composure.

I've watched a fair bit of Snooker over the years, and played a few Snooker games too. WSC Real '09 I think was one of them. Always enjoyed watching the World Championships. Watch a variety of sports.

 

Stephen Hendry was a phenomenal player, certainly in the top 5 of all time. Probably top 3. Maybe the best. 

 

On 11/26/2021 at 11:50 PM, rjkclarke said:

That should have been my answer for why I took ages to reply - getting questioned by the plagiarism police.

 

One day I'm sure Doc and I will have a massively different opinion about something - I mean I guess we do on Final Fantasy VII to an extent. He loves it, I love it slightly less. See worlds of difference haha!

Quick get a screenshot, preserve it!!! haha

[Shrooba]

On 07/10/2021 at 10:54 AM, rjkclarke said:

The gameplay itself, as I touched upon briefly earlier – take the form of colour manipulation puzzles, which end up being a combination of environmental manipulation and in a few instances physics tinkering. Essentially, you are given a ring, which you eventually fill with colours – each colour in that ring can then change the entire environment to match that colour, which is where the puzzle element comes into play. Any object in the environment that shares the colour being changed into will instantly disappear from view. I hope you haven’t gone cross eyed after my terrible explanation – essentially this allows for a whole raft of varying puzzles that see you manipulate the environment in a whole host of ways – I’m being deliberately vague, because some of them are so interestingly implemented they should be experienced not relayed via text.

I'm back from the dead and I haven't forgotten to check out your Hue review! ? I'll try to catch up with all your other reviews through the coming week but for now I wanted to check out this one since I did promise after all!

When you mentioned the gameplay mechanics-- the concept of traversing through varying environments with different colours-- it reminds me a ton of Portal 2. It introduced this cool concept called the gels; you've got orange, blue, and white respectively. Portal is a platformer game with (and you'll find this very shocking) portals in it, which are your main method of transportation, alongside monentum-- but gels really took that idea of momentum and took it to a whole new level, because the orange gel drastically increased your running speed, blue allowed you to bounce a certain height depending on the height you dropped from, and white allows you to place new portals, making you think more outside the box.

I'm not sure how closely this links in with Hue's gameplay, but it's cool to see that the overall concept of colours is intertwined with the gameplay itself. Funnily enough, it's shared through both Hue and Portal, which are both puzzle/platformers as you said! Interesting that this concept can be carried through the mediums of both 2D and 3D! ? I've got this from the PS Store recently, so I'll definitely check it out at some point!
 

 

[rjkclarke]

On 01/12/2021 at 11:39 AM, YaManSmevz said:

Good! I like it - and I'm certain I'm not alone there!

 

Nah, I don't think so. Sentiments like that only feel clichéd when you're just saying it for sake of saying something. When it's used as an honest, heartfelt expression, I feel it's exempt from the term!

 

Awesome!

 

Although I'll try not to quite turn this into my gaming autobiography, but I'm certain bits and pieces are going to have to creep in here and there.

 

I think I could have lived with that Goran part being a tired cliche anyway. I'm glad I get a free pass though - I meant every single word of that. Theirs a character in  Doctor Who that The Doctor, used to speak about a lot " A hermit, who lived in the mountains, who used to impart his wisdom" for me he was that hermit. But yeah I won't dwell on that too much right now, as much as I love talking about him it makes me sad, and I don't want to bring everyone down so I'll leave it at that.

 

On 01/12/2021 at 11:39 AM, YaManSmevz said:

That settles it, I'll be paying Grim a visit this month! The only thing to determine is if I'll add it to the challenge or use it as a swap... starting to get a little worried - after this month, and the month after that, there's only one month left!

 

I know where you're coming from with that one man - I've still got five swaps in the bag but I'm thinking of maybe using some - I keep forgetting I've put quite a lot of long games on there, so I ought to think about taking a few off.

 

Grim is like a 12 hour platinum though from what I remember, so you could always sub it in for a longer one, or just do it anyway. I'm pretty interested in what you'll think of Grim Fandango - it'll be interesting to see if Glottis cracks you up as much as he did with me.

 

You still have RE5 on your list on the challenge right? I know @Destructor-8 was playing it fairly recently - and I asked Destructor if he wanted a hand with it because you and I were planning to do it ourselves at some point, so if we can find one other person to give us a hand, we can probably get those versus mode trophies knocked out fairly quick sharp. So That'd be one less thing to worry about for the challenge.

 

On 01/12/2021 at 11:39 AM, YaManSmevz said:

Dude same. I went back to safety saving because I am playing that and San Andreas concurrently, and the vast difference in the controls messes with me at times - for example, in Bangkok I accidentally dropped my pistol because that was the reload button in SA, and of course someone saw me right away and it threw me right into one of those chaotic moments where all you can do is run and try to find a new disguise as quickly as possible

 

Well to borrow a line from Martin Crane from Frasier " OHHH GEEEZ"

 

That's gotta be quite the headspin that one - those two control types are so different - that'd be so jarring. I reckon I'd be trippin pretty often and expect to be able to just kill a target and then drive off on a BMX like in San Andreas.

 

Am I the only one that uses the BMX's far more often than I should in San Andreas? I know they're much slower, but I just find something so satisfying about using them.

 

On 01/12/2021 at 11:39 AM, YaManSmevz said:

I'm very much looking forward to those reviews, but I'll happily read whatever you crank out, ain't no rush!

 

I should have the Contracts one done by tomorrow.

 

Although my latest platinum (the review I'm writing right now.) might interest you. I mean the subtitle of the game is literally Cyberpunk Bartender Action...... I think you'd really dig that game, but we'll see, I'm hoping my review doesn't end up putting you off it. My thoughts on it are actually very positive, but the game as a whole might not be your thing, we'll have to see.

 

On 01/12/2021 at 11:39 AM, YaManSmevz said:

You are correct - and it sounds like Horizon Zero Dawn just got a violent shove up the backlog, that's actually a huge motivator. And also I never really thought Life Is Strange would be my thing, but I might have that twisted...

 

It's seriously good Horizon Zero Dawn - it's one of the best examples I can think of, of a first entry in a franchise. It's got like the perfect amount of setup for future titles, not an overwhelming amount of shallow side content, and intriguing characters that leave you wanting more from them. Oh and the DLC is excellent too. I can see whenever I tackle that in a Classic Review down the line it'll probably end up being a long one. 

 

I don't know - you really liked Oxenfree and Afterparty, so there's a good chance you'd enjoy Life is Strange too. I'm like 2 entries in the series behind now, so I need to catch up on LIs2 and True Colours.

 

But there isn't a gulf of difference with the characters in Afterparty and Oxenfree and those in Life is Strange. I'd say the ones from Night School probably feel a little more natural, and authentic, but the actual story to Life is Strange is pretty damn good - and I remember really wanting to play each next episode, especially the cliffhanger ending to episode 3 of the first Life is Strange, that's a real "OHHHHH SHIT!" moment.

 

On 01/12/2021 at 11:39 AM, YaManSmevz said:

Thank you, I'm definitely trying to give it a solid go!

 

Yeahmann, it's definitely frustrating. Especially since we get such precious little time with this beloved hobby of ours, to find yourself not enjoying it is a unique kind of unpleasantness!

 

I wish I was a writer, just seems like Night School would be a great work environment. I remember when I was a kid, I saw interviews with animators and writers for Nickelodeon, and they were just goofing off and laughing and I just thought "wow, that's what I want to do when I grow up."

 

Knowing the truth now about some of the stuff going on behind the scenes back in those days though has soured that image a bit

 

Well the monthly update posts you're doing show how much progress you've made with actually cutting a big hole in your backlog. I saw your thing of getting under 500 unearned trophies, and was like "yeah he's got this" I want to do that myself, I'm close-ish, and if I go on a big DLC hunt I could probably get that done, so perhaps I ought to approach it like that.

 

That's so true - you almost feel a little cheated right, if you don't end up quite enjoying the experience the way that you feel like you should have done.

 

I'd love to work for Night School too.

 

It certainly seems appealing when you hear writers/ animators talking about how fun the creative process is. Which it is, but there's a double edged sword that goes along side that.

 

I've got admittedly a fairly limited experience of this, so my experience isn't exactly huge on this one, so far at least. But  I think when it comes to writing like that you sort of have to detach yourself a little bit, otherwise when things don't quite go right you can get sucked into a black hole of negativity. I actually went into that a little bit in my Broken Sword 5 review if I remember right. That game dug me out of that black hole of negativity.

 

Or if you don't quite have control over the thing you've created - it can also go disastrously wrong. If someone completely misinterprets the thing you have written, which happened to me, all the way back making a short film about five years ago now, and goes and makes something that's completely the opposite to what you imagined in your own head it can be equally disappointing. 

 

I don't know if he did before he died, but Goran never saw the feature film that he wrote - because he knew that it wouldn't be anything like how he'd envisioned it whilst writing it, so he didn't see the point in watching it, as he felt like by that point - it wasn't his anymore.

 

17 hours ago, The_Kopite said:

I know those kind of sleeping issues, not because of insomnia but lack of sleep over extended period is really hard to deal with.

 

 

Isn't it just! I feel for you on that one......

 

....... Once it catches up with you it gets to be so tough right.

 

I find I can barely function like that - it just gets so tough to even do the easiest things.

 

17 hours ago, The_Kopite said:

Well I'll try to remember to tell you my opinion on the film when I get around to it.

 

Yeah let me know about Aladdin and Beauty and the Beast when you watch them.

 

The live action remakes are certainly very family friendly so yeah Hunchback will most likely not be made in the way you would want.

 

 

Please do - I'd like to hear it.

 

I will also let you know mine once I've given Aladdin and Beauty and the Beast a watch too. Although - I'm far from Aladdin's biggest fan, I actually like the third Aladdin film more than the first, I think that was called The King of Thieves?

 

I guess I'll just have to try and get funding from somewhere and make my own version of Hunchback of Notre Dame then haha. It's one of those bucket list films for me, that if I somehow did manage to break on in and become an actual film-maker that I'd love to make my own version of, because the book is fantastic.

 

Ironically, another one I'd love to make has also been destroyed by Disney which is Doctor Dolittle, some of those books are excellent, but there hasn't been a decent screen outing since the 60's, I've always wanted to write a big screen version. I've written a few treatments for it, and kicked around loads of ideas in my own head, but then the terrible RDJ film was announced, so I thought even on the incredibly slim off chance I could have gotten that off the ground, it definitely isn't happening now haha

 

17 hours ago, The_Kopite said:

Yeah go for it! You would definitely write great guides! I'll look forward to it!

 

I just submitted my Sonic Colours one for review today after getting the platinum for it, 225 wooo. Certainly there have been some modern Sonic stinkers sadly, but Sonic Colours is one I really enjoyed and would recommend to you and anyone. Had lots of fun with it.

 

If there a word limit on them? Because I'd probably go way over them, without actually meaning to haha

 

Thanks though! I'd love to take a crack at writing one at some point.

 

Congrats on getting the guide off for review - and the platinum obviously, now you've gotta get to 249 so you can jump right on in with Resident Evil 2!

 

17 hours ago, The_Kopite said:

Oh no, that sounds like a real nightmare (gaming wise of course). That had to be super annoying when guides conflict with each other. Yeah the trophy lists could certainly be better in many ways for Final Fantasy games. If they do release the Pixel Remasters of 1-6, maybe they can correct that a bit. 

 

It comes to something when one of the most enjoyable trophy lists in a Final Fantasy title comes from Final Fantasy XIII-2 of all things, In my opinion obviously.  That's a great trophy list, pretty much none of it felt like an unnecessary grind. 

 

Fingers crossed that yes they do a better job with the Pixel Remasters - and that they don't just do 1-6 all in one trophy list, that'd be disappointing. I want a platinum in each one!

 

Yes- FFX-2 was a real gaming nightmare in that regard. It's really lucky that you don't have to get 100% in one complete playthrough, or I might have been a weeping mess crying in the fetal position ?

 

18 hours ago, The_Kopite said:

Grim Fandango I might give a go at some point. Your recommendation always helps.

 

I do appreciate Platinums personally but I'm not adverse to playing a 100% game so we will see about Monkey Island in the future.

 

Well Grim Fandango isn't long, so it might be one to play with your limited time - and yes I love it, I've played plenty of good and bad point-and-click adventure games, and I'd definitely say that's one of the really good ones.

 

Well as you don't mind playing a 100% game keep the option open then.

 

I definitely think there's a lot of good games you can miss out on by avoiding games with just a 100% altogether. Although there have been plenty of times where I've played a 100% list and thought surely this could have a platinum.

 

I suspect I'll think that after playing Mars: War Logs, which I'm probably going to start later.

 

18 hours ago, The_Kopite said:

I've watched a fair bit of Snooker over the years, and played a few Snooker games too. WSC Real '09 I think was one of them. Always enjoyed watching the World Championships. Watch a variety of sports.

 

Stephen Hendry was a phenomenal player, certainly in the top 5 of all time. Probably top 3. Maybe the best.

 

WSC Real 09 was a banger - and so was WSC Real 11 - I still play it occasionally, in fact I was world number one on the online leaderboards on that game, for about a week or so, which is mental actually, thinking about it. Although probably only about 5 people played it to be fair haha. Even now that Snooker 19 is out, I occasionally play WSC Real 11, Snooker 19 though is also pretty excellent by the way. It's got some really satisfyingly accurate ball physics.

 

Stephen Hendry is definitely top 3, Number 2 for me, just behind Ronnie O'Sullivan - Hendry was an absolute animal. Watching him play in the 90's at his peak was like watching a really evil, vengeful shark that had smelled blood. He was an absolute machine, just picked people apart.

 

If you could transplant his will-to-win into any athlete, they would absolutely thrive in their chosen sport. 

 

10 hours ago, Shrooba said:

I'm back from the dead and I haven't forgotten to check out your Hue review! I'll try to catch up with all your other reviews through the coming week but for now I wanted to check out this one since I did promise after all!

 

Good to see you back buddy!

 

Although - I'd totally be going all older brother or concerned Dad on you if you'd been neglecting your studies ?.... You're a smart guy, and wise beyond your years, so I'm glad that you've absolutely got your priorities in the right place.

 

Awesome if you do read some of those other reviews though, if you get a chance. Some of them got a little personal ? (even my name haha,) I even discovered what my favourite game of all time might be, in the original NieR  so there's that I guess. But no pressure or anything, if you don't feel like you've got the time.

 

10 hours ago, Shrooba said:

When you mentioned the gameplay mechanics-- the concept of traversing through varying environments with different colours-- it reminds me a ton of Portal 2. It introduced this cool concept called the gels; you've got orange, blue, and white respectively. Portal is a platformer game with (and you'll find this very shocking) portals in it, which are your main method of transportation, alongside monentum-- but gels really took that idea of momentum and took it to a whole new level, because the orange gel drastically increased your running speed, blue allowed you to bounce a certain height depending on the height you dropped from, and white allows you to place new portals, making you think more outside the box.

I'm not sure how closely this links in with Hue's gameplay, but it's cool to see that the overall concept of colours is intertwined with the gameplay itself. Funnily enough, it's shared through both Hue and Portal, which are both puzzle/platformers as you said! Interesting that this concept can be carried through the mediums of both 2D and 3D! I've got this from the PS Store recently, so I'll definitely check it out at some point!

 

I didn't know Portal 2 had those features! That's awesome.

 

I think Hue might have benefited from  a lot of those things that you mention - I feel like I should remember, but I don't think any of the new colours actually change any part of the gameplay, they just add new complexities to the puzzle rooms. If they'd implemented the gel feature from Portal 2 it could have added a lot of depth to the gameplay.

 

That isn't to say Hue isn't worth playing though, it's absolutely a pretty satisfying experience - and what little story there is is quite thought provoking too.

 

I did play the original Portal in The Orange Box, but I never got around to playing Portal 2 - perhaps I ought to, even if it does end up adding another couple of unobtainables to my list.

[rjkclarke]

I Went To Valhalla & All I Got Was This Lousy New Platinum

(Disclaimer: Platinum Definitely Not Lousy)

 

Platinum #340

VA-11 HALL-A (PS4)

 

 

 

Jill of all trades
Get all achievements

 

Platinum Earned - 30 November 2021 : 7:33 :14 PM

Time Taken to Platinum :  1 day, 16 hours, 47 minutes

Platinum Rarity  - 32.44%

Trophy Number - #16,269

 

 

I feel as if before we really get into the review proper – I ought to make it clear that I’m not the most qualified person to talk about Visual Novels, which this game essentially is. I’ve played a few but that’s it, so I don’t claim to have any real in depth knowledge of the genre. As such I’ll just approach this the same way that I would any other game.

 

VA-11 HALL-A, or to give it its full title VA-11 HALL-A: Cyberpunk Bartender Action Is a low-key independent title released for the PS4 all the way back in 2019. You take the role of Jill a Bartender, as you serve drinks to the various patrons and denizens of Valhalla (the bar). It’s as simple as that.  For ease I’ll just refer to the game as Valhalla from here on out. This game is set in the same universe as the excellent (in my opinion at least,) 2064: Read Only Memories. Valhalla basically serves as more of an offshoot, or a spin-off as opposed to a sequel in the truest sense, or simply just a shared universe. Although you very much don’t have to know 2064’s story to understand or enjoy this one, that knowledge will just give you a pre-existing notion of how the world works, so some of the elements that might seem a little bit off-kilter actually won’t be. The character cameos will end up making more sense though, but again they don’t really play any large role in determining the outcome of the story.

 

On a visual and artistic level, Valhalla has a gorgeous aesthetic, much like 2064: Read Only Memories, it contains rich and interesting pixel-art that really brings the characters to life. Although Valhalla is far more anime visually inspired than truly pixel-art. What the game might lack in varied animations and movement, it more than makes up for in the detailed way specific characters have been designed. Each one feels unique – in a game that has two human-cat hybrids or cat-boomers – well in truth only one is a hybrid, and the other is a cat-boomer if you’ve played 2064 and this, you’ll understand the distinction, and the game does enlighten you on that anyway.

 

Valhalla doesn’t have the most distinctive sound elements of a game that I’ve encountered, sound effects are few and far between, but what there are, are at least decent. There aren’t any voice lines either, so you might have to do what I did and create voices for them like I did. One interesting aspect of the soundtrack is how it’s actually implemented, which take the form of Jukebox tracks – you select 12 at the beginning of every shift, so you can decide what you listen to when you want to essentially. It’s interesting as this means there’s no real situational music – apart from a few places, it doesn’t try and emotionally manipulate you, it just lets the music be just that, a musical accompaniment. It’s pretty much universally excellent though; I ended up opting for some of the more ambient pieces quite often, because I found it was the best thing to allow me to concentrate fully on the dialogue and story playing out.

 

I feel like I might have undersold the gameplay aspect a little too much. It might seem simple on the surface – but there’s a little bit more to it than just pouring out drinks and choosing measurements. I feel like I should probably mention that I played this entire game in two sittings, with a break of about three hours in-between for food and I wasn’t ever bored once, so this aspect of the game is actually very strong.

 

Yes, on the surface it is just a case of “find what the customer wants and make that drink” but that is woefully underselling how satisfying this element of the gameplay can be. Once you get to know the regular customers, you then start to be able to almost pre-emptively anticipate their order. In much the same way a good Bartender in the real world would be able to ascertain exactly what someone means if they came in and asked for “my usual.” With that also comes the curveballs that the game can throw at you when those same customers ask for something completely different, which is usually a good indicator that something isn’t quite okay with them. This was one of the elements of the game that I really enjoyed; it absolutely made me feel like I was part of the proceedings as opposed to just the person viewing everything from a distance. For a game with no player choice, I thought that was actually a very impressive feat.

 

So how involved is the drink making experience? It’s simply a case of pressing a few buttons to add the quantities of ingredients to a drink. Mercifully the game provides you with a bartending manual, which bestows upon you the information of the quantities of ingredients needed to make the specific drinks. There comes a satisfying progression with this, that the more you do it the quicker it becomes, so at first it seems quite daunting, and you are constantly looking at the manual, constantly reminding yourself how much you need. Then by a certain point you’ll be serving drinks faster and faster – and you’ll feel more and more like you’re actually efficiently bartending. There are some slight intricacies – like when a customer asks for a big drink, or asks for something alcohol free – which means you essentially have to double the quantity of the ingredients to get the order right, or leave them out entirely.

 

This leads me to the other side of the gameplay experience – the in game currency, something that plays more of a part in proceedings than you might think. Much like in the real fleshy world (the one we live in, with the nice graphics, but occasionally sub-par gameplay,) bartending is a job, and with that comes payment. Also like in the real world, you make a lot of money from tips. Essentially getting a customer’s order correct, will reward you with a higher tip. You have to get all of them correct for trophy purposes anyway, but one aspect I thought was incredibly realistic was that as the customers become increasingly friendlier with you, as they spend more time with you – as a result they’ll start to tip more as your relationship with the characters starts to grow. It’s something that’s quite contextually accurate too, as rich characters throw more money around, because you then know they can afford it. A very small thing, but as some of you will know, it is miniscule details like this that really enhance  the immersion and gaming experiences like this as a whole for me.

 

There is a practical use for the money too, each new work day you are greeted with a message saying that Jill would like to buy x item to stop her getting distracted at work. Even if we take trophies out of the equation for a minute, if you weren’t to do this, you’d have to pay attention to every single thing a customer says, because if Jill becomes distracted you won’t get the reminder in a small text box, which tells you exactly what it was the customer wanted because she lost her focus. There is a slight element of money management too, because you have access to a shop and can decorate Jill’s apartment with several visual stimuli. Alongside that you also you have looming bill payments (if you’ve played Beholder 1 or 2, you’ll be familiar with that gameplay conceit,) which mean you have to be very careful with how much you spend, so in much the same way Jill as a character is on a budget, so are you as a player.

 

One of the finest aspects of Valhalla is the way in which it tells its story. It is an altogether smaller scale story, but that doesn’t make it any less interesting or important. This is quite a contrast to 2064: Read Only Memories – which has a grander scale, and feels as if the events of the story affect the entire world instead of just the people and the area it takes place in, as it does with Valhalla.

 

Let me make this clear though – that is not a bad thing, what Valhalla lacks in a grander scale it more than makes up for with the atmosphere, character, world building and some of the more existential questions the game ends up making you ponder.

 

I absolutely respect the decision that Sukeban games made by not giving you any player choice at all. It’s uncompromising sure, but I feel like a lot of the time in choice based narratives – the choice element is usually quite an illusory one anyway, more often than not you get funnelled down the story path that the developers truly wanted to tell, instead of one the player might have stumbled down themselves. Valhalla eliminates that problem entirely, by just letting the story play out.

 

What a story it is too – I’d probably liken it structurally to the sort of story you’d see in an independent film. This coincidentally is one of my favourite types of film. What I mean by that is that its smaller scale in nature – and very much a character based affair. You meet some fascinating characters across this game, the nature of which asks some serious questions of the player. Tough ones too – an example is that one of the characters (they are most all awesome, I just don't really want to give many spoilers away,) Dorothy is a sex worker robot (or LILIM, as the game terms robotic life forms,) who is also designed to look between the ages of ten and thirteen – and instead of just glossing over that aspect – the game directly addresses it, and explores how unhealthy something like that truly is.

 

I found myself empathising with Jill (the protagonist) far more than I ever expected to. In fact I’m genuinely gutted that I don’t think she’ll be in the sequel N1RV ANN-A. She felt so real. She and I share quite a few personality similarities, in that we both dwell far too long on things we’ve said in the distant past, things that most people wouldn’t even think about, but manifest themselves and linger in a way that you wish they didn’t. The game really explores the self loathing that appears hand-in-hand with that, that only really you, yourself is aware of.  But the game doesn’t do it in an unsubtle way at all, far from it. She’s one of my favourite characters of anything I’ve played this year, and that includes Final Fantasy IX.

I know exactly how that baggage Jill carries around feels like, and how things that you say to your friends can cryptically allude to those bits of baggage as a way of talking about them, without actually saying them. The game does have a payoff to this too, and it’s an earned and natural one, much like the game doesn’t have a Hollywood-ised narrative, its conclusion is also on a smaller scale.

It’s a piece of writing in this game that I don’t think I’ve seen given any of the credit it deserves in other reviews. So here Valhalla – you can have all my love for the way you told your story. I won’t go into the specifics of the story, but I think it’s really well told, it’s never boring, as I alluded to earlier, I played this in one sitting. Just like with 2064: Read Only Memories, all it did was leave me wanting more from that world – so in a way I’m happy that today I learnt both games are getting a sequel.

 

Another aspect of the story that I loved (okay, okay, shut up Rob, we get that you love the story, I bet you’re thinking,) hear me out here though – is the seamless way it wrote minority characters. Whether those minorities were disabled, gay, transgender or any number of aspects – those aren’t the characters defining characteristics. They just serve as an aspect of them, they seamlessly slot in with everything else, no questions asked.  It’s a real pet peeve of mine when you have characters like that, which end up being purely defined by their sexuality, or something of that nature – it’s really shallow writing, and it’s something people need to make a much more conscious effort with. It’d be like if I only defined myself as a person with long hair – nobody does that, people are a sum of so many different things and a well written character should reflect that.

 

Valhalla unfortunately does fall into a very specific trap on a few occasions however, and I can’t really ignore it. Although, honestly it only happens a few times – and it’s a problem that you see in literature very often – where it’s very apparent it is one writers voice coming out of different characters. It’s so easily done, and it only happens a few times – but it’d be remiss of me not to mention it. There’s several times where some of the characters specifically end the sentence with exactly this “, actually.” It is very few and far between though, and apart from that pretty much all of the characters have their own voice and distinct personality.

On the other side of that – if any of you have read my Final Fantasy IX review, I made specific mention of how well characterised I thought each characters specific text bubbles were. I think that’s another element of Valhalla that’s really strong, much like Vivi’s lack of confidence is denoted by a b-but, instead of a but, that same detail was applied here. What they couldn’t convey with voice acting meant they had to become creative, and I think it’s something they did a wonderful job with.

 

The journey to the platinum in Valhalla is actually a simple one. Well actually it’s really simple if you follow a guide, you could just spam X for about two hours and just serve the drinks in the right order and make safety saves. I’d strongly advise against that though – you’d be swindling yourself out of a great experience – just follow a guide for specifics like getting orders right, or save before a shift like I did so you can reload if you make a mistake. I’d just advise looking up what’s potentially missable to save yourself from spoilers.  Look up what you have to do to make all the cameo characters from 2064: Read Only Memories appear in the bar. Then consult a guide for cleanup. There is one tricky trophy, which comes in the form of an R-Type like mini-game with some bullet hell sections – which might really test your patience (it did mine,) but if I can get through them after not sleeping for thirty-odd hours, then you absolutely can do it too.

 

I really loved this – but whether or not you would, absolutely would depend upon you, the reader, and your own preferences. If you played 2064: Read Only Memories and enjoyed that, then I think there is an enjoyable time to be had here. Even if you didn’t like 2064, I feel like this game is different enough that it’s worth trying out. I am admittedly not very well versed in Visual Novels, and this game is essentially a hybridised version of a Visual Novel and a Simulation experience, but for me it did what good stories often do – which is leave me wanting more.  

 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

I didn't quite expect to enjoy that game as much as I did - but there we go I did. That's basically the equivalent of reading a book almost entirely in one sitting - I mean, I always planned to power through regardless, to do it for the Trophies to fight cancer event - but I didn't quite expect almost none of the experience to be boring - so in a way I'm really glad it hooked me the way that it did.

 

I can't promise everyone else would love this the way that I did - but I really did have a surprisingly good time with this.

 

I feel like I really have to thank @gruffiiti for this one - if you hadn't of let me known it was on sale - I don't think I probably would have noticed - and as a result would have taken much longer to actually get around to playing this one. So thank you for the heads up on that one.

 

You might like this @YaManSmevz - what with you being a Bartender and all - you'd probably also understand some of Jill's frustrations, and probably chuckle at some of her inner monologue moments - it just depends how willing you are to be just reading for most of your playtime I suppose. Well - that and the fact it might be a bit of a busman's holiday for you ( I don't know if you have that saying in the states).

 

@realm722 - I actually went on your profile before writing this to see if you'd played it - because I thought if you hadn't you'd absolutely enjoy the majority of this I expect, and I would have recommended it to you - then I went full sleuth mode and tracked down your review of this (great by the way)...... I honestly worried that you wouldn't have enjoyed it, because I know you weren't the keenest on 2064: Read Only Memories - so I was pleasantly surprised that you and I played the game almost identically, and loved it almost identically - even almost down to the playtime. Ironically - the thing you really didn't like, was one of the ones I did - in the removal of choice. So that's kind of funny when you think about it. I need to drop a comment on your thing about Objective Reviews as well by the way, that was another very interesting read.

 

Catch you in the next one folks!

Edited July 24, 2022 by rjkclarke

[The_Kopite]

5 hours ago, rjkclarke said:

  On 12/1/2021 at 11:39 AM, YaManSmevz said:

You are correct - and it sounds like Horizon Zero Dawn just got a violent shove up the backlog, that's actually a huge motivator. And also I never really thought Life Is Strange would be my thing, but I might have that twisted..

Horizon Zero Dawn and Life is Strange are great in very different ways, especially Horizon. Well worth a play through, really intriguing story too. Just my thoughts.

 

5 hours ago, rjkclarke said:

Isn't it just! I feel for you on that one......

 

....... Once it catches up with you it gets to be so tough right.

 

I find I can barely function like that - it just gets so tough to even do the easiest things.

Yeah absolutely. I've had a day recently where I got 1 hour sleep the night before, yeah it's not fun.

 

5 hours ago, rjkclarke said:

Please do - I'd like to hear it.

 

I will also let you know mine once I've given Aladdin and Beauty and the Beast a watch too. Although - I'm far from Aladdin's biggest fan, I actually like the third Aladdin film more than the first, I think that was called The King of Thieves?

 

I guess I'll just have to try and get funding from somewhere and make my own version of Hunchback of Notre Dame then haha. It's one of those bucket list films for me, that if I somehow did manage to break on in and become an actual film-maker that I'd love to make my own version of, because the book is fantastic.

 

Ironically, another one I'd love to make has also been destroyed by Disney which is Doctor Dolittle, some of those books are excellent, but there hasn't been a decent screen outing since the 60's, I've always wanted to write a big screen version. I've written a few treatments for it, and kicked around loads of ideas in my own head, but then the terrible RDJ film was announced, so I thought even on the incredibly slim off chance I could have gotten that off the ground, it definitely isn't happening now haha

Definitely will! 

 

Sweet, looking forward to it! For me, Aladdin is my favourite Disney film. Always liked the songs, the characters, humour etc. Watched Return of Jafar back in the day which was decent, don't think I ever got around to watching The King of Thieves though I know Robin Williams returned to play the genie.

 

Hey, no problems with having a bucket list. Got to dream eh?

 

You know, Doctor Dolittle is one of those films I've never watched. Yeah I'm quite bad with missing classicly regarded films lol

 

5 hours ago, rjkclarke said:

If there a word limit on them? Because I'd probably go way over them, without actually meaning to haha

 

Thanks though! I'd love to take a crack at writing one at some point.

 

Congrats on getting the guide off for review - and the platinum obviously, now you've gotta get to 249 so you can jump right on in with Resident Evil 2!

I've never encountered any feedback about a word limit personally.

 

Yeah you should go for it, honestly I think you'd be great. It takes a bit to learn how to create one, what structure the guide team are looking for etc but it's fun!

 

Yup, that's the plan! Just platinumed Day of the Tentacle earlier and need to get RE7 Madhouse run started to wrap up that platinum. Going to be hard I'm sure.

 

5 hours ago, rjkclarke said:

It comes to something when one of the most enjoyable trophy lists in a Final Fantasy title comes from Final Fantasy XIII-2 of all things, In my opinion obviously.  That's a great trophy list, pretty much none of it felt like an unnecessary grind. 

 

Fingers crossed that yes they do a better job with the Pixel Remasters - and that they don't just do 1-6 all in one trophy list, that'd be disappointing. I want a platinum in each one!

 

Yes- FFX-2 was a real gaming nightmare in that regard. It's really lucky that you don't have to get 100% in one complete playthrough, or I might have been a weeping mess crying in the fetal position

Final Fantasy XIII 's trilogy I did quite poorly in terms of trophies, but then I wasn't really going for platinums back then to be honest. 

Oh don't give Square Enix any ideas, if they gave only one platinum for all 6 of the games that'd be a gaming travesty!

 

Very lucky! ahem....

 

5 hours ago, rjkclarke said:

Well Grim Fandango isn't long, so it might be one to play with your limited time - and yes I love it, I've played plenty of good and bad point-and-click adventure games, and I'd definitely say that's one of the really good ones.

 

Well as you don't mind playing a 100% game keep the option open then.

 

I definitely think there's a lot of good games you can miss out on by avoiding games with just a 100% altogether. Although there have been plenty of times where I've played a 100% list and thought surely this could have a platinum.

 

I suspect I'll think that after playing Mars: War Logs, which I'm probably going to start later.

Yes you seem like you are an afficiando of the point and click adventure games genre, so I respect your recommendations.

 

True, it's a hard one sometimes. Games like The Simspons Game, X Men Arcade are classics and though it's a pity they didn't have a platinum, it was still very fun to play them regardless. 

 

Mars: War Logs, never heard of it. Another point and click adventure?

 

5 hours ago, rjkclarke said:

WSC Real 09 was a banger - and so was WSC Real 11 - I still play it occasionally, in fact I was world number one on the online leaderboards on that game, for about a week or so, which is mental actually, thinking about it. Although probably only about 5 people played it to be fair haha. Even now that Snooker 19 is out, I occasionally play WSC Real 11, Snooker 19 though is also pretty excellent by the way. It's got some really satisfyingly accurate ball physics.

 

Stephen Hendry is definitely top 3, Number 2 for me, just behind Ronnie O'Sullivan - Hendry was an absolute animal. Watching him play in the 90's at his peak was like watching a really evil, vengeful shark that had smelled blood. He was an absolute machine, just picked people apart.

 

If you could transplant his will-to-win into any athlete, they would absolutely thrive in their chosen sport. 

 

Wow that's a really impressive achievement! Kudos! Hows the trophy list for Snooker 19? I do enjoy my sports games when the trophy lists are reasonable.

 

Yeah absolutely. Everyone had raved about Steve Davis before he came along, then he took his world championship record and the new king was around. O'Sullivan is great too.

 

100% agreed.

[YaManSmevz]

On 12/1/2021 at 0:07 PM, The_Kopite said:

Yeah go for it! You would definitely write great guides! I'll look forward to it!

 

Seconded!

 

6 hours ago, rjkclarke said:

I know where you're coming from with that one man - I've still got five swaps in the bag but I'm thinking of maybe using some - I keep forgetting I've put quite a lot of long games on there, so I ought to think about taking a few off.

 

Grim is like a 12 hour platinum though from what I remember, so you could always sub it in for a longer one, or just do it anyway. I'm pretty interested in what you'll think of Grim Fandango - it'll be interesting to see if Glottis cracks you up as much as he did with me.

 

You still have RE5 on your list on the challenge right? I know @Destructor-8 was playing it fairly recently - and I asked Destructor if he wanted a hand with it because you and I were planning to do it ourselves at some point, so if we can find one other person to give us a hand, we can probably get those versus mode trophies knocked out fairly quick sharp. So That'd be one less thing to worry about for the challenge.

 

I have all my swaps too, and I think I'll be bustin them out this or next month, as I've got a few quicker games on deck. I'd like to see how long I can go without using them, though... last time I busted them out last minute, and while I did complete all my games, it was quite a photo finish!

 

I'm excited for Grim! I got it really cheap. The Día de los Muertos vibe grabbed me right away, and when I looked into it more and saw how funny it seems to be, I was sold.

 

I do indeed have Res 5 and I am all about that! I've been cherry picking easy things here and there until I'm ready to start tackling it seriously, but when y'all are ready just give the word! I'll finish my playthrough so I can have the controls down and we can handle business?

 

6 hours ago, rjkclarke said:

That's gotta be quite the headspin that one - those two control types are so different - that'd be so jarring. I reckon I'd be trippin pretty often and expect to be able to just kill a target and then drive off on a BMX like in San Andreas.

 

Am I the only one that uses the BMX's far more often than I should in San Andreas? I know they're much slower, but I just find something so satisfying about using them.

 

Speakin of controls! It really is. Sometimes I'll have a split second where I'll either be playing Hitman 2 and wonder why the auto aim targeting isn't working, or be playing San Andreas and wonder why my intuition isn't working?

 

I like bikes too! I didn't mind the lack of speed either, for me the only real downside (other than potentially flying off, of course) was not having the radio. Which reminds me, I gotta get my biking skill up so I can knock that BMX challenge out!

 

6 hours ago, rjkclarke said:

Well the monthly update posts you're doing show how much progress you've made with actually cutting a big hole in your backlog. I saw your thing of getting under 500 unearned trophies, and was like "yeah he's got this" I want to do that myself, I'm close-ish, and if I go on a big DLC hunt I could probably get that done, so perhaps I ought to approach it like that.

 

Thanks! I'm trying to knock out as much as I can - as of right now, while of course I wanna keep tryin on new games and such, my top priority is finishing as much of what I've already started as I can, and then go from there.

 

I say do it! Give it the old college try (whatever exactly that means). It's a good feeling watching your unearned trophies number dwindle, and I'll bet you'd make a huge dent in a fairly short amount of time!

 

6 hours ago, rjkclarke said:

I'd love to work for Night School too.

 

It certainly seems appealing when you hear writers/ animators talking about how fun the creative process is. Which it is, but there's a double edged sword that goes along side that.

 

I've got admittedly a fairly limited experience of this, so my experience isn't exactly huge on this one, so far at least. But  I think when it comes to writing like that you sort of have to detach yourself a little bit, otherwise when things don't quite go right you can get sucked into a black hole of negativity. I actually went into that a little bit in my Broken Sword 5 review if I remember right. That game dug me out of that black hole of negativity.

 

Or if you don't quite have control over the thing you've created - it can also go disastrously wrong. If someone completely misinterprets the thing you have written, which happened to me, all the way back making a short film about five years ago now, and goes and makes something that's completely the opposite to what you imagined in your own head it can be equally disappointing. 

 

I don't know if he did before he died, but Goran never saw the feature film that he wrote - because he knew that it wouldn't be anything like how he'd envisioned it whilst writing it, so he didn't see the point in watching it, as he felt like by that point - it wasn't his anymore.

 

Oh, absolutely, just deadlines and edits alone! And as you say, sometimes things aren't going well and you can start doubting yourself, and oh the snowball that can build!

 

I used to write music, and I remember there being such dizzying creative highs - there's nothing quite like that "Eureka!" moment when you're crafting something that is in some way artistic - but some lows that really require some unwavering determination and confidence.

 

I was gonna touch on something your mentor said that I heavily identified with, the bit about not worrying about stealing. Sometimes I would start something with a piece by somebody else in mind, and not that I wanted to replicate it, but wanted to maintain the same vein. However, it would always end up completely different, just sounding like some crap that I made. Initially this bothered me, but eventually I realized what a good problem that is to have! Er... I don't know if that's applicable or not, but oh well. It's already on your forum AND YOU'VE ALREADY READ IT MWAAHAHAHAA!!

 

2 hours ago, rjkclarke said:

I Went To Valhalla & All I Got Was This Lousy New Platinum

(Disclaimer: Platinum Definitely Not Lousy)

 

Platinum #340

VA-11 HALL-A (PS4)

 

.

 

Firstly, I love picturing you voicing all your characters. I need to get back to FFIX so I can tell you what the characters sound like to me?

 

I saw that you were playing this! 'Cyberpunk' and 'Bartender' being in one title definitely made me go "huh!" Also, when you wrote 2064 my dyslexic ass thought you said 2046 and I thought "how the hell did they make that movie into a game??"

 

Sidenote: I loved that movie, but never got around to seeing In the Mood for Love. I am uncultured swine?

 

I like how you describe the gameplay, and the effect it has on you where you start out sneaking looks at recipes like "crap, am I doing this right?" to cranking out things nonstop without a second's thought while entertaining your guests. That really is a great microcosm of having that job long term. Then again, I suppose that's any occupation really!

 

Good to see you gushing over Jill and her story - it may have in and of itself made a sale! The Dorothy character you mentioned sounds like she was handled well, which makes me glad - I played a game earlier this year that I thought was excellent, until it featured a similarly creepy element in its twist that was not at all given the serious examination it deserved. Happy to see that kind of subject matter being discussed in an honest, healthy way!

 

I don't think busman's holiday is a thing in the states - it should be though, as that's very apt! I dunno, I loved Overcooked and that isn't entirely dissimilar from what I do for a living so who knows! Don't think I've ever played a Visual Novel game before, but this could be as good as any a place to start!

 

Great work as always, homie?

 

18 hours ago, Shrooba said:

I'm back from the dead and I haven't forgotten to check out your Hue review! I'll try to catch up with all your other reviews through the coming week but for now I wanted to check out this one since I did promise after all!

When you mentioned the gameplay mechanics-- the concept of traversing through varying environments with different colours-- it reminds me a ton of Portal 2. It introduced this cool concept called the gels; you've got orange, blue, and white respectively. Portal is a platformer game with (and you'll find this very shocking) portals in it, which are your main method of transportation, alongside monentum-- but gels really took that idea of momentum and took it to a whole new level, because the orange gel drastically increased your running speed, blue allowed you to bounce a certain height depending on the height you dropped from, and white allows you to place new portals, making you think more outside the box.

I'm not sure how closely this links in with Hue's gameplay, but it's cool to see that the overall concept of colours is intertwined with the gameplay itself. Funnily enough, it's shared through both Hue and Portal, which are both puzzle/platformers as you said! Interesting that this concept can be carried through the mediums of both 2D and 3D! I've got this from the PS Store recently, so I'll definitely check it out at some point!

 

Aayyyy, back from the dead in style, I daresay!

 

I actually ended up buying Hue on the strength of Mr. Clarke's fine review!

 

Okay, that and the fact that it was on sale for like two bucks?

 

You're makin me want to dig up a copy of Portal 2 for PS3, I played it for a bit with a buddy on the 360 and had a ton of fun!