Popular Post Amaterasuthewolf Posted June 20, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 20, 2023 #79: Platinum Duck Difficulty: 2/10 Enjoyability: 8/10 Despite its simplicity, it's a fun little platformer that reminds me of the glory days of flash gaming and Newgrounds. 11 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post percy547389126yv Posted June 21, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 21, 2023 #2,572 Miracle Snack Shop 11 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Mr_Fluffy_Pants_ Posted June 21, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 21, 2023 159 - Access Denied 11 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Jamescush147 Posted June 21, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 21, 2023 Platinum 393 Super Sleuth Unlock all trophies 55.48% Common Platinum in 1 day, 5 hours Another Mystery game in the can. And no I'm not gonna spoil it. 16 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post ShinigamiSensei- Posted June 21, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 21, 2023 #237: CANDLE: The Power of the Flame Completionist Collect all trophies to unlock the platinum trophy. - 50.41% COMMON - Enjoyment: 5/10 Difficulty: 2.5/10 Top#50: Fastest Platinum Achiever 5 Hours, 51 Minutes 14 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Suminya Posted June 21, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 21, 2023 #365 - Psycho-Pass: Mandatory Happiness Trophy Complete You have obtained all trophies. #366 - Star Melody: Yumemi Dreamer おーるくりあー☆ すべてのトロフィーを取得した 13 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Bean_Cove Posted June 22, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 22, 2023 yep i really did this... its my canon event #137 - DC League of Super-Pets: The Adventures of Krypto and Ace #138 - Paw Patrol: Mighty Pups and finally #139 - My Friend Peppa Pig 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Caldor2K2 Posted June 22, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 22, 2023 #152 - Final Fantasy III This was actually my first time really spending much time with FF3. Dabbled with it a bit back in the late 90s or early 2000 with the early NES emulation and fan translation but never amounted to much. Never got into it in 2006 when it came to the DS for the first official release in the West. Final Fantasy 3 plays very similar to the first game, ditching MP for the cast per spell level system again. Levels have returned, and such the need to overly grind to increase stats is gone as well. The job system makes its first appearance here, albeit limited to what the other games do with it. Most jobs have unique skills, but can't be used unless you stay with that job. The story I thought was nothing special, better than FF1, but lagging behind FF2. There were no surprises and just felt dull and boring at times. The job system basically allows for the game to be played in various ways, and probably no two players will do it the same. I myself never really used any magic except when needed, but used the weapons that cast instead. There were a couple gimmick dungeons as I call them requiring you to shrink or turn into a frog to enter. So glad these were gone from future games. Trophy wise this game is just like all the other pixel remasters, collect all the treasures, encounter all enemies and visit all locations. These can be missed so you'll want to be careful of that unless you feel like doing another playthrough. All in all not a terrible game, and was interesting to play seeing the changes the series underwent over the years. 25 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Mr_Fluffy_Pants_ Posted June 22, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 22, 2023 (edited) 160 - Tacoma PS4 This game is free for ps plus extra as of Tuesday. Very quick and easy platinum. No skill involved either as it’s just a walking sim type game. Shout out to @Optinooby who made a great guide, which is also 33% faster then the other guides on YouTube. For anyone interested you can find his guide here: Edited June 22, 2023 by Mr_Fluffy_Pants_ 18 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post DesmaBR Posted June 22, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 22, 2023 #207 Friends Forever Unlock all other trophies in My Friend Peppa Pig I like getting trophies ironically. Some games, I've brought just for the funny. I saw a game called "Monkey Kong" on the PS Store, and I brought it and got 100%, just because the name was funny. So I was looking to get this Peppa Pig plat whenever the game hit PS+ Extra, because haha funny. ... But now I am floored. This game floored me. I was not ready for it. So in this game, you create your character and then barge into Peppa's house. Ok, right to the point. We meet Peppa and then we can go have some fun. But for some reason, Peppa just does not want to do anything. Every time I want to do something, Peppa would just point in the other direction and say "Let's go over here!!" If I listened to her, I'd still wouldn't have the plat. Personally, I never really watched many Peppa Pig episodes, so this was my first experience with the series. And I gotta say... this ain't that bad. Nothing I'd watch on my own, but if I had kids and I sat and watched some episodes with them, it wouldn't be the worst thing. I've watched a lot of Saturday Morning Cartoons when I was a kid, and I assure you, there are much worse out there. There's even some incredibly bizarre stuff that pops, like how the character just have an attack and fall to the floor whenever they laugh. One particular scene especially baffled me in a pretty amusing way, but I don't wanna spoilers so I'll refrain from talking about it. Even characters like Peppa have a bit of sass to them, which can make for some interesting events. So you know, not the worst thing... But there are almost 400 episodes of it, so I can see that being an issue. As for the game tho, this is not great. Absolutely not worth any money. Ok, maybe if you have a small child, and you plan to play this game once with them every week (at least)... but that'll be an issue for the adults. Of course, kids are pretty into watching the same episodes of a series over and over again, so I can see the appeal for them. There's even some light RNG that changes things somewhat (Which might be an issue for the speedrunners here) If you have Extra and really feel like getting this plat, go for it. Just don't spend actual money on this game. 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post DrBloodmoney Posted June 22, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 22, 2023 575 718 The Outer Worlds A 2019 WRPG from Obsidian, The Outer Worlds took a familiar gameplay model - that most notably associated with Bethesda's Fallout and Elder Scrolls games (and which Obsidian themselves had already dabbled with in the form of Fallout: New Vegas) - and transposed it to a more contained, much smaller, yet far deeper (and less prone to bugs and jank) setting. Set in an alternate future of 2355, in a timeline that diverged from ours in 1901, wherein William McKinley was never assassinated, and as a result, Teddy Roosevelt was never elected, and never broke up the "mega-corps" of their day, two colonisation ships - the Hope and the Groundbreaker - were sent to a small, 6-planet star system called Halcyon... funded by "The Board" - a collection of mega-corporations, and filled with people looking for a fresh start. While the Groundbreaker made it and settled the system, the Hope was lost... ...until eccentric (and possibly full-blown-mad) scientist Phinias Wells discovers it 80 years later. Unthawing a single occupant - the player - he informs them of the reality of life in Halcyon... and how the whole colony is falling to ruin by the incompetence and idiocy of the corporate governance, and sets in motion a plan whereby the player can help him revive the remaining Hope colonists... ...for him and the good of the colony... ...or for the Board, depending on what the player decides to do! As said above The Outer Worlds is a specific type of game - and one that shares its gameplay loop, visual template and "game feel" with very specific games: namely the Bethesda Fallout and Elder Scrolls games, and Obsidian's own foray into that world - Fallout: New Vegas. A lot of the basic principles of the game are directly analogous to those games, and so the best way to approach a write-up, is to look at the differences, rather than the similarities. The best way I find to look at The Outer Worlds, is to consider this: if the quality of those games is a finite amount of water... then Fallout and the Elder Scrolls are a vast puddle, and The Outer Worlds is a narrow but deep well. There is about the same amount of "liquid" in both, but one is a mile wide and and inch deep, and the other is a foot wide, but just keeps going down and down. If Fallout and The Elder Scrolls are the "No Man's Sky" of this genre, then The Outer Worlds is the "Outer Wilds".(Hows that for some name-brand confusion!) Plot and writing-wise, The Outer Worlds is, with the exception of one other "Bethesda-model" game - the equally "smaller-but-deeper" The Forgotten City - the best written one. In comparison to those bigger games, The Outer Worlds is, as said, much, much smaller in footprint, however, the actual amount of writing in the game is a significantly smaller drop off by volume than the land-mass or the mission list. Conversations for virtually every encounter and certainly every mission, are distinctly more malleable and significantlylonger and more involved than any I can recall from any of the "Big" games of this nature. Even Fallout: New Vegas - certainly the "wordiest" (and best written) of those bigger games - has a lot of writing, but it is generally functional, rather than flavourful in nature. It exists either as a mechanical function of the game, or to flesh out the lore of the world, or, ideally, both. Now, don't get me wrong - those things are very important - but in The Other Worlds, the writing rarely feels like an "info dump" in the same way, because the extensive dialogue is not only mechanically functional (affecting the numerous possible outcomes of a quest, virtually every one of which has multiple possible paths,) and giving significant world-building and lore... it is also adding much more flavour, in the sense that it is also much more character-driven... and it is funny. The world The Outer Worlds takes place in is an absurdist, commercial dystopia, run my mega-corporations, but unlike most cyberpunk style corporate dystopias that share this broad idea, these Mega-corps are demonstrably and overtly stupid. They are run run by overtly stupid and/or unashamedly and transparently evil and maniacal people. It's a world more resembling Brazil (the movie, not the country!) than Bladerunner. This results in a general tone - and specific dialogue - that is overtly funny in its crassness and devaluation of human life, and the use of HR "corporate-speak" taken to the Nth degree, and practically (and in some cases literally) turned into a pseudo-religion, is really cleverly written, and manages to remain pretty funny all the way through. Everyone the player meets is somewhere on the spectrum between insane, evil, and snivelling corporate sell-out, and lives in a world that sees humans as a resource no more (and usually less) important than the cans of Saltuna they produce. Obsidian do a lot with this - they keep the jokes working far longer than most writing in games would - but do another smart thing in terms of comedy... they let the player be stupid. There is an option in the game, if the player makes their character have a below average "intelligence" stat from the start, to open up special "dumb-guy" responses... and I absolutely encourage every player to do this! The "Dumb Guy" responses tend to result in some of the funniest lines and reactions in the game - and its actually genuinely impressive that the writers are able to keep the narrative going, and account for these all the way, while keeping the main thread chugging along! The basic gameplay is familiar to anyone who has played a Bethesda game, and as such, I won't go on about how the missions are structured per-se, but instead, concentrate on the biggest differences between the Fallout and Elder Scrolls games, and The Outer Worlds. For starters, the narrative, as said, is far more variable - and more importantly, feels robust in the way it is variable. In Skyrim, as a counter-point, a player can guide the narrative, but it often feels rickety and haphazard as a result. Because the design-philosophy of that game is quantity, rather than quality, the way the story varies is generally by simply having so much content, that the players narrative is shaped by which missions they encounter, not necessarily how they approach doing them. They can choose to simply kill someone, rather than do their mission, but generally, that is the end of it. Some missions will become unavailable, but it doesn't affect too much beyond that. It feels more like the player is "breaking" the narrative, than "shaping" it. In The Outer Worlds, on the other hand, virtually all playthroughs will result in finding the same basic missions... but the way they choose to approach and "solve" them is far more important to how the narrative plays out. It doesn't really feel like the player is "breaking" anything, no matter how they choose to approach the game - it feels like because the game is smaller and more contained, Obsidian were able to really drill down on virtually every possible scenario, and write reasonable, smart ways out of every thing the player could do, that still make sense for the overall narrative. As an example - in one of the two (very good) DLC add-ons to the game, there is a long-running quest involving two principle characters, whom the player can chose to align with, or switch allegiances to, as it develops. If the player kills one of these principle characters before that quest concludes, another character will actually step in, after some time, to take their place... ...but Obsidian don't simply make them a "stand-in". In that scenario, the entire premise of the original narrative is recontexualised into something else - the motivations of the original quest-giver are revealed as being different than if they player hadn't killed them... and the game finds a way to keep going, on a whole new level. This isn't "further info" that feeds into the other possible path - it's a different path, where the players past actions and the narrative's past, are retrofitted correctly to account for tier new path. It's schrodinger's narrative - it is neither ne, nor the other, until it needs to be. It's really smart, and actually, gives the player a real insight into just how malleable the narrative is. There are entire, long, interesting conversations and lore that would almost certainly be missed by the majority of players there... and finding it tends to suddenly make them realise: "Shit, how much stuff is there in the rest of the game, if I start just doing odd shit I hadn't thought of?!" Another major way the game diverges, is in the lack of an overall map. Rather than a single, unified world, the player has multiple smaller locations to visit. These are still "open world" in the broad sense - there are still optional areas to find, to loot, to fight in... but they are much more contained than a Fallout or an Elder Scrolls map, and as such, feel a bit more bespoke and hand-crafted than those bigger game maps do. These are are "warped to" via use of the player's spacecraft: The Unreliable. The Unreliable acts as a base of operations, a hub for the companions (more on them later!), a mode of travel, and a sort of "regrouping" area, where the player can talk to the Ship's AI, and get information, advice... and a lot of pretty funny back and forths. The biggest difference in terms of these kind of games, however, is the way companions function... in the sense that they are much closer to how companions work in the Mass Effect series, than in Fallout or the Elder Scrolls franchises. Companions in Bethesda games (and Fallout: New Vegas) are always a good source of interesting lore, and here, they are no different. However, in those bigger games, they had a tendency to be relatively useless in combat, and a little unwieldy. They always felt rather superfluous to the actual narrative, and could be as much a curse as a blessing when exploring, due to the increased flimsiness of the game engine when dealing with AI companion' movements etc. Here, however, companions are one of the highlights of the game. The player ends up recruiting (if they chose to) 6 different characters, and each is funny, well implemented, have genuine things to say on mission, and are actually useful in a fight. Companions are worth taking on every mission - they can fight, of course, but they also add benefits befitting their backgrounds. The Outer Worlds actually surfaces and leans into its "gamified" elements - it is not shy about them, and will show, for example, the exact "perception" requirement to pass a specific speech check, or the exact "lock-pick" requirement to open a safe, or the exact "lie" stat required to... well... tell a lie and get away with it. Taking specific companions on the players part will give them bonuses to these attributes, and so because they can only take two at a time, it benefits the player to really consider what kind of task they are going to do, or how they want to do it. If they are going to be talking their way through things, best to bring someone who boosts their lying skill. If they are going to be sneaking, maybe bring someone who boosts hacking, or lock-picking. If they are going to be shooting, best bring your friendly, homicidal cleaning robot, who douses enemies in toxic detergent! These companions also provide a lot of good comedy, in the form of flavour dialogue on regular missions, of their specific character missions (essentially, the "loyalty" missions from the Mass Effect series)... ...as well as a lot of great back and forth between each-other, particularly on board the Unreliable. Their quarters are right next to each-other, and they need to share a kitchen and a bathroom... and you're going to hear exactly how much trouble that causes! Gameplay in The Outer Worlds could, of course, feel shallow, given that it is using a design and gameplay model usually associated with huge, open-world games, and applying it to a smaller area, but it works, primarily because of the almost complete eradication of the biggest drawback those massive worlds entail: bugs and "open-world-jank". Fallout and The Elder Scrolls are - let's face it - riddled with bugs, and while most are non game breaking, and simply result is some chuckles, The Outer Worlds manages to basically appear big-free, because the size is small enough that the game doesn't groan under the weight of itself... and because the comedic tone means that even where some "jank" does creep in, which would result in unintentional comedy in the other games, it feels fine, because the overall tone here is deliberate comedy. In some sense, Obsidian seem to have realised early on, that these kind of game, made in these kind of engines, have a tendency to become inherently funny, whether they want them to be or not... ...so they lean into it. And, it works. In terms of visuals - and world-building aesthetic specifically - the fact that The Outer Worlds is set in the distant future of and alternate past makes it virtually impossible to avoid being immediately struck by comparisons to Fallout. Fallout, after all, is also set in the future of an alternate past, and as such has a somewhat similar design ethos. Both are amalgams of futuristic tech, but with strong allusions to specific periods of design history. In Fallout's case, the 50's, and in The Outer World's case, the 1900's. Both lean heavily into the "future-but-retro" feel, but both are drawing from different eras, and to The Outer World's credit, they do a pretty good job of keeping all 50's-style, Mad-Men-era advertisement art well away from their own aesthetic, to try not to step on Fallout's turf. Having said that though, because the "future-retro" aesthetic is quite striking and relatively un-worn territory outwith a few select games, and because 1900's advertisement art is not massively different in scope to its 50's equivalent, there are some areas where it becomes impossible not to draw direct comparisons. Remember when Bioshock Infinite was drawing from a different era of design than Bioshock, but they were still clearly "of a type"? Well, the same does somewhat apply to Fallout and The Outer Worlds. I do, however, think The Outer Worlds looks significantly better than Fallout - or even any of the Elder Scrolls games - primarily because of the reduced scope. The lack of requirement for re-using assets ad-nauseum over a massive world, means individual areas can be much more distinct. The lack of requirement to look like any facsimile of Earth helps too. While there is no over-arching world, the game still allows quite a bit of exploration on the smaller individual planets the player visits, and while there aren't a huge number of them, the are all distinct looking, have unique and divergent flora and fauna, and make for a cool universe to explore. At no point during Fallout, or The Elder Scrolls, did I ever find myself simply looking at a vista, or a sky-box, and thinking "wow, that looks cool". In The Outer Worlds, that happened quite a few times. Character models look good - and more than that, different armours and outfits are fun - it's a curiously fun thing to see the companions - who feel more aligned with Mass Effect than with Fallout - still be able to be fully kitted out with any combination of armours and weapons, and to see them looking that way wherever they go. Design of things like the ships and the technological elements are fun and distinct, and suit the "haphazardly thrown together" world that Halcyon is. Audio is good in The Outer Worlds too. The score is fine - not superlative, but at worst functional, and in spots, very stirring and evocative, and the sound effects are decent. Where it excels though, is in the voice work. There is a huge amount of dialogue, and while it's not exactly on par with a straight, simple narrative game - this is no Last of Us - the voice work and acting in the game is a considerable cut above all the Elder Scrolls and Fallout games. It's closer to the other Fallout / Elder Scrolls adjacent-but-smaller game: The Forgotten City. The voice work is clearly "of a game" - it's not naturalistic, as it would be basically impossible to make some of the huge conversations in the game sound naturalistic, given that player is in complete control of every response... ...but it does a much better job with its smaller scope than any of the "bigger boy" games playing in the same turf could hope to achieve. In terms of voice work, I'd liken it closest to something like a comedic Mass Effect... and given my own love for Mass Effect, I think that's high praise. Certainly there is less scope for rousing, goos-pimply speeches - The Outer Worlds is funny, and decidedly non-serious - but the quality is there... and actually, hitting those comedic lines properly is something not all that easy, and the actors here do it fairly well. Overall, the thing about The Outer Worlds that really comes through, is that while inarguably the "smallest" of the Bethesda/ Obsidian style WRPGs to still maintain the full suite of gameplay those games afford, "small" is not really the word that best fits. The best fitting term is "compact". The experience of playing the game is certainly much faster and much less sprawling than a Fallout or an Elder Scrolls - the player is levelling up once every half hour, rather than every 5 hours, for example - but in reality, very little of the best experiences of those games is actually lost. It doesn't feel like any important section or segment of those style of games has been excised, but rather, that the gaps between the important parts have. Fundamentally, playing something like Skyrim, the player is enjoying the freeform aspect of picking up quests, choosing how to approach them, levelling up their character, getting better and better weapons and armour, meeting new people, getting to new places, and crafting their own version of a broad narrative. In virtually every one of these aspects, The Outer Worlds is not only doing the same thing... but it is often doing it better... and all it is "missing" from that gameplay cycle, is the "downtime"... the portions of those games between all those parts, where the player is simply doing fetch quests to get to the next level up, or cleaning up inventory, or doing another dungeon that looks remarkably like every other dungeon. The Outer Worlds doesn't have a massive open world, and it doesn't have even close to the same level of exploratory "I've never been here... let's just go!" aspect to it... ...but what it replaces it with is far, far more depth in terms of variability of the main narrative, far more depth in terms of individual conversations, far more variety in terms of environments and mission type, and a much more robust feeling, deeper involvement with NPC companions. It's not a game where the player wants to play a single, massive playthrough, in which they do everything... instead, it is designed to be so malleable, that it is far more fun (and much more viable,) to play multiple playthroughs, seeing the same narrative play out in different ways - and the fact that it takes 10-15 hours to get to that point, rather than 100-150 really helps to make that work. It's a really smart, really fun changing up of the existing Bethesda/Obsidian formula, and one that works very, very well in all the areas in which those games are good... ...and, it does it all, while being genuinely funny and charming. There are folks who are upset because the next "big" Bethesda game of this type - Starfield - will not be appearing on PS5. I'm a fan of Bethesda's big, open-world games... but having played Skyrim and The Outer Worlds both in the recent past, I can state comfortably that Starfield won't be the one I'm sad to see locked out of my console of choice... ...it'll be The Outer Worlds 2. (For original review and Scientific Ranking see HERE ) 16 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post DrBloodmoney Posted June 22, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 22, 2023 576 719 Killer Frequency A curious game from Team 17, Killer Frequency operates as something of an odd hybrid between Adventure Game, Puzzle Game and interactive Radio Play. The player takes the role, over the course of a single midnight-4am radio broadcast, of Forrest Nash - a former "big-time" radio host, who's career has hit the skids for some undisclosed reasons, and has found himself knocked down to running a Call-In Talk Show on the graveyard shift for KFAM - the local radio station in the small, Podunk town of Gallows Creek. Near the beginning of one of his broadcasts in his first few weeks on the job, a call is received from the local 9-1-1 operator, who informs him that she has found the town Sheriff dead and the only active police deputy unconscious. After Forrest, (and his endearingly cheerful producer, Peggy,) talk her through a dangerous run-in with an assailant - who appears to be a reincarnated serial killer and local legend, who terrorised the town 30 years prior - the operator informs them that she has to drive to the neighbouring town to get help... which will take several hours. As the only other facility with multiple phone lines and personnel with experience manning them, she asks the station to take over her duties - routing 9-1-1 emergencies to the show in her absence. As such, Forrest and Peggy - as the only two personnel at the station during the graveyard slot - must continue running their broadcast, all the while fielding the (many) emergencies that come up, owing to the return of the phantom "Whistling Man"... all the while, still running their show! Let's just address this right at the start: It's a really, really silly premise. However... it's one that just about works with the "spooks and comedy" tone of the game. Once the player (and Forrest and Peggy) get over the absurdity of it, and are willing to just go with it, it makes for a really odd, and kind of winning, gameplay loop. The tone is spooky chills, rather than scares - sort of an R.L. Stine's "Goosebumps" as opposed to Stephen King or Clive Barker - and it does manage to hit that pretty well. The narrative is helped a lot by the fact that the voice work in the game is fairly heightened and theatrical, as opposed to naturalistic. Even when in mortal danger, the performances are more like one would hear in a well produced daytime radio-play or a fictional narrative podcast than aiming for genuinely frightening. This voice work is very good too - the nature of the game means occasionally there are rather abrupt swings in tone - where Peggy and Forrest must swing back to lightness after a particularly unsuccessful attempt to save someone, for example - but the fact that the writing does a pretty good job of bridging all possible outcomes back into the main narrative helps in that regard... as does the odd premise. Forrest and Peggy are, after all, still hosting an entertainment show at the same time as dealing with the horrifying events of the night, so there would probably be some pretty awkward shifts in tone as they try to keep that train on the tracks if such a bizarre event were to happen in real life! Essentially, the gameplay boils down to relatively discrete, individual puzzles, as different people call in with their emergencies or Whistling Man encounters, and Forrest and Peggy use what information they can glean from the calls, and from items around the station, to help the people through them alive. In one case, it might be looking through a car manual, to find how to hot-wire a specific model of vehicle, in another, it might be using a town map and bits of information to figure out which take-out food provider would be able to deliver to them, and how to get a message to them using that. Finding a map of the town's "Maize Maze" to help a lost person in one scenario, or figuring out which code to put into an entry-gate security system to avoid the alarm sounding in another. The puzzles are never particularly difficult, however, there is often quite a tight time requirement for answering caller questions - so while figuring out what the concept of a puzzle is might be fairly simple, actually solving it under pressure can be quite fraught and fun. The game has no "Game-Over" state either - the story and narrative is designed to continue no matter the outcome for any individual character, and it actually stitches these together pretty seamlessly. Playing the game multiple times, I was actually quite impressed with how variable the dialogue is - there have been lines designed for a lot of combinations of outcomes, and for different player actions, and they work well for the most part. Where the game does miss a bit of a trick, however, is in the puzzle answers themselves. The puzzles are fine to solve, but once they are solved once, they don't change between playthroughs. Despite clearly being designed in such a way that the game could have worked by varying these up - making, for example, the car's serial number be different each time, requiring different methods from the manual to be used, they are actually static. The answers are always the same, which feels a bit of a wasted opportunity, and tends to sap the game of the replay value that the variable story deserves. In fact, I can't speak to the development, but I feel confident in guessing that the original intention WAS to have these puzzles be dynamic and changeable - as so many of the solutions are clearly designed in such a way as facilitate that kind of implementation - so it's possible that simple budgets and scheduling required the developer to abandon such a design, in favour of single, static solutions. The game does certainly justify repeat playthroughs in terms of narrative (indeed, for Trophy Hunters, the game requires a minimum of 2 playthroughs - an "everyone dies" and an "everyone lives"... and will probably have 3, since most blind playthroughs will result in a "some survive, some don't", as mine did!) The variable lines and non-critical choices result in some decent variation... ...but the puzzles themselves become rather throwaway once solved a single time. The visuals of the game are actually very nice. There isn't much required to be rendered really - virtually all the "action" of the game is purely in audio, (obviously,) but thats not to say the KFAM radio station isn't nice to look at. 95% of the game will take place in a single location - behind the DJ desk (so much so, in fact, that the developer adds a completely optional and non-critical activity - a stack of paper balls, and a basketball hoop above the trash, that they can tinker with while listening to calls) - but as the game progresses, the player gets access to more and more areas of the station they can explore in search of clues to help the hapless potential victims, and doing so is fun. The whole visual style is somewhat cartoonish - it's not exactly cell-shaded, but objects have a think black outline getting somewhere close to cell-shaded style, and it works nicely in a game like Killer Frequency, which is aiming for some light chills, but keeping things fairly light, and never overtly scary. There are never any fully visible humans. Even Peggy, the player's producer, (serving as tutorial, confidante, friend and helper,) is only partially visible - seen throughout the whole game through muted glass, making her not much more than a silhouette in practice. Some credit should be paid though, to the fact that while Peggy is only seen in this form, there are a pretty good selection of body movements from her, which in combination with the voice work, go further than one might expect to giving her a distinct personality, and making the player feel less "alone" in a game virtually devoid of visible people. That brings us to audio, and here, the game does very well. As said, the voice work is pretty heightened and similar in tone to old-timey radio-plays, or radio broadcast narratives, and within that context, it works. There are quite a lot of characters in the story over the course of the night, and some are better than others, but characters are distinct and specific enough that when they recur, the player can identify them clearly. The two most prominent voices are the player character - Forrest Nash, who has the bulk of the voice work - and Peggy, and both work pretty well. Forrest's rather lethargic and downtrodden persona when off-mic, and his "game-face" audio when on-air both work, and Peggy's infectious optimism makes her a genuinely winning character that helps to make a game who's format could easily become grating or stale stay fun throughout. Foley work is very good too - because the game requires all "action" to be off-screen, and because in some instances, hearing the background noise of an audio "scene" is a requirement for solving the particular puzzle, there is a level of specificity required of the foley work, on which it pretty much always delivers. The score is fine - it's mostly brooding tones, with some 80's-style synth rock underpinnings, none of which is hugely memorable, but al of which feels appropriate for the game. The one area that is perhaps a little disappointing - or at least, tends to betray the limited budget of the game - is in the diagetic music though. Because Forrest is producing a call-in talk and music show, he (and therefore, the player,) is often putting on records to cap scenes, or to fill time as he and Peggy take calls or talk off-air. There is a selection of records available (including some collectible additions found throughout the station,) and most of these are perfectly fine music... ...but they are not real, licensed tracks, and in most cases, are simply instrumental music, done in the STYLE of the 80's but don't really represent a VERSION of 80's pop or rock tracks. Were the game higher budget, with the kind of money available to licence real 80's tracks, or simply to commission 80's revival bands to record real tracks for these, I suspect the game would benefit from the increased verisimilitude, but as it stands, the music that plays feels more like a placeholder - it is representing the IDEA of specific types of music, rather than actually BEING them. On the other hand, the one song that does seem to be a legitimate, commissioned "rock track" in the game is not actually diagetic - it's the song "Killer Frequency" which plays over the closing credits... ...and I do have to admit, it's pretty bad, and probably the single piece of music in the game I actively disliked... so maybe the answer is: we didn't have the budget, so didn't try to pretend we did! Overall, Killer Frequency is a pretty unusual game - not one that is likely to be gracing any "best of the year" type lists, and isn't necessarily the kind of game that one would replay for years to come... ...but it's a small, fairly charming thing, that takes an unusual concept and a pretty bizarre premise, and turns it into something genuinely good fun, does far more things right than wrong, and for a lower budget game, is genuinely impressive in some visual and audio elements. The voice work is good, most of the humour lands pretty well, and actually, the central mystery which Forrest and Peggy are solving throughout the night is interesting, and fairly well worked out and executed. (For original review and Scientific Ranking see HERE ) 12 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post JadedDragos Posted June 22, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 22, 2023 #152 #153 Werewolf: The Apocalypse - Earthblood 9 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Bean_Cove Posted June 22, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 22, 2023 (edited) #140 - Tacoma Edited June 22, 2023 by Bean_Cove 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post NetoStyle Posted June 22, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 22, 2023 (edited) 3 NEW PLATINUMS #184 #185 #186 Friends Forever Unlock all other trophies in My Friend Peppa Pig 74.66% | Common 4 hours, 41 minutes. My Friend Peppa Pig Paw Patrol Legend Collect all trophies 50.09% | Common 16 hours, 26 minutes. Paw Patrol: Mighty Pups Platinum Pup Earn every other trophy 50.09% | Common 16 hours, 26 minutes. DC League of Super-Pets: The Adventures of Krypto and Ace Three of the hardest plats out there! ? haha. All jokes aside, I always wanted to play the Peppa Pig one just because I thought it'd be a funny plat to have. All of those three games are available thanks to the PS+ Extra catalogue, so I thought, "why not?" I played two of these games with one of my little nieces so of course she recognized almost every character in the games haha, it was a fun experience for my little niece Emilia and I so I'm happy we got these done! ? Edited June 22, 2023 by NetoStyle 8 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Quixotesque Posted June 22, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 22, 2023 I have just discovered that this threat exists, so here is my contribution. ☺️ Platinum #32: The Order 1886 I have posted my views on the game in my badly-called trophy journal that I create in my Status section. Here is the link if somebody has time to spare and wants to read it: https://forum.psnprofiles.com/profile/353743-quixotesque/?do=content&type=core_statuses_status&change_section=1 21 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post geunc Posted June 22, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 22, 2023 #156: Horizon Call of the Mountain (PS5 VR2) Difficulty: Medium Enjoyment: 8,7/10 Time: 8-14 hours 15 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post PotrikBerger Posted June 22, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 22, 2023 Lake (PS5) Anticipation - 2/5 Not that high really. Main driver for playing this was the fact its game tile was light green and therefore could be used in a challenge event here on PSNP. But I do have a fondness for narrative driven games so was more than open to giving this one a go since it became part of the subscription service. Enjoyment - 1/5 Its sooooo bad. So very very bad. Has to be the dullest narrative I've EVER come across in any narrative game I've ever played. I mean its mind-numbingly dull. I get a simple story may well be the point of the game, but it is still possible to make a vaguely interesting story whilst keeping it simple. For me this one fails spectacularly in every area. The story is almost unbelievably dull. There is nothing to it at all. No intrigue, no jeopardy, no hook and perhaps most importantly, absolutely no fun....in any moment....in any part of the game. Its almost astonishing just how bland this is. And bland is almost giving it too much praise as that implies its agreeable in a small way, perhaps even charmingly gentle. Its neither of these things. I'm struggling to think of a worse game I've played in recent times. Retrospect - 1/5 Ive re-read back the above a couple of times and wonder am I being too harsh? No, I'm not I've decided. The characters are not interesting in any way, in any moment. The story is ridiculously dull. Monotonously so. The gameplay....well they just shouldn't have bothered, its a 3 hour repeating fetch quest. Wearisome like I haven't before experienced. Even though this is an incredibly short game it managed to make me feel like Ive been playing it for a week. Even the music in it is completely unremarkable. I'm struggling to find a single redeeming feature of this title and its been a long, long time since I've played anything remotely uninteresting and soul-sapping as this. Truly awful in every single regard. 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Swotam Posted June 23, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 23, 2023 #207 - Assassin's Creed Rogue Remastered (PS4) Platinum Trophy 27% Uncommon One of the few Assassin's Creed games I never played or got Platinum in. I'd been pondering it for several years but never got around to buying it on sale, so when I joined PS+ Extra and saw it in the list I figured I should get on with it just in case it gets removed one day. The only one left now is Valhalla, but I figure if I start it now I might have it done by the time Mirage releases in October As far as Assassin's Creed games go, Rogue is more of the same if you're familiar with the way the games played in the 2013-2015 timeframe. The story is the usual linear Sequence and Memory style, although in the case of Rogue it's noticeably shorter than its peers. It differs in the sense that you end up playing as a member of the Templars as opposed to an Assassin, but aside from this as a story difference things are fundamentally the same when it comes to gameplay. The game unsurprisingly suffers from many of the issues that older AC games have, including often janky parkour, your character going entirely the wrong way from the direction you pushed the stick, jumping randomly to his death because reasons, and basically not doing something simple because the game just decides to make your life hard. It also has the Abstergo intermissions, where you're pulled out of the Animus to go do some mediocre task before being able to go be an Assassin again, something I never liked. On the other hand, it's a fun enough game to play, with the usual stuff you expect in an AC game, plus the naval combat and ship ownership that made Black Flag so popular. If you liked Assassin's Creed III, or Black Flag, then you'll probably like Rogue as well. It's a straightforward if not rather tedious Platinum with no missable trophies, and consists of the usual trophies for completing Sequences and getting 100% synchronization, but it's unfortunately hampered by Ubisoft's obsession with dumping a bazillion icons on the map. Despite the story being relatively short, the amount of collectibles and other post-game cleanup that needs to be done to get Platinum is on par with a full-blown AC release, and it really takes away a lot of the good feelings you may have had about the game by the time you're done. While some of the weapon-related and naval trophies are fun, the amount of time you have to spend roaming around the different zones picking up collectible items gets extraordinarily tedious after the first few hours, and by the time you're done it's more of a relief that it's over than anything else. It took me ~35 hours to get the Platinum, but only 10 hours of that was related to completing the story, and the rest was the often tedious repetition of picking up all the things. Still, it's a game I wanted to play so now I've played it. I'm used to the AC games and their Platinum requirements, so I expected a lot of the negatives I've mentioned and decided to play it anyway, but I'm glad it's done and I hope that Mirage finds a good balance between the older games and the newer ones. 18 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post whodeygamer Posted June 23, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 23, 2023 #54: Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart I’m so thankful this game was added to PS Plus Extra last month. As somebody who’s not a big fan of the Ratchet & Clank series, I’m thankful that the trophy list here was super easy that way I didn’t have to waste more time than necessary getting the plat. I’ll give Rift Apart this though, it’s got fantastic graphics. 25 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Mr_Fluffy_Pants_ Posted June 23, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 23, 2023 161 - Carto Fun little puzzle game. Really enjoyed the visual style. Original game mechanic as well where you move around the map like puzzle pieces. 9 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post aarnettbraun Posted June 23, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 23, 2023 The Dark Pictures Anthology: The Devil In Me (PlayStation 5) The Architect Collected all Trophies Difficulty: 2/10 Time: 13+ Hours Screenshot When Earned: 14 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Intoner_Zero Posted June 23, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 23, 2023 #190- Paradise Killer If you blended the Phoenix Wright and Danganronpa games along with Suda51's aesthetic weirdness under a vaporware fever dream, I'm sure you'd get this game. Yes. ✨May the Silent Goat walk with you in all of the cosmic heavens✨ 11 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Elvick_ Posted June 23, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 23, 2023 Platinum #290 Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin The Dark Soul Aquire All Trophies First actual Souls game to plat. I played vanilla on PC, up to the dlc/final boss but that snow one annoyed me so I dropped the game. Well combined with that and learning I missed stuff because I never summoned. I think it’s janky and weird, but I like it for some reason. I think it’s that it allows me to just veg out and clear an entire area of enemies for no reason. I had over 3 million soul level by the time I went through that one door that you need either 1m or the 4.. primal souls? I know it’s primal bonfire… idk. the way I play is very slow paced and careful, so it wasn’t that bad for the enemy spam. It was more in most places, and some are simply bad like the room up to Smelter Demon. Way too many and the aggro range is so massive enemies come from another room when they have no line of sight. lucatiel (sp) is a neat side character and I like her a lot. I wish you got a resolution or something, but I guess that’s not how these games do things. Which is why I usually lose interest in things. graphically doesn’t look very good. Some areas do look okay factoring in it’s a PS3 game ultimately. Shrines of Amana… Almana? Idk, mage spam hallway is beautiful but the level itself is so lame. this has some of the lamest level design of any game. The DLC this go around actually showed me what it could’ve been in other areas. I don’t mind the gutter honestly. It feels like it was purposefully put there and done how they intended. While much of the rest of the game feels incomplete or tacked on in a rush to get it out the door. Shout out to Platinum Chasers YouTube channel, he had a video walk through of the platinum and it was easy to follow. And the comments get stuff he missed so it was pretty easy to do everything without worry of missing anything. I just built for magic again though. I like it. music is nice. Most bosses are kinda lame. Fume Knight was the best fight in the game. It’s easy to read his moves, just a matter of doing it. The only thing is hitboxes, but I would say that more are in YOUR favor than not. Only stinker I had to deal with was that stab move he does in a combo, it would always get me when I was off to the level of his weapon. but then his fire sword would sweep right by me and not do anything so fair trade ? That other one Sir Alonne? In the same dlc was also pretty fun, but I found him harder to read. I prefer Fume Knight as a fight. I had to change from a heavy weapon to an ice rapier and took my clothes off and used that item that increased def and attack and managed to beat him first go that time. Sihn was pretty fun other than running back and forth after him. I did him and the chick before him first go with summon… s? I think I had two. Some bosses with summons are way too tanky for it to be worth it. Others it felt more fun to do that way. needing to play through 2.5 times suuuucked ass. And for what? Spells? Because they just don’t sell them until then? Lame. Why. I’ll never understand that logic. many of the flaws have been done to death. I plan to platinum the vanilla version in the future too. I already picked it up for then. I do enjoy the jank of it. the voice acting is really good. The story is… I think interesting. If I even understand it enough to get it. I’m not so sure I do. Again I guess that’s just the point of how these games tell their stories. I wish this started with the same background cg intro that the others did. Because focusing on “you” for that seemed stupid when nothing else about you matters that much beyond “you player, therefore important”. So why hype us up at the start when it makes no difference? im thrilled it’s over. My next souls game will probably be Elden ring, because I was watching people play and the summons are cool. And I want to play it. I like the games I just struggle sticking with them. Especially to platinum. But with two more under my belt and tons of time in Nioh, maybe I’ll be less terrible and actually get these done lol. I’d like to do Nioh too, but missables and collectables just aren’t fun to play with and following text guides or cut up videos makes it more annoying and stressful than it should be. I digress. I will say I’m glad you have to kill that annoying faith seller. I don’t know how you would discover she’s the usurper invading you naturally. I was looking my NG+ to see if I could tell it was her and I guess the one in the castle sorta looked like her, but it’s odd. Fuck those stupid stealth ninja things that do quick jabs and destroy the crap out of you in the windmill. I hate them so much. I’ll give the ol’ girl this, it didn’t crash on me at all. i wish we got the original intent, or a more firm designed game. Because the dlc show what the director who ended up releasing it can do when given the lead without cleaning up someone else’s game. I love the idea of the torch and lighting your way through dark areas getting a little further each time and needing to sacrifice a hand for light. But only like two areas needed it. And from what I see many don’t even use them there either. I still obsessively lit every thing I could find. Even when I could already see anyway. mindless tasks that serve no purpose are my jam I guess 24 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post RoastedPeanut Posted June 23, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted June 23, 2023 #228 - Mystery Chronicle: One Way Heroics (Vita) You have completed your Greatest Adventure! Difficulty: 7/10 Enjoyment: 10/10 Time to platinum: 50 hours (two weeks and four days) Rarity: 1.57% Well it finally happened. After lasting a bit over three years, I finally found myself knocked out with Covid. Curled up in bed with my Vita I was thinking to myself "Hmmm what should I play?". I've wanted to buy Mystery Chronicle for awhile now but kept putting it off. Finally, I cashed in my PS Stars points for a $30 PSN card and bought it. Absolutely no regrets! Mystery Chronicle: One Way Heroics may not be for everyone, but if you're a fan of rougelikes I highly recommend it. You play as a nameless character with one main goal....run! A giant wall of white light called the Shine Raid is swallowing everything it comes across. Every step/action you perform, the Shine Raid slowly moves across the screen. If you get trapped it's gameover. Initially you start with five classes you can choose from and you just need to keep moving to the right. Every couple of steps travelled equates to 1km and at intervals around the 150km to 250km mark you are approached by the fallen angel, Alma. If you can kill Alma before she retreats (or kills you), congratulations game over! Alma will retreat after a few ingame hours, which is only a minute or so in real time, before popping up again a couple of hundred km's later. If you can avoid Alma and reach the 2000km mark, congratulations game over! As you play the game over and over and over you will unlock more classes. In total there are 25 classes with three different skins. Initially only two of the skins are available but when you complete a run with that class you unlock the third skin as well as a medal for completing with that character variant. In total there are 75 character variants, meaning you will be completing the game a minimum 75 times to unlock each medal. You also unlock different NPCs which you can add to your starting castle. Some of these NPCs will offer items for sale and others will have quests. When you undertake one of these quests Alma won't appear but various other quest NPCs will pop up at different intervals on your travel. Each quest has an epilogue attached to it which will unlock upon completion and all epilogues are required for a trophy. There are also ally NPCs which will pop up randomly at different intervals. If you recruit them they each have their own epilogue for completing a run with them still alive and all their dialogue exhausted. At different intervals you will get a notification that your ally wishes to chat with you. Each ally has a different way of raising affection and triggering these dialogue scenes. Some are pretty straight forward, but one ally only raises affection when you take damage so that one can be a pain in the ass to trigger. Once you have travelled 2000km for the first time, any subsequent playthrough won't automatically end at the 2000km mark. You will have the option to continue your journey all the way to the end of the world which is at the 10,000km mark. This playthrough is by far the longest, but if you keep running and only fight when necessary it shouldn't take more than 60-90 minutes to complete. For some people, the repetitive nature of the game may be enough to turn them off from going for the platinum. 75+ playthroughs is definitely a lot. I don't know what the absolute minimum number of playthroughs would be, but I'd say it took me at least 100. The good thing is you have access to something called the dream vault. Each time you finish a run you can add some of your items to the dream vault which can then be used in any of your subsequent playthroughs. By upgrading a good sword and some heavy armour and placing them in the dream vault you can easily kill Alma when she first appears and essentially knock out a run within 5 minutes. This is especially handly when playing with some of the more annoying classes that you just want to be over and done with. Trophy wise, the most time consuming two trophies are upgrading your dream vault to 99 capacity and unlocking the extra medal. Each run rewards you with genesis stones which is the currency for expanding the dream vault. The extra medal is rewarded when you unlock every other medal in the game. There are 75 medals for finishing with each class variant, 12 for finishing with each ally, three for completing a run on different difficulties, one for expanding the dream vault to full capacity, and two for defeating certain bosses. There are also four online trophies which I would highly recommend a boosting session to complete as the online is pretty dead and one of the trophies requires winning 10 games in a row. Basically it's a head to head contest to see who can go the furthest in a 10 minute timeframe. If anyone owns both a vita and a PS4 this can be self boasted in around 15-20 minutes as the game is both cross-buy and cross-play. Anyway, for anyone that read all of this, thank you. I apologise if it isn't very well written because I feel I've rambled on quite a bit and missed a few details. I really enjoyed my time spent with Mystery Chronicle and the repetitive nature of it really didn't bother me one bit. 11 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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