Madbuk's List of Unfinished Games

[madbuk]

Progress Update: #417 - Persona 4: Dancing All Night

Here is a game I had never expected to be able to play. The UI on this game is atrocious, and the fact that my vision on my left side is limited, it made playing the demo of Persona 3 Dancing practically impossible because I simply wouldn't see any notes on the left side and thus couldn't press them. Some advice I got recently made me go back to that demo, and made the game far more playable - the notes aren't random, they work in a clockwise/anti-clockwise fashion, so that lets me know when to swap my attention to the other side.

 

Unfortunately, this rule isn't always the case - the one song I tried to play on All Night difficulty was all over the place, and some of the songs on hard had double hold notes that I just had no idea I was supposed to press, but for the most part it's correct and the plat never makes you play All Night, so I didn't have to worry about that. I might try practicing it in the future for fun, like how I regularly return to Miku despite having 100%, but I don't expect to ever clear a song on the highest difficulty.

 

Initially I was cautiously excited for this game for the story mode - I had heard bad things, but I still liked the idea of there being a story connecting the rhythm gameplay, but now that I've played it... nah. Now I'm excited for Persona 5 which doesn't have that at all - it's so poorly paced (takes at least an hour to get to the first song), very predictable, and just not engaging at all. Some of the voice actors also changed from Golden and this game has taught me that Ashley Burch only has one anime voice, because she sounded identical to Mayurii in Steins;Gate lol.

 

I'll probably play Persona 5 Royal before diving into 5 Dancing, but vision/UI gripes aside this was still a very enjoyable plat and I'm eager to play more with, imo, a better OST. I'll be skipping 3 because I hear that has spoilers.

Spoiler

PS Now

NEW GAME: Altered Beast [+12] {+100%} (COMPLETE!)

 

Digital {Excluding PS+}

Genshin Impact [+6] {-37%}

NEW GAME: Persona 4: Dancing All Night [+40] {+100%} (COMPLETE!)

Tales of Zestiria [+3] {+3%}

 

Unstarted

NEW GAME: Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight [42] {Digital}

 

[madbuk]

Progress Update: #418 - 2064: Read Only Memories

PS+ gave me this game a long, long time ago (October 2018) but I never really bothered looking into it, must've been busy with other games at the time. Recently though I had seen quite a few people praise it, and I wanted an excuse to stop playing Tales of Zestiria, so I decided to download it and try it out. It... ended up being rather lackluster tbh, especially compared to all the hype people had been giving it.

 

It's not a bad game by any stretch, has some interesting characters, the art is good, the music is excellent, and the plot could be engaging when it's not beating you over the head with entire conversations about operating systems or AI or other electronic-based systems. Those conversations got repetitive and tiring and unfortunately that's almost the entire game, and the main plot gets lost in it a bit and by the end I just didn't really care anymore. It didn't help that I had my save data corrupted at the end of chapter 5 (there are 6 chapters) so I had to redo the entirety of the game. And then you have to do another playthrough on top of that, which had some fun conversational changes (because you're rude to everyone in that run), but the main plot was basically the same overall so it wasn't particularly interesting.

 

I do wonder whether my thoughts would be a little more positive if the save corruption hadn't necessitated an entire extra playthrough pretty much, but... I doubt they would be, honestly. If this game interests you it's worth at least trying it, because it's not outright bad, but I'd recommend going in with lower expectations than I had.

Spoiler

PS+

NEW GAME: 2064: Read Only Memories [+12] {+100%} (COMPLETE!)

 

Digital {Excluding PS+}

Genshin Impact [+11] {+39%}

Tales of Zestiria [+7] {+9%}

 

[realm722]

On 5/22/2021 at 5:12 PM, madbuk said:

It's not a bad game by any stretch, has some interesting characters, the art is good, the music is excellent, and the plot could be engaging when it's not beating you over the head with entire conversations about operating systems or AI or other electronic-based systems. Those conversations got repetitive and tiring and unfortunately that's almost the entire game, and the main plot gets lost in it a bit and by the end I just didn't really care anymore. It didn't help that I had my save data corrupted at the end of chapter 5 (there are 6 chapters) so I had to redo the entirety of the game. And then you have to do another playthrough on top of that, which had some fun conversational changes (because you're rude to everyone in that run), but the main plot was basically the same overall so it wasn't particularly interesting.

 

I do wonder whether my thoughts would be a little more positive if the save corruption hadn't necessitated an entire extra playthrough pretty much, but... I doubt they would be, honestly. If this game interests you it's worth at least trying it, because it's not outright bad, but I'd recommend going in with lower expectations than I had.

 

Happy to see another review on 2064 even if it's not a very glowing one. For me it ended up being my 30th platinum milestone back during a time where I was really just starting to get a feel for different games and trying out a variety of genres in general - I too picked it up via PS+ and I'll admit, I outright skipped the vast majority of the dialogue. What I did was follow a trophy guide from a YouTuber called Cheapskate or Die. Bizarrely enough - I think that made me enjoy it more than I would have had I not since the dude was pretty funny while directing tips along the way. For all the games that you'll blaze through and remember little about, what absolutely sticks out in my mind about 2064 is that bizarrely difficult "Threat Neutralized" trophy that you basically HAVE to use your d-pad for as well as "Cardinal of Combat" which was easier but came up much earlier in the game. 

 

It sucks to hear that your save got corrupted. I remember having that fear that something would bug out during the Iron Rom play-through. Having bugs and glitches can absolutely taint your experience of the game from being "eh I didn't love it but it had a decent vibe, nice music, and wasn't too long" into "I freaking hate this game it's ruining my playing time". Keep up the great work and can't wait to see what you review next!

[madbuk]

11 hours ago, realm722 said:

 

Happy to see another review on 2064 even if it's not a very glowing one. For me it ended up being my 30th platinum milestone back during a time where I was really just starting to get a feel for different games and trying out a variety of genres in general - I too picked it up via PS+ and I'll admit, I outright skipped the vast majority of the dialogue. What I did was follow a trophy guide from a YouTuber called Cheapskate or Die. Bizarrely enough - I think that made me enjoy it more than I would have had I not since the dude was pretty funny while directing tips along the way. For all the games that you'll blaze through and remember little about, what absolutely sticks out in my mind about 2064 is that bizarrely difficult "Threat Neutralized" trophy that you basically HAVE to use your d-pad for as well as "Cardinal of Combat" which was easier but came up much earlier in the game. 

 

It sucks to hear that your save got corrupted. I remember having that fear that something would bug out during the Iron Rom play-through. Having bugs and glitches can absolutely taint your experience of the game from being "eh I didn't love it but it had a decent vibe, nice music, and wasn't too long" into "I freaking hate this game it's ruining my playing time". Keep up the great work and can't wait to see what you review next!

On the bright side it only takes an hour or two to skip through back to chapter 5, and I didn't have to redo that awful arcade game again lol.

I found the touchpad easier than dpad - dpad/x button didn't feel responsive at all (I even did a stream of me playing the arcade game, and at one point I was spamming x, but you could clearly see on the stream that almost none of those inputs were being recognized.) It really did feel a bit out of place in a game so easy everywhere else.

[madbuk]

Progress Update: #419 - Tales of Zestiria

This is without a doubt the worst Tales game I have played to completion. Not only is it rather poorly balanced (I ended up having to fight the final boss when he was over 60 levels higher than me... and I had been fighting every mob), it's also just not very interesting. None of the characters stand out as being memorable, the plot feels barebones, and every environment looks pretty much the same. A part of me wishes I hadn't played Berseria already so many years ago, because that one seems to add a lot to this retroactively, but I can only vaguely remember the big connections so that's a bit lost on me.

 

The plat experience was pretty miserable too - I spent 2 days just running around in circles praying to RNG for my snack trophy to pop, and then there's a bunch of other RNG stuff to do as well. It's easy, it's just a complete slog. This game also features one of the things I hate most about certain JRPGs - if you die, you reload a save. There are some exceptions - most story bosses let you retry, but if you die to a mob or an optional boss, have fun losing potentially hours of progress. It feels so archaic and outdated, shocking that such a thing was still considered okay for a late-gen PS3 game when as far back as PS1 (maybe even earlier) games had autosaving. It's literally just a waste of the player's time for no reason. Some games can do it well - Shadow of the Tomb Raider, for example, which has an emphasis on traps and puzzles. The reload save aspect of that helps add to the tension and danger of it all - but Zestiria isn't like that at all. In Zestiria it's just tedious.

 

I am very happy to be done with this but god I hope that Arise is actually good. I need a good Tales game to cleanse me after this one.

Spoiler

Digital {Excluding PS+}

Genshin Impact [+2] {+6%}

Tales of Zestiria [+33] {+70%} (COMPLETE!)

 

Unstarted

NEW GAME: Aragami [52] {PS Now}

NEW GAME: EMMA: Lost in Memories [29] {Digital}

NEW GAME: Gris [18] {Digital}

NEW GAME: Hyper Light Drifter [23] {Digital}

NEW GAME: The Messenger [43] {Digital}

 

[madbuk]

Progress Update: #420 - Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair

A very bittersweet completion here. Great game (although I do prefer the first one), but.. also my final Vita game. What an incredible handheld and I'm sad I have to say goodbye to it for now. As for the game, my main problem with it comes from how... over the top it is. Danganronpa 1 had some typical anime tropes but for the most part it was pretty grounded, the characters felt like actual people, and the setting was also better. Here, some characters are just walking anime tropes all the time (Looking at you, Mikan and Teruteru), some of the plot elements are way more out there, and the setting is very bright and vibrant, which is fine, I just prefer the tone the original had.

 

That said, the trials in this did feel harder which was very nice, and ignoring how over the top this game could be it's still a very engaging story. The bonus minigame modes were pretty bad, but Magical Miracle Girl Monomi wasn't quite as bad as people were hyping it up to be, which was a nice surprise.

Spoiler

Digital {Excluding PS+}

Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair [+30] {+75%} (COMPLETE!)

 

Unstarted

NEW GAME: WILL: A Wonderful World [52] {Digital}

 

[madbuk]

Progress Update: #421 - Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered

I have been wanting to try this out since PS+ gave me it. Have never played a CoD before and it seemed like a good starting point, I just always had other games distracting me from it and thus never got around to actually playing it. A recent Discord event changed that however and got me to finally play it. It's... ok. The shooting feels good, but there are so many questionably designed sections that feel like they come down entirely to RNG being in your favour, like the ending of One Shot, One Kill, the ending of Heat, Mile High Club, the final countdown chapter... Those weren't fun sections at all, and I hope the sequel (which I do plan on playing at some point) has less of that.

 

The story wasn't quite as gripping as I had expected. CoD games don't seem to be known for their story anyway, but considering MW2 was remastered without its MP at all I figured maybe the MW games were an exception... not really. I couldn't tell you the names of any of my AI squadmates apart from Cpt. Price, and ask me again in a few weeks and I'll have probably forgotten what even happened. It's not a memorable experience at all.

 

Overall I enjoyed this, but it's definitely not one of my favourites.

Spoiler

PS+ Titles

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered [+51] {+100%} (COMPLETE!)

 

[madbuk]

Progress Update: #422 - Aragami

I don't often play stealth games, so I was at a bit of a disadvantage here, but overall it wasn't particularly hard and I had a very pleasant time with it. The shadow dash mechanic is very fun, and I enjoyed that it was possible to get through every level entirely stealthily without killing anyone at all. The trophy list requires 2 runs - one for no kills, one for all kills (and one of these runs has to be done without being detected too), and I definitely enjoyed the no kill run more. Part of that may just be because there was no way to tell if you missed a guard somewhere until you finish the chapter, and then if you did you have to replay the entire chapter again.

 

Graphically it's very stylish and looks great. The story is nothing special, but it's adequate and better than not having one at all. Was a refreshing change of pace compared to the usual type of games I play, it's currently on sale stupidly cheap, and doesn't seem to go on sale often. Definitely recommend it.

Spoiler

PS Now

Aragami [+52] {+100%} (COMPLETE!)

 

[madbuk]

Progress Update: #423 - The Messenger

This was fairly decent. Not my favourite 2D platformer, but I can say I enjoyed it, which is more than I can say about most. The linear first half of the game was definitely my favourite, second half got a bit vague and open-ended for me. It's not a game I can imagine myself stacking, but it's one I don't regret having played. Music is decent, the art style is nice, story isn't great but it's serviceable, gameplay feels good, and the Cloudstep gimmick is pretty interesting even if at times it felt a bit wonky when you had to do a lot in a row while also gliding.

 

Can definitely recommend this in a deep sale or if it ever comes to PS+.

Spoiler

Digital {Excluding PS+}

Genshin Impact [+1] {+9%}

The Messenger [+43] {+100%} (COMPLETE!)

 

[AJ_Radio]

I don’t expect too many people to really love The Messenger unless you grew up in the 16 bit generation. A lot of people here weren’t even born yet, but the Super Nintendo and SEGA Genesis was my introduction to the world of gaming, looking back, that generation meant a lot to me.

 

The Messenger has a ton of references to old Nintendo games including Super Punch Out!, so it was nice to see them all in one package. This is definitely not a game for everyone, 16 bit inspired platformers are very niche. But I absolutely loved it, it’s a gem I think more people should play. 
 

My main complaint was going thru those caves without using a light source. Everything else including the Voodoo DLC was solid. Definitely offers some challenge without going too overboard.

[madbuk]

Progress Update: #424 - Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition

Pretty good game. I've already played this before, this was a stack, so I knew going in that it was a good game. However it took me 2 years to actually get around to it because I had so many other games keeping me busy. Glad to say I've finally gone back and finished this up, and I had a great time doing so, despite some of the side content being rather lackluster (lockbox/camera collection is pretty dull. Same with the evidence bags in the DLC)

 

Definitely an open world game I'd recommend if you like GTA, since this is better in every way compared to GTAV imo. Great story, characters, control, gameplay, mission variety... all around just a really well constructed package. Shame we never got a sequel, but the leaked documents for the sequel didn't look particularly promising anyway, so... oh well.

Spoiler

Digital {Excluding PS+}

Sleeping Dogs [+46] {+84%} (COMPLETE!)

 

[Tunnel1ngEffect]

Eventually you will be doing Resident Evil 3, 4, 5, 6, Revelations, Revelations 2, 7, and 8 write-ups. I look forward to those. ?

Also, sleeping dogs is great.

Edited June 27, 2021 by Tunnel1ngEffect

[madbuk]

2 minutes ago, Tunnel1ngEffect said:

Eventually you will be doing Resident Evil 3, 4, 5, 6, Revelations, Revelations 2, 7, and 8 write-ups. I look forward to those.

RE4 has no plat, I don’t tend to do posts of those  Not entirely sure why tbh, some of them are harder (and/or better) than your average plat, but back when I started this years ago I didn’t bother so I just kinda stuck with that routine. Maybe it’s something worth changing.

 

Also still not sold on Revelations, will probably just stick to numbered entries

[Tunnel1ngEffect]

I think you'll feel strongly enough about RE4 to do a write-up about it, it's not exactly short either. Average first run completes clock in about 14-16 hours. Pretty meaty as far as Resident Evil games go. We just need to get those game-trains a rolling bud. Resident Evil 3 awaits. ?

[madbuk]

Bonus Post #1: Genshin Impact

No plat for this one, but I felt it deserved a post anyway, a lot moreso than some of the other games I've posted on here. This game is very, very good. Exploring the world, solving puzzles, finding rare resources, and just general questing is so much fun in this game, and it just gets better with time as you start unlocking more characters and combat gets more depth as a result. Combining different elements to cause reactions is very satisfying, especially the Anemo ones since Anemo can combine with practically anything. I also feel the need to address the elephant in the room - the monetization of a f2p gacha game like this one... I can safely say, this game is very generous with its resources and I only ever bought one thing in it, meaning the grand total expenditure for this game was £8.99. Considering I got almost 300 hours of this game, that's insane value. Look at Ratchet & Clank which is 10 hours for £70 lol.

 

The story isn't particularly engaging, which is a shame because there are a large amount of interesting characters throughout, but the gameplay more than made up for that. I also happened to start this game during the patch (1.5) that introduced the Windtrace event, which was definitely my favourite. Such a unique concept (for Genshin, I know prop hunt is popular elsewhere), and a breath of fresh air compared to the sheer amount of combat the game already has. Future events had a lot of combat focus and that just wasn't as interesting to me, but it was still fun because the combat is fundamentally good.

 

Trophy list wise, this is way simpler than they could've made it, making it very possible for f2p players to get 100%. You don't need every star in the final Abyss floors (thank god), you don't need every character (thank god), you never have to raise anyone to level 90, you never have to use specific characters so you're free to experiment and find the team(s) you like playing the most, and a lot of it is tied to exploration which is Genshin's strongest aspect imo.

 

While I would love to keep this game installed and continue doing my daily/weekly duties, and participate in upcoming events, it is quite a beefy game in terms of download size, and I'm beginning to struggle on my 500GB PS5 in regards to space (500GB really wasn't enough...). I'm going to keep it installed for now (especially with the upcoming Kazuha banner I want to pull on) but it may have to be deleted at some point unfortunately.

 

I'd honestly love to see future updates bring more trophies, but I doubt it tbh. It's a shame that I don't have a plat to show for this, and I'm not a fan of autopopping - and autopopping is unavoidable in Genshin - so I'll never get to play the PS5 version and plat that, but the PS4 version runs very well and has fast loading, so I don't mind being stuck on it. I can absolutely recommend this game, especially since it's free, but expect a considerable time investment if you want 100%. It's worth it though.

 

In terms of my checklist and how many 100% posts I'll do similar to this one, I'm not sure yet, I might not do many (if I even do any after this one), but if a game resonates with me as much as this one did I suppose I may as well.

[madbuk]

Progress Update: #425 - Need for Speed Hot Pursuit Remastered

I remember this game as being pretty easy back on PS3, and I remember really enjoying my time with it. I was expecting this to be equally as enjoyable and just as much of a breeze, and... honestly, either I've become worse as a game or they've done something to the AI, because the racer campaign in this seemed much harder than it used to be. I like that though, the added challenge was actually appreciated and made it even more enjoyable.

 

Playing as a cop, surprisingly, was more fun than being a racer for me, but both campaigns are good and decent in length (78 events for racer, 63 for cop IIRC) so there's plenty of things to do here. The online trophies were pretty easy but they do basically require single player completion to begin with which is a little annoying, but manageable. I can definitely recommend this game to racing fans, it's the best NFS I've played so far, and if it's ever cheap enough I may even do the NA stack of this in the far distant future as well.

Spoiler

Retail

NEW GAME: Need for Speed Hot Pursuit Remastered [+66] {+98%}

 

Digital {Excluding PS+}

Genshin Impact [+1] {+3%} (COMPLETE!)

 

Edited June 30, 2021 by madbuk

[madbuk]

 

Progress Update: #426 - Katamari Damacy Reroll

Pretty bizarre decision to remaster this game - Katamari Damacy is the first ever Katamari game, and you can definitely tell. Various QoL improvements introduced in Forever and Touch My Katamari are entirely absent here, and the game's controls feel a little worse as well. There's also less content than there was in Forever, both in terms of number of levels and extra content like new game modes.

 

Honestly Forever seems like it was just the ultimate package of every prior Katamari game, so I have no idea why they opted to remaster this one instead of that one. The very least they could've done is added in some of the minor upgrades Forever had, like having rainbow text for newly acquired items. It's a small detail that was surprisingly helpful and it sucks it's non-existent here. I will say that I appreciated the lack of gimmick levels this one had - it had two, which were both very annoying to get completion in, but Katamari Forever had some even more annoying gimmick levels (hot & cold... oof) that I don't miss in the slightest.

 

Overall I enjoyed this because Katamari gameplay is fundamentally fun, and it's something so unique that I'm grateful we got any "new" game on PS4 at all, but it could've been better. Let's hope we get a PS5 game - PS3 had 1 (Forever), Vita had 1 (Touch), PS4 had 1 (Damacy)... lets keep the trend alive.

Spoiler

Retail

NEW GAME: Assassin's Creed Valhalla [+2] {+2%}

Need for Speed Hot Pursuit Remastered [+1] {+2%} (COMPLETE!)

 

Digital {Excluding PS+}

NEW GAME: Katamari Damacy Reroll [+22] {+100%} (COMPLETE!)

 

 

[AJ_Radio]

I'm not sure if I'm ever going to get around to Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit Remastered or not. I honestly hated the racer campaign in Rivals, cops were always on your tail and it was a chore to get all the speedlists done for Rank 60.

 

 I skipped a large portion of Need for Speed history but I'm generally told Hot Pursuit is or was a good racing game.

[madbuk]

4 hours ago, AJ_Radio said:

I'm not sure if I'm ever going to get around to Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit Remastered or not. I honestly hated the racer campaign in Rivals, cops were always on your tail and it was a chore to get all the speedlists done for Rank 60.

 

 I skipped a large portion of Need for Speed history but I'm generally told Hot Pursuit is or was a good racing game.

HP is much much better than Rivals. It’s not open world, so races actually have thought put into the route, you can pause it, and there’s no speedlists. Simply need to get gold in events and that’s it. Handles a lot better, too.

[AJ_Radio]

15 hours ago, madbuk said:

HP is much much better than Rivals. It’s not open world, so races actually have thought put into the route, you can pause it, and there’s no speedlists. Simply need to get gold in events and that’s it. Handles a lot better, too.

Glad to hear it. I’ll check out some video footage when I have more time.

[madbuk]

Progress Update: #427 - Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight

Originally I had planned on doing Persona 5 Royal before this, but I needed something relatively stress free over the past few days and this seemed perfect for that. It was also perfect for a trophy event I'm currently a part of (and have no chance of winning, but still...) so I decided not to wait and just jumped right in. Overall, I like the social event structure of this compared to the VN-style structure of Persona 4 Dancing, but it was still very weak in that aspect and a lot of the interactions were incredibly uninteresting and simply padded out the playtime. Exploring each character's room afterwards was fun though, I spent ages trying to track down some of those hidden cards lol.

 

The dancing gameplay overall seemed harder than 4 was, but the trophy list was still extremely easy regardless because it doesn't ask for mastery at all. The UI is still complete trash and a real hindrance for me personally as someone with bad peripheral vision, but ignoring that I still had fun with it. Still don't expect to ever play 3 because of spoilers, but maybe Atlus will decide to port actual Persona 3 over some day and then I can play 3 Dancing afterwards.

Spoiler

Retail

Assassin's Creed Valhalla [+6] {+7%}

 

Digital {Excluding PS+}

Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight [+42] {+100%} (COMPLETE!)

 

Unstarted

NEW GAME: Raging Loop [31] {Digital}

NEW GAME: Yakuza 6: The Song of Life [59] {Digital}

 

[madbuk]

Progress Update: #428 - Atelier Escha & Logy: Alchemists of the Dusk Sky

I was looking forward to this after a relatively promising start to the series with Ayesha, but... honestly this one was kinda a slog for me. The characters are all pretty bland, the plot feels entirely unrelated to the events of Ayesha, the time limits were a lot stricter and more stressful, and... idk. Something about this just really didn't engage me as much as Ayesha. I do like the chemistry between Logy and Escha, they're perhaps the highlight of the cast, and it had some pretty touching endings even despite how little I was engaged in the story during the game itself. The fact that I was playing this via PS Now and was having issues with getting that to work didn't help my enjoyment either.

 

I will say though that the QoL improvement of it actually telling you where events are is very nice, no more blind wandering around. That was the biggest pro this game has compared to Ayesha. Despite the good main characters, decent endings and good QoL improvements, I really just can't recommend this. It's not a bad game by any means, it's just completely mediocre and average.

 

Will I continue and finish off the trilogy with Shallie? I had intended to do the whole trilogy after finishing Ayesha, but now I'm not so sure. Still a few months until my Now sub runs out though, so we'll see.

Spoiler

PS Now

NEW GAME: Atelier Escha & Logy: Alchemists of the Dusk Sky [+53] {+100%} (COMPLETE!)

 

Digital {Excluding PS+}

NEW GAME: Genshin Impact [+1] {-27%}

Killzone Shadow Fall [+11] {+18%}

NEW GAME: The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles [+6] {+10%}

 

Edited August 1, 2021 by madbuk

[madbuk]

Progress Update: #429 - Ghostrunner

As a huge Mirror's Edge fan, I have had interest in this game since it was announced but the emphasis on combat was a little off putting, so I never ended up buying it. Thanks to PS Now I have had the opportunity to play it for "free", and I regret being so hesitant. Yes, there's a lot of combat in this, it all feeds directly into the platforming, because the way combat works is you die in one hit, and enemies die in one hit, and you have to platform your way to them to attack whilst also dodging their attacks and it works extremely well.

 

It's a very short game, which is a bit of a shame considering how good it is, but at least it doesn't overstay its welcome. The controls did feel a little looser than Mirror's Edge and I'm not sure I'm a fan of that, but when you get used to it it's not a huge problem. The story isn't anything special, but I wasn't playing this for the narrative anyway so it didn't bother me. The environments are all very stylish and a joy to run through.

 

Overall, while this doesn't top Mirror's Edge for me personally, it's still a fantastic game in a criminally underused genre and I can definitely recommend it. I'll probably stack it at some point during a decent sale.

Spoiler

PS Now

NEW GAME: Ghostrunner [+34] {+100%} (COMPLETE!)

 

Digital {Excluding PS+}

Genshin Impact [+2] {+3%}

Killzone Shadow Fall [+2] {+2%}

The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles [+2] {+4%}

 

[madbuk]

Progress Update: #430 - Gris

Going into this I heard heard nothing but positivity and praise, which was rather exciting. Celeste rekindled my interest in 2D platformers and I was excited to play another of the great ones that everyone loves... unfortunately, I don't think this game is really anything special. It's not bad at all, it's very stylish and presents the story well, but the gameplay I wasn't particularly fond of - the running speed of your character is very slow, and some chapters (especially the last) drag on for longer than I'd have liked really. There's some great variety across each stage though which keeps the experience somewhat fresh, so it definitely has that going for it.

 

Overall this was disappointing but I'm not upset to have played it, it was still worth trying out. It's just likely one of those games I'll have forgotten about in a few months entirely.

Spoiler

Digital {Excluding PS+}

Gris [+18] {+100%} (COMPLETE!)

 

[madbuk]

Progress Update: #431 - The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles

After years of hearing how wonderful these two games were and how much of a shame it was that they were never going to be released outside Japan due to copyright problems.. they have finally released regardless, and I'm very happy to have finally been able to play this beloved duo of games when I thought I would never be able to. Overall my opinions of them are fairly mixed. I much prefer the setting of this game to the original AA trilogy (and arguably even prefer the characters as well), but the actual main plot... it certainly has a lot of aspects to like and they do a good job of setting up threads and then giving payoff, but the pacing is highly questionable. There are so many times in these two games where you'll be told this is "your last chance" or "it all comes down to this" etc. etc. and then it continues for another hour or two after that "pivotal" moment. It just gets rather repetitive and routine - this is definitely an issue with the original trilogy as well, but for some reason it bothered me more here. There are also some rather dumb deus ex machinas - another original trilogy problem, so I just went along with it really. Some of the new mechanics introduced in this duology were interesting, but reused too much to the point they just become boring by the end.

 

Despite my grievances with this set of games, I will just repeat that I am very thankful to have had the opportunity to actually experience them for myself after all the years of hype (part of me wonders if the reason they're held in such high regard is because they were exclusive for so long and only megafans had played the translations - AAI2, another unlocalized AA game, is also insanely well regarded, as are the unlocalized Trails games... Seeing a pattern here...) I would probably say I would be more interested in a Great Ace Attorney 3 than another game with Phoenix and co., most things got wrapped up but they definitely left a few threads open for a potential third game to pick up on.

 

Overall I would still recommend these games, I just wouldn't recommend going in expecting the masterpieces everyone had been hyping them up to be.

Spoiler

Digital {Excluding PS+}

Genshin Impact [+2] {+2%}

Killzone Shadow Fall [+3] {+9%}

The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles [+22] {+86%} (COMPLETE!)

 

Edited August 18, 2021 by madbuk