Puppeter04 returns

[Jeanolt]

On 9/18/2023 at 7:03 PM, Puppeter04 said:

I aaaaaaaaaaam, tbh lately ive been feeling more alive than ever before!! 

 

it is hard for the simple reason that as nutritionist are not in public health system, and finding a company is a pain in the ass cuz there's a lot of competition out here, its either that or building ur own company which i think is way worse hahahah, but yeah finding any type of job is difficult, I'm aiming to find something remote, but damn, I'm feeling the stress coming my way like a truck at full spead no breaks.

 

how are you?! 

It's tough, although I'm glad you studied what makes you happy, and not something else you don't enjoy or find attractive. I'm doing good, trying to find more motivation, I have some finals to finish between this month and october and then I'll be a baker! But yes, for some reason it's hard to find more motivation to move and make other things and plans. 

 

Remote work sounds good, also you can always work on anything else you want without being related to nutrition. I'm currently working of something totally unrelated to bakery lol, but I enjoy it so that's what matters.

 

My philosophy is that work is never the end goal of life, it's just something that helps you work on your goals. If work is your entire meaning, then you're dependant on it and your performance.

 

In my country there's a lot of pressure to find a succesful career and it's not fair. You should always enjoy more life than work, whatever that is, personal fullfilment is more important in my point of view.

 

And that's the ted talk lol, hope you can really sort the stressful situation out, there's always better days coming😊

[Puppeter04]

On 9/21/2023 at 1:30 AM, Jeanolt said:

It's tough, although I'm glad you studied what makes you happy, and not something else you don't enjoy or find attractive. I'm doing good, trying to find more motivation, I have some finals to finish between this month and october and then I'll be a baker! But yes, for some reason it's hard to find more motivation to move and make other things and plans. 

 

Remote work sounds good, also you can always work on anything else you want without being related to nutrition. I'm currently working of something totally unrelated to bakery lol, but I enjoy it so that's what matters.

 

My philosophy is that work is never the end goal of life, it's just something that helps you work on your goals. If work is your entire meaning, then you're dependant on it and your performance.

 

In my country there's a lot of pressure to find a succesful career and it's not fair. You should always enjoy more life than work, whatever that is, personal fullfilment is more important in my point of view.

 

And that's the ted talk lol, hope you can really sort the stressful situation out, there's always better days coming😊

 

Good luck with the finals, you are gonna do good, not good but great! Talking about that, last week I went to my uni to return some books I grabbed and had the intrusive thought of "I kinda miss studying" but for now, i'm done with that, maybe next year I'll do something again cuz the adult life is a complete trap.

 

I'm glad you enjoy what you're doing, that's the most important thing, and we have the same philosophy. Never depend too much on anything.

 

Sadly, money plays a huge role in today's society, til the point that everyone's obsessed about it, but that gives me advantage to make some of that ppl mad, ngl, I'm the type of person that enters a room full of crypto-bros and ask "then why don't they print more money?!", the look on their faces? gives me life HAHAHAHH 

 

I've work as so many different things and positions that I just aim for something that keeps me entertained and I enjoy. A job is nothing to me, just a tool to pay rent and my stuff. So plan A: finding something like that. If that doesn't work I guess the plan B is being a stripper 🤣 

[Puppeter04]

The whole Unpacking review deleted itself from here before posting it so here I go again:

 

134 - Unpacking (EU version)
 

 

Moving can be stressful and exhausting experiences. The idea of having to put everything in boxes, move them and create a mess in which there are many things that are lost or damaged is not very pleasant, and myself, after 10 of those, I'm definetly paying someone to do it for me next time...

 

That's why Unpacking is such a surprise. This game turns that exasperating activity into a relaxing, fun, and humane ritual.

This game from Australian indie studio Witch Beam—the same people responsible for the fun Assault Android Cactus—originally went on sale for PC, Nintendo Switch, and Xbox platforms in November 2021 and immediately became a critical success. It won awards for best audio and narrative excellence at the Game Developers Choice Awards, was chosen as the best indie game of the year at the DICE Awards and also won the BAFTA award for best narrative. Unpacking  released for PlayStation  and a little late than expected but this whole week was when I played it. 

 

The game system of this title is really simple. We simply have to open the boxes, take out their contents and organize them in the rooms we have available. That's all. Of course, there are rules. Each object must be put in a place where it makes sense. We cannot leave clothes lying on the floor or put the laptop on the toilet. Once everything is unpacked and organized, we can continue to the next scenario.

Unpacking immediately made me fall in love with its presentation. The pixel art that defines each setting and object is really detailed and the music that accompanies each level is very calm. The sound effects of the boxes and objects when we interact with them are very satisfying. It is not in vain that this is described as a perfect game to relax.

There are no penalties for putting something in the wrong place and we can even activate a game mode in which it is valid to put things wherever we want. We can also organize things by color, size or according to any parameter we set. Doing this without effort is a quite 'zen' experience.

 

 

Although there is no dialogue and we see almost no text, Unpacking has a story. Each scenario takes place in a different year—1997, 2004, 2007, 2010, 2012, 2013, 2015, and 2018—and in each one we learn about the protagonist's life through her possessions and her new home. Unpacking is the best example we can find of environmental narrative in a video game. I'm not exaggerating. The way it tells the story is absolutely masterful. Not finding an object that we had to locate in a previous setting says more about this woman than any speech about her past.

This form of narrative also carries over to the gameplay itself. There are times when an object placed in its obvious place appears 'badly placed', but we can intuit what happened in history to make it so. The ease or difficulty of finding a place for all the possessions is linked to the narrative and the protagonist's situation at that moment in her life. It's a surprisingly clever game in the way it does things.

 

When I finished the game I felt enormous familiarity with this woman. I know what her childhood was like, her time at university, her trips abroad, we learned about a relationship that failed, we saw how she discovered her love again and much more. The ending can be quite emotional. That feeling of finding a place in the world is warm and beautiful.

But it is also true that living in a modern apartment, graduating, moving back to our childhood home, starting a family, etc. They are aspirations that not all of us can achieve. Interpreting the game as a nostalgic experience, an aspirational fantasy, or a biased look at what a life should be is up to each player.

 

Although Unpacking is an easy game that can be finished in four to five hours, it has its small complications. There are levels where you really have to work to make room for all your possessions. We can also unlock stickers for 'photo mode' by fulfilling special objectives that are only suggested in their descriptions and in the trophy list. It is not a complicated challenge, but it is fun and can extend the life of this title a little more.

 

Everything about this game is so pretty and enjoyable that I was momentarily tempted to give it a really high rating. But the truth is that Unpacking for PS4 has some problems that keep it from excellence. None are truly serious and are better described as 'annoyances' than defects.

To begin with, a problem that may be due to cultural differences. There are objects that I simply could not recognize and that can affect us when deciding their position. These may be recognizable to international audiences, but here in Spain and perhaps other countries we have no idea what they may be and have to decide their location by context or trial and error.

 

Finally, the technical problems. Although it worked perfectly almost all the time, in the last level I suffered pauses that could exceed a second in length when I picked up certain objects or moved from one room to another. Although it was nothing serious, it did break the flow of the game.

But none of these issues affected my perception of this title much. Unpacking is a wonderful work that deserves to be better known. It is a perfect game to relax after a long day of work and to discover a simple, but beautiful story in a very new way.

 

8.8/10 yup yup. Going back to Valhalla

[Copanele]

12 hours ago, Puppeter04 said:

 

To begin with, a problem that may be due to cultural differences. There are objects that I simply could not recognize and that can affect us when deciding their position. These may be recognizable to international audiences, but here in Spain and perhaps other countries we have no idea what they may be and have to decide their location by context or trial and error

Hah that was exactly my problem with some of the maps 😂 I was "huh what are these items?"

Also for some reason, in one map it asked me to put the pots under the sink. THAT'S WHERE  THE TRASH GOES, LADY! 

(pretty damn fun game though  )

[Puppeter04]

On 10/16/2023 at 8:51 AM, Copanele said:

Hah that was exactly my problem with some of the maps 😂 I was "huh what are these items?"

Also for some reason, in one map it asked me to put the pots under the sink. THAT'S WHERE  THE TRASH GOES, LADY! 

(pretty damn fun game though  )

that's exactly where the trash goes!!!! and cleaning products. Don't gonna judge but that's some lack of common sense huh hahahah

[Jeanolt]

I felt the same way about the game.

 

Now to to the real questions. When are you going to play puppeter? Are you a fake fan!😡!?

[Puppeter04]

3 hours ago, Jeanolt said:

I felt the same way about the game.

 

Now to to the real questions. When are you going to play puppeter? Are you a fake fan!😡!?

 

Come again?? 

 Hahahaha when I finish deadly premonition and fallout 3 (I like to torture myself apparently), how many years since f3 released? 10? 13? Damn

 

[Puppeter04]

 135 - A Winter's Daydream (AS) - PSVita
 

 

The people of Sometimes You are in charge of bringing curious Japanese visual novels to us. If recently we had to be an analyzer of women's panties in Pantsu Hunter, now we will be a lonely boy who goes to visit his grandmother after passing around her family's town on New Year's Eve and discovers that she has magically rejuvenated herself to the appearance of a 16-year-old girl. It is a title with an interesting premise, which attracts more for its narrative than for the gameplay in a bizarre and emotional story.

 

Although the story is a bit bizarre like... seeing your grandmother as a 16-year-old girl, it is a starting point to tell a story about the feelings of the protagonist and those around him, and manages to provide an effective and emotional side. Here it is also time to clarify in the sense of gameplay, that this title has a linear story, so decision-making will not be present to make changes to the narrative. As clarified in its synopsis, the game has around 50,000 words, so it translates to around 3 or 4 hours of reading. The story, in addition to having emotional characteristics, plays a lot with humor, especially in the situations in which the young grandmother is the protagonist.

 

 

⭐ Rating 6.5/10

 

 

 

 

136 - Without Escape (AS) - PSVita

 

 

 

The typical first-person graphic adventures were missed, yup yup, as it is a genre that is a bit obsolete and there is not much to choose from. Luckily there is always someone who decides to revive the genre and that is what happened with Without Escape, a game that was released in 2018.

The story of the development of this game is very curious, as it has been created by a single person: a young Spaniard (let's goooo) named Miguel Antonio Rivera - alias "PacoChan" - and it is also a project that has been evolving over the years. It began as a homebrew game only available on modified Nintendo DS consoles and the first versions were quite graphically improved. Later he learned 3D design and over the years he has improved the rendered scenarios in the different editions he has released, first in Xbox 360 and now on current consoles with an "enhanced" version that greatly improves the visual aspect. This whole story can also be seen in some of the extras that are unlocked at the end of the game.

 

This horror adventure places us in a random house in a random city of course, we put ourselves in the shoes of a teenager who is left alone at home when his parents go on a trip. While alone in his room, during the night he begins to hear strange noises that seem to come from somewhere in the house and decides to go out to investigate. From that moment on, nothing will be the same again.

 

Speaking of the plot, it may not be one of its strong points despite being the main engine of the game. There is no progression in the story, new mysteries do not appear or are resolved as we play, instead, it throws everything at you all at once in the final cinematic, until then we won't know what is happening from the beginning to the end. As a countermeasure, we will have multiple endings - some of them involving a speedrun - that offer us different povs.

 

As I mentioned before, Without Escape is a tribute to those graphic puzzle adventures in the style of the Myst saga. We will play with a first-person view, at no time will we see our protagonist or know his physical appearance, the only thing we will do is tour the house and the different scenarios represented in the form of pre-rendered backgrounds. This implies that we will not have direct control over the character, but rather we will move a cursor and click on the objects with which we can interact. The bad thing about this cursor is that we will only move it with the joystick, it is not understandable why touch control has not been enabled, being a game genre that lends itself to it. Totally.

 

 

The gameplay is not too complicated: we will walk around the entire house, collecting objects and using them in the appropriate places. We won't even have to use them, they will be used automatically when necessary. The puzzles are other elements that are worth it since they are well planned and we will have a good time thinking about solving them, although unfortunately, they are not very abundant., you'll be wanting more.

 

Regarding the visual section, as already mentioned, pre-rendered scenarios have evolved over the years and been refined in the different editions that have been released, which gives the game realism. It is in the sound where we perhaps find one of its biggest weak points: the melodies are good and manage to convey the feeling of loneliness and overwhelm, but sometimes they are too crushing and heavy, especially in the moments in which we have been stuck in a 20-minute puzzle, checking each corner carefully and an accelerated melody keeps playing to put our bodies in tension for a supposed danger that never comes. The sound effects, on the other hand, are very sparse and limited to when the game requires it, such as a phone ringing or knocking on doors. In conclusion, we must recognize that Without Escape is not a bad game and it achieves its objective, something very commendable considering that almost all the work falls on a single person, but even so it is not free of errors and design problems. Despite everything, it manages to leave those who play it with very good feelings and with the desire to continue advancing. For my part, I hope to see more games from Miguel "PacoChan", it must be incredible what he can achieve with a great team behind him considering what he has created alone.

 

 

 

Well... let's continue getting collectibles (AC Valhalla)

 

 

[Copanele]

On 11/11/2023 at 12:45 PM, Puppeter04 said:

If recently we had to be an analyzer of women's panties in Pantsu Hunter, now we will be a lonely boy who goes to visit his grandmother after passing around her family's town on New Year's Eve and discovers that she has magically rejuvenated herself to the appearance of a 16-year-old girl.

If one thing is certain, it's that you can never get bored by the themes in Japanese games that's parkour level of story switching!

[Puppeter04]

Okay, let's go, 30 plats gotten after the last post here, a lot of shovelware ngl, but on the days when my job asks too much I just wanted to get home and play little games to get a lil bit of satisfaction somehow. Those won't get a review unless there's smth worth talking about,  but we have great games between those, such as AC Valhalla, Metal Hellsinger, Far Cry 3 CE (last plat), and that's it, the rest of the games are "meh" ones. 🤣

Plat 136 to 144:

Spoiler

Plat 136 - MLP A Maretime Bay Adventure. 

I never thought I'd spend an afternoon playing my little pony, but I already did My Name is Mayo so I'm not very surprised here tho 

 

Plat 137 - Just a Phrase by Powgi (EU)

 

Plat 138 - Bouncing Bullets (AS) 

This game is hella fun, there are some eastasia and ratalaika's entries worth playing. 

 

Plat 139 & 140 & 143 - Daggerhood (EU & NA & AS) - it was so fun that I did it 3 times hahahah

 

Plat 141 - Mochi Mochi Boy (EU)

 

Plat 142 & 144 - Tic-Tac Letters by Powgi (EU & NA)

Plat 145 - AC Valhalla 

+120h spent in England, Norway, Vinland, Asgard, and so on

 

After platting my beloved AC Odyssey and Origins it was time to go to Nordic lands, I knew the game was huge beforehand and even tho being used to plat games of +80hrs...  damn, there were days when I felt the burn mostly with collectibles.  OR FUCKING STONE CAIRNS OR ANOMALIES.

Story-wise, being honest, as I've said before, I expected more plot twists or even a more interesting story, there're plenty of arcs but the fact that you can play them "out of order" made the story a lil unstable. 

Go here, do this, do that, be friends with this person, alliances, done, and again, and again, and again 

 

 

In this  Assassin's Creed we play the role of Eivor, a powerful Viking who at the beginning can choose whether he will be a man or a woman, who together with other members of the Raven Clan must leave their home in Norway to begin a new stage of their life in England, creating a settlement that they must grow through alliances and looting.

 

 

This settlement in Raventhorpe is an important part (or a pain in the ass) of the game since we will have to manage the place that will start with the most basic but as we obtain raw materials and alliances, new stores and shops will open to make it grow. Don't forget the cosmetics trophy, good luck trying to find which one you're missing

 

 

Within these events, OF COURSE, moments of the present are also presented with Layla Hassan (I just can't stand her)who investigates the conflict between Assassins and Templars. These segments will give you moments full of joy (ironic) with the anomalies of the Animus, and, personally, I felt that they forced the plot to connect it with the roots of the franchise.

 

 

Valhalla continues along the same path as its two predecessors, presenting a very similar game system but with some interesting new features. And although some will surely criticize that it continues to move away from its roots that had a greater focus on stealth, it still retains elements of social stealth such as the use of the hood to go unnoticed and the ability to hide, in addition to including the iconic hidden blade. I must also say that as Vikings it really doesn't make much sense to take a stealthy path as the nature of these warriors is a violent head-to-head combat but whatever.

 

 

So we are looking at an action RPG in an open world with a very satisfactory combat system since there is a wide variety of weapons to choose from (even tho I only used 3) and each one has brutal animations to kill enemies violently. The basic mechanics consist of weak and strong attacks, parry, and a sort of jump to dodge hits, plus some special abilities that can be assigned to eight slots. 

In melee attacks it is possible to customize how your character will fight, being able to choose whether to use a combination of an axe and a shield or carry a weapon in each hand, in addition to the possibility of using the bow and arrow to ranged attacks, now with the advantage of being able to shoot enemies in weak points that are highlighted and cause greater damage.

 

 

The combat system at the beginning seemed a little imprecise and meh, but as I continued advancing I adapted until it felt more natural, and although one might think at a given moment that it is very simple or repetitive, the diversity of enemies (including new classes) give it variety and it seems to me that in the end it is what is most fun of the entire experience, this even though I found some problems OF COURSE with IA in both allies and rivals.

 

 

Complementing the gameplay, the health regeneration system has been removed and it is now necessary to consume food to recover the health bar. This is an important point since the rations that can be carried in the inventory have a limit, and although it can be expanded using resources, it is something that ends up being a key factor in some complicated battles. There is also an adrenaline bar that should not be lost sight of as if consumed it temporarily limits movement.

 

 

Finally, the progression system (LIKE WHAT THE F!!!!) works based on points that are obtained by completing tasks and exchanged in a huge (and I mean huge) skill tree that unlocks Eivor's abilities and at the same time raises his/her level. There came a time when I just pressed the auto-assign button.

 

 

Enough of presenting the game, here comes the rant, biggest AC to date? definitely. A great experience for a normal gamer? Yeah. A nightmare for us? yup.

The fuck!ng amount of collectibles? hello? Do you think I don't have anything better to do than helping stupid ppl find keys, fix their marriages, or fulfill their stupid dreams? Or pilling up stones!?!?!?!?!? (Mysteries). Or shooting arrows at things, or running after a fucking piece of paper or going out of my way to grab a scroll or whatever?! (Artifacts), and I'm not gonna talk about Wealth cuz thankfully lot of it can be gotten on raids and stuff. 

 

But, let's talk about Asgard collectibles. If I hated Norway/England ones, Asgard is on a whole other level. Enough, I don't wanna remember it, if you got the plat you know what I'm talking about.  But Asgard is BEAUTIFUL except for those:D Imo, the game is a solid 8/10 for AC lovers aka me.

 

I'd love to write a post just about the characters of this game cuz bro, there's a lot to talk about but not today, this day 👇

 

DLCs, maaaaaaaaaaaaaan, roguelike addition, fantastic. I have them all but I've only played 2-3, I'll be back once I finish them all. 

 

 

 

 

On Sunday I'll be back with the other set of plats. Have fun and keep the hunt going !

[Puppeter04]

Plats 146-155

 

Spoiler

146 - MILO'S QUEST (NA)

 

147 - FULLBLAST (EU)

 

148 - ZEROPTIAN INVASION (AS)

 

149 - JUST A PHRASE BY POWGI (AS)

 

150 - MIDNIGHT DELUXE (EU)

 

151 - ENERGY CYCLE (AS)

 

152 - PEASANT KNIGHT (AS)

 

153 - MOCHI MOCHI BOY (NA)

 

154 - グリザイアの果実 SIDE EPISODE

 

155 - GRAVITY DUCK (EU)

 

 

Plat 156 - METAL HELLSINGER

 

 

wooooooooooooooow, the budget this game had and the quality they delivered?! BOOM.

 

Metall Hellsinger is a rhythm-based FPS designed around the classic formula of different successions of arenas where multiple enemies await which we'll have to defeat to progress. Anyone who has played Doom knows perfectly well what they're up against since it even maintains some of its mechanics, such as executions when we weaken an enemy. But, as I said, there is one big little change: the music (metal lovers, this is for you!!).

 

If you have played Crypt of the Necrodancer or, even better, Pistol Whip, you'll better understand what this title proposes. The idea is to shoot, reload, dodge, execute... to the rhythm of the music. Some indicators set the pace and, if you take the right action at the right time, you'll increase your streak of correct notes. When the multiplier reaches x16, the song's vocal track is activated, which features top artists that I'll discuss below cuz damn.

 

It's a very, very simple change, but it completely changes the way you play. In fact, it has taken me a long time to adapt my brain since, by default, we tend to shoot as soon as we have the enemy within range, and not when the music suits us best. Even so, it seems like a great change to me, which even has a small element of strategy when it comes to dodging or positioning ourselves on the map, or even the weapon we use.

Not only do they have different rhythms, but different recharge times or different purposes. 

For example, one of them is very weak, but it helps us maintain the streak simply by shooting, so we can use it between arenas or when we do not have any enemies nearby.

 

 

Everything is very, very well designed, becoming very addictive even if we don't get excited about the scores; something difficult since the leaderboards appear as soon as we finish a level. Furthermore, there are a lot of enemies that require different approaches, although I have been a little disappointed by the lack of variety in bosses, which vary more due to the scenarios in which we fight them than due to their design. Even so, the difficulty curve is very well designed, making these challenges always interesting. Finally, in terms of gameplay, it should be noted that each main scenario has 3 challenges that, in turn, have 3 objectives and if we complete them, we'll unlock skills for our protagonist. 

 

 

One of the most interesting aspects of Metal: Hellsinger is, without a doubt, its soundtrack. It features vocalists such as Serk Tankian (System of a Down), Matt Heafy (Trivium), Mikael Stanne (Dark Tranquility and, more recently, The Halo Effect, with the rest of the former In Flames), Randy Blythe (Lamb of God), Alisaa White-Gluz (Arch Enemy), Björn Strid (Soilwork) and Tatiana Shmailyuk (Jinjer), hence the reward for reaching and maintaining the x16 multiplier is killing demons to the rhythm of their voices. I believe that, if you are one of those who enjoy Metal all year round and not just when a new Doom comes out, you'll enjoy this masterpiece even more.

 

 

Aside from the music, which is fantastic, the sound is complemented by what seem to be the only two voice actors available in the industry, Troy Baker and Jennifer Hale. 

I cannot stop commenting on the visuals, very solid and, at times, surprising. Although the scenarios are more discreet and have more ups and downs, I liked the characters, very detailed, and even very well designed to represent their role in combat and their fighting style. 

 

 

Just play this ffs, you even have the option to make your character not be as arrhythmic as I am after 5 shots of tequila. But that's the easy way. 

[Puppeter04]

Last set of plats, I think I fkd up the order cuz I'm missing one, so probably Valhalla was 146 instead of 145 here. Anyways:

 

Plats 157-164: we are gonna assume plat 157 is another Ratalaika's entry I missed

Spoiler

158.- Super Box Land Demake (AS)

 

 

159.- FoxyLand (NA)

 

160 & 161.- FoxyLand 2 (NA & EU)

 

162.- Reed (EU)

 

163.- Little Adventure on the Prairie

 

164.- FoxyLand 2 (AS)

 

165  Far Cry 3 Classic Edition (PS4)

 

Ngl, not having to do coop trophies in this one was a huge relief, bc doing so back in the day on PS3  was a pain in the ass, bc my cousin was clumsy af. 

 

It's always great to revisit some of our fav games from time to time with a new plat to get and of course, it's always nice to see our fav psycho once again, what a GREAT character Vaas is.  This time, let's do a more "technical" review instead of an enjoyment one cuz I already did so with the PS3 version somewhere on this checklist.

 

 

Returning to a videogame that once captivated me to the point of needing to explore 100% of its content and possibilities is something that I find pleasant and worrying in equal parts on some occasions when I see that the good memory that I have of the work in question will not survive the passing of time. I could anticipate that this was going to happen with the return of Ubisoft's once-successful video game.

 

 

The return of 'Far Cry 3' does not respond to a need to visually adapt a video game from the last generation to the "current one" so that those who missed their opportunity can discover its benefits. A visual touch-up that improves the overall resolution of the game but that is not capable of obtaining 60fps anyways... This does not look better than the original version on PC, nor is this the only thing that makes 'Far Cry 3' a game that has aged poorly, because precisely in the technical aspect is where I had no problem with this FPS .

 

 

The problems with the game of Laurent Bernier and his team were already different in 2012 and with their return in 2018, new ones have been added. There is no debate about the fact that the script for 'Far Cry 3' was already as weak as the main characters years ago. It is true that he managed to give us an emblematic and memorable antagonist as he was and is Vaas Montenegro, a peaceful islander member of the centuries-old Rakyat tribe who was corrupted by Hoyt Volker, a warlord who introduced Vass to drug addiction and violence until plunging him into a state of madness from which he cannot return. This left us with a mentally broken enemy who was difficult to hate despite the atrocities he perpetrated in front of our eyes, because we saw in him the same uncontrollable destruction that we can see in a kid soldier forced to kill to survive.

 

 

In the background we also had the story of the Rakyat themselves, a tribe of warriors who see their virgin island infested by pirates who profit from the trafficking of weapons, drugs and people, giving rise to a rebellion that begins with the arrival of Jason Brody, a young rich American man who goes on vacation to the Rook Islands to celebrate with his rich American friends how good they were at being rich and American. The outcome of their story ends with the group kidnapped by the pirates of Vaas to demand a ransom for them. How lazy and dull the teenage protagonists are becomes more and more evident with each flash of genius in characters like Vass or other native members of Rook.

 

 

The generic nature of the plot in 80% of its outcomes combines well with the generic nature of the design of the open world in which we move in 2012 (and which is worsening in 2018). The presence of the now - luckily - forgotten radio towers (a repetitive, artificial and dull mechanic that Ubisoft itself popularized with quite a few licenses) continues to force us to climb these metal structures to unlock the many icons on the map that lead us to secondary missions, animals to hunt, collectibles to collect and, in general, a series of tasks that are very unappealing if you have closely followed the evolution of open worlds in recent years. Releasing this work after 'The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild', 'The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt', and even 'Far Cry 5' is something that could not go well. Well, even the latest installment of the license has notable problems in its design, but it has learned enough from its past to not repeat the most basic mistakes (thank God).

 

 

On the other hand, I have found myself extremely uncomfortable with the playability. I notice the FPS aspect is much older than I remembered and I find it exhausting to play the title for several hours in a row precisely because of this. I suppose the reason is that just as in the design of the world I have already adapted to more conscious and evolved games, with the subject of hitting shots the same thing has happened to me with the evolution of the genre and 'Destiny' as a personal pinnacle of what nice it is to shoot virtual weapons. The heaviness of the gameplay is not due to any type of realism, simply to the passage of years.

 

 

And if I have started listing all the problems that 'Far Cry 3' has (or I have with) it is because I consider that it is not worth buying this release (if you are reading this from 2018) at all except in rare cases.

 

 

Despite what has been said, there are still good ideas that I have not minded fondly remembering in the hours I have spent with 'Far Cry 3', some of them being the need to hunt more or less dangerous animals to significantly improve the carrying capacity. of the character and his inventory, just as I still greatly enjoy mechanics such as chain executions when playing in stealth since it is as spectacular now as in 2012 to chain an aerial assassination to immediately go on to stab the next enemy, then took the gun from him to shoot down two others. It's also nice to walk through the wild environments of the Rook Islands again and see that thanks to the game's artistic direction, a technical revision was really unnecessary. But if there is a 'Far Cry 3' that would be worth recovering on the new gen, it is, without a doubt, 'Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon'.

[Puppeter04]

Let's talk about Horizon Zero Dawn...

 

The game is at 96% (2 trophies of NG+ left) but I'll cover that down whenever I make it. Because I still don't know how I'm gonna defeat the last boss. 

 

Platinum 166 - Horizon Zero Dawn 

I started the game on Normal difficulty, til the last boss fight, jesus fking christ, I was cooked and lowered the difficulty, of course. 

This game is the type of game in which you have 535354 weapons and tricks to use but If you are like me, ofc you are gonna complicate your whole existence and just stick to 3-4 weapons cuz the rest of it requires too much thinking. It could have been easier if I actually learned how to use them? yes, Did I do it? no. I tend to go Rambo-mode and don't use strategy at all.

 

First of all, a shoutout to Guerrilla for their 1st open-world game, taking that into account it was a complete success. 

 

It is curious that several of the most anticipated PS4 games back then have a post-apocalyptic setting in common, such as Days Gone, The Last of Us Part II or Horizon: Zero Dawn. What differentiates the Guerrilla game from most of these games is that its setting is not set a few years after a catastrophe, but hundreds or miles of years in the future, with humans forming tribes of hunter-gatherers as if they had returned to prehistory, without knowledge of a very distant past.

 

The Earth is now inhabited by machines shaped like animals that have become the dominant species and we control young Aloy, a hunter of uncertain origin who wants to discover her past, and also the secrets that this beautiful  and dangerous world hides.

 

The first thing that surprises me about Horizon: Zero Dawn is its very elaborate narrative, which will guide our steps throughout the adventure. We could say t that the game has two stories, disconnected from each other. On one hand, the war and political conflicts of the human tribes that inhabit the world, something that has been written in great detail, creating a very elaborate lore. I wasn't too interested in this part of the narrative, and it seemed like the typical story that you can find in any other RPG, although I must admit that it is good

 

 

There is a simple conversation system in which we can choose the topics we want to investigate, and which sometimes forces us to make a decision, although these do not have any relevant impact story/trophy-wise. 

 

Where Horizon: Zero Dawn is really interesting is in its science fiction story, in the reasons why humanity has gone to waste, and now the planet is inhabited by these machines that look and behave like animals. This is the part of the game that has you completely hooked from start to finish, and everything is explained with meticulousness and the amount of detail that makes you have to take your hat off to the enormous work that Guerrilla Games has done to create a great story.

 

The desire to tell us a good story is so great that at specific moments, in some main missions, this turns against it. There are so many audios and texts that give you details of the narrative, that if you want to listen to them all, you can spend several minutes with the character standing in the middle of the stage, which ends up affecting the pace of the game at certain moments. In situations in the final part of the adventure, where they want to tell us many things, it becomes excessive turning it into a real problem.

 

The characters have not captivated me either, and here we can see Guerrilla's lack of experience creating this type of adventure or RPG, and it is surprising how little you care about all the people who are not Aloy or one of her closest friends, something which is not exploited well in the secondary missions either. The protagonist herself did not seem like a memorable character to me in terms of her personality or behavior, but the story behind her is so interesting that it makes you endure well throughout the game, and generates a certain sympathy... In general terms, it could be said that, although they have put a lot of effort into the script, some of its parts, such as the conversations, are not entirely well written, and it is difficult to maintain interest in the political intrigues of the different tribes, or in the personal conflicts of the characters.

 

Aloy - "damn, I fucked up"

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Anyways, if you are looking for a great story in this game, you will be satisfied, and it is evident both in the narrative and in many other details that it is a tremendously ambitious game, and that it was born with the intention of becoming a great saga and it did. 

 

As I said before the story and the mysteries behind the world of Horizon manage to keep you hooked on the game, of course so does the gameplay itself, which is based on something essential: perfect control. From this, everything begins to be built, and we have an action that is totally coherent with the story itself, since Aloy is a hunter, and behaves as such. 

The main weapon that we use throughout the adventure is a spear for hand-to-hand combat, which is very easy to use, with just two types of blows, and the bow, either short or long, with different types of arrows. Later we get some more weapons, such as the slingshot to throw explosives, or the stunner to place tripwires on the ground, but the variety of weapons cannot be said to be one of its strong points, and not even the situations push us to get the most out of each one of them thing I didn't do ofc.

 

Yes, the type of action it proposes is very interesting, with strategic touches and that invites you to think, observe your enemies and act accordingly. Each robotic enemy we face has its own behavior and a series of weak points and body parts that we can destroy separately, uncovering their greatest weaknesses. Before facing them, it is advisable to analyze them with the Focus, by pressing R3, and that allows us to identify important objects or resources, highlight traces of footprints, or, as I just said, see the weaknesses of the machines. Thing I did for nothing. 

 

In fact, stealth, if you learn to take advantage of it when facing human enemies, becomes too powerful, due to a very dumb AI, which means that you can clean a camp with silent executions and headshots without too much effort.

 

There are certain role-playing touches in inventory management, and Aloy can be equipped with different types of outfits, which modify her defensive capabilities against certain elements (electricity, fire, ice), and we can equip modifications on both weapons and suits, some objects that improve statistics or abilities in different ways. And I'm to tired to keep writing, when I come back with the ultra hard playthrough done we'll talk about things I missed such as collectibles, power cells and ofc DLC 

 

Aesthetically is jaw-dropping ngl, several times I just stopped and admired whatever I had in front of me, we just gotta love open world adventures!

 

 

 

Edited April 21 by Puppeter04