Kill Your Completion v3. 0

[crimsonidol38]

3 minutes ago, xFalionx said:

Great now I'll have to decide what to swap for Lost Planet 3. Both Lumo and Severed look very interesting, but I think I'll go with Severed since that will also fit the artistic theme of my own challenge.

That's a really good decision. 

IMO the game has a really unique atmosphere and some may think it's too easy but overall it gives you a good time. It also shows that touch-only controls can be good, too.

Edited March 1, 2017 by Crimson Idol

[Oobedoob S Benubi]

Everyone: want to play Tearaway Unfolded? It's on spot #6 for me but I do have a little bit of leeway left.

 

 

 

56 minutes ago, Hemiak said:

Hmmmm, maybe if I do a 4th event I'll let everyone designate a reserve game that they can swap in quickly if they absolutely hate their original game and haven't earned a trophy. 

 

Like Stalker I strongly disliked Echochrome. Strange because I really like puzzles type games usually. I had even played a demo years before and it seemed all right. I actually stopped playing one level before beating the first set of levels, so I didn't actually earn a trophy. If I had an extra game I would have gladly switched it in. Tell you what, go ahead and start one of the other games you were tinkering with, to preserve the rest of your list. 

 

Thanks a lot!

 

Hadn't even thought of an actual switch yet but being able to discard one game on the first day might be useful, especially to those who use KYC events to play PS+ games they don't know if they'll like yet.

 

I'll start on Four Sided Fantasy yet, I'll keep TorqueL as a failed first game this time because I'm going to spend many hours on the Switch and I don't want to add yet another game to try here while I could just as well make sure I've already done the game I should play this weekend.

 

Will do a final review of TorqueL and then I'm going to play Four Sided Fantasy for a while before going back to The Witcher III.

 

56 minutes ago, Hemiak said:

 

• Tearaway Unfolded (PS4)
• Disc Jam (PS4)
• Lumo (PS Vita, Cross Buy  PS4)
• Under Night In-Birth Exe:Late (PS3)
• Earth Defense Force 2025 (PS3)
• Severed (PS Vita) 

Tearaway still the only one of these I'm remotely interested in since Severed isn't ps4. 

 

Saw the games but I was busy on dinner and then a card game with my wife (Phase 10) so I couldn't write until now.

 

I'll keep my list like it is, unless someone wanting to do Tearaway with me but not on spot 6 means I'm changing the order but I don't need any other March PS+ game for now.

[Oobedoob S Benubi]

 

Game #1: TorqueL

Final Review

Total playtime: little under an hour

Trophies: 0/13 for an F rank

 

Thought this would be fun

Finally got to play it

Fucking disaster

 

Spoiler

Yes, it has happened! I changed my setup from doing a limerick as a final review to doing a haiku. We're at the final part of a trilogy so I need to change things up. Also decided I'm going to do a big image in final reviews, mostly because Kung Fury's image is so awesome it would seem like a mistake not to let it shine.

 

As for TorqueL... Can't really say much more than I said already. Tried to play some more after work but I just couldn't get through it. Kept being stuck on the same stupid level while trying half a dozen different strategies, but nothing worked. I lost all interest and decided I just didn't want to play any more. It's my first and hopefully only score of the season.

 

 

TorqueL final score:

- BillyHorrible

? - @Kevvik, @xFalionx (will update when they post their final review)

Next up: Four Sided Fantasy

[Oobedoob S Benubi]

FUCK!

 

I spent the last thirty minutes trying to get Four Sided Fantasy to work. The core game mechanic - holding R2 to lock the camera in place - seems to be broken for me, it often does not work and when it works, it's random and over way too soon. Can't even get beyond the third hurdle like this... Fuck me, seriously pissed off right now.

 

I deleted the game and am redownloading at this moment, if it still doesn't work then I might try my other controller but that shouldn't be the problem as the first instance where I have to use it, the game shows that I am holding down R2 but the lock just doesn't happen 95% of the time.

 

Can't find anything about this online so the problem seems to be just on my PS4..

Edited March 1, 2017 by BillyHorrible

[Myu]

@BillyHorrible not your best day, isn't it? :/ I hope your game starts working properly soon!

 

Here is my first update.

I've played every localized Ar Tonelico games and I loved every single one of them (except for Qoga which was kind of a disappointment to be honest).

 

What makes the Ar series so great is the wonderful OST. Listening to the game's opening brought back a good deal of nostalgia and the need to listen to songs from the previous games.

Also, Japanese voices are available, which is a real relief.

 

I've played the game for 5 hours (minus cooking and playing with the cat from time to time). The characters are average but I don't dislike them like I did with Qoga. The dialogues are often funny and you will encouter several « oh no, I randomly ran into a naked girl, again ! » situations. I had a good laugh with some of the items' descriptions too (check out « Passion Pulp »'s description if you ever play the game!) and I absolutely didn't expect the weird synthetizing songs.

 

Check out those songs if you don't plan on playing the game!

My face at the time → 0_o

 

The battle system is a mix of old and new. Your Reyvateil (now called Geno-something) is still singing behind you and you have to protect her until enough energy builds up to release it and annihilate everything. The enemies come in waves and you have 6 turns to defeat every single one of them. You will have to try to get as many « breaks » as you can to get extra turns.

There is also something to do with chains but the battles are so easy, I don't really need to get how that works for now. There are very few encounters, one per screen and the characters level up pretty fast.

 

The story seems interesting so far but I don't like the way some characters are randomly popping here and there when they are not really needed. I'm not very far into the game though because I spent at least 1 or 2 hours synthetizing items. 

[Oobedoob S Benubi]

19 minutes ago, Myu said:

@BillyHorrible not your best day, isn't it? :/ I hope your game starts working properly soon!

 

Edit: using my second controller now (the one which only has been used when my wife plays along with LEGO or the occasional co-op platformer) and the game works like a charm.

 

Guess my main controller must be slowly breaking down, the mechanism might have become too sensitive or something?

 

Anyways thankfully it works now but I might have to look into buying a new controller, which is no fun at all.

 

... And, of course, a whole precious hour of gaming time has been wasted on this.

Edited March 1, 2017 by BillyHorrible

[NebbyLunala]

Sorry you're failing the challenge so far, Billy. First you failed on a crappy game and now on a crappy controller. I feel like karma has it out to get you. Don't give up, I'm sure one of the games in your list is complete-able.

[Hemiak]

36 minutes ago, BillyHorrible said:

 

Edit: using my second controller now (the one which only has been used when my wife plays along with LEGO or the occasional co-op platformer) and the game works like a charm.

 

Guess my main controller must be slowly breaking down, the mechanism might have become too sensitive or something?

 

Anyways thankfully it works now but I might have to look into buying a new controller, which is no fun at all.

 

... And, of course, a whole precious hour of gaming time has been wasted on this.

Maybe you should give TorqueL a shot with the new controller? Just a thought. 

[Oobedoob S Benubi]

2 minutes ago, Hemiak said:

Maybe you should give TorqueL a shot with the new controller? Just a thought. 

 

My first thought as well but the controller works like a charm in stuff like Witcher, Psychonauts and any other game I've played recently, and TorqueL does not use the R2 button.

 

Will try TorqueL just for a few minutws tomorrow just to be sure though, but with TorqueL it was less about the game not doing what I told it to do and more about the physics just being bad.

[Jaguargenie]

Game # 1 Initial Impressions:

 

Strider

 

Completion % at start: 75.13

Completion after first session: 74.82 (-.31%)

**Full disclosure, I typically play games on hard at the outset, but since most probably don't for this event I am starting on normal.**

 

So I'm off of work today and was able to get about an hour and a half in today. So the concept is a VERY fast melee-centric metroidvania with a futuristic vibe. Gotta say I am loving it so far. I am so into the metroidvania sub-genre and this one is great. It is very fast and super smooth. Strider is very responsive and it has to be when there are enough enemies on screen to sometimes turn it into a bullet hell. It adheres pretty closely to the metroidvania formula. The map has several parts closed off. You gradually get upgrades that add abilities so you can access those new sections.Something pretty cool I notice happening with this game is that new enemies appear in previously explored sections that can only be conquered by the new abilities. For example, a shield wielding enemy appears after you get the ability to charge your blade. That adds a cool little wrinkle into rooms you have already visited. 

 

The game is very pretty. You have a super bright, colorful palette and a very well designed 2.5D environment. I have yet to experience a time when Strider moved into the background, but plenty is going on back there to liven things up. I haven't noticed any frame rate hitches or any glitches thus far.

 

The story is non-existent. There is no opening cut scene, and the only motivation you have is a message the pops up when the game begins that says something about killing the main baddie. Yup. So don't go looking for any type of story. This is all action.

 

The only negative I can talk about thus far is the difficulty. It is EASY. I only died once in the initial time I was playing and that was when I was trying to hunt for a kill trophy and got mobbed by enemies.

 

All in all, really positive impressions thus far. Really liking it and if you like the metroidvania genre, you should give it a try.

[voodoo_eyes]

5 hours ago, dmland12 said:

 

It looks like you missed my post a few pages back.  Here's my starting percentage:  95.67%

 

I got a chance to play a little of Lone Wolf last night...  or "Joe Dever's Lone Wolf Console Edition" if we're being formal.    It's an interesting game so far.  It's an RPG, but you're reading the story from a book most of the time and making a decision here and there or getting into a fight.  The decisions involves quick-time events some of the time, and if you fail you'll lose Vitality (HP), Kai (Magic), or Endurance (needed to perform most attacks during a battle).  Other times you just use a skill or your stats and the story moves along.  This is my first playthrough so I'm unsure how much difference these decisions actually make, but they obviously do have some effect, which is nice.  For example, one time I decided to use my "Animal Kinship" Kai specialty to convince some ravens to harass some enemies while I sneaked into a building they were guarding.  The ravens started attacking them and they discovered me anyway, but they started the battle with lower health from the raven attack.  Kind of neat.  

 

The combat is turn-based more-or-less and not too bad on normal difficultly so far...  although I'm not very far in the game so it will probably get more difficult.  I can already see that the hard difficulty where your enemies have double the HP will be difficult to manage.  The combat system is pretty straightforward so far.  You hit them and reduce their HP before they hit you and reduce yours.  Most of your attacks require you do to quick-time-events for max damage and sometimes you get a chance to dodge or block an attack with a QTE.  I say so far, since I did skim through a tutorial page that listed at least a dozen negative status effects that I haven't seen yet, so it's probably going to get more complicated.  

 

I always thought Lone Wolf had the combat outcome based on "dice rolls" for some reaon, I must have been mixing it up with some other game. SOunds interesting so far from your description.

 

4 hours ago, Hemiak said:

Also just got Terraria in one of the US sales for $3.74 Been looking at this for a little while. Ps+ freebies still haven't been posted as far as I can see. 

 

Edit: speak of the devil. 

• Tearaway Unfolded (PS4)
• Disc Jam (PS4)
• Lumo (PS Vita, Cross Buy  PS4)
• Under Night In-Birth Exe:Late (PS3)
• Earth Defense Force 2025 (PS3)
• Severed (PS Vita) 

Tearaway still the only one of these I'm remotely interested in since Severed isn't ps4. 

 

I was one post before this one, when I thought to myself "I wonder what the ps plus games are"`. Well... now I know, cheers  .

 

Just go home from work, had dinner and am knackered so I might only get a short taste my of first game, definitely won't be making a "review" today though, that's for sure.

 

PS: I also fucking hate the new notifications btw, just showing 1 when there are like 20 really .

 

Edited March 1, 2017 by voodoo_eyes

[Hemiak]

40 minutes ago, voodoo_eyes said:

PS: I also fucking hate the new notifications btw, just showing 1 when there are like 20 really .

 

I'm ok because it usually says, 'x, y, Z, and 5 others have replied.'

 

Im much more irritated when I get 14 different 'Q has replied to a status update' notifications. Fell me who's notification, and stack everybody who replied to the same one. 

[DamagingRob]

Day 1- Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor

 

First thought? I am terrible at this game. :/ Dying all over the damn place. But at least it's fun, unlike the last two games I played.. Second thought? This is pretty violent by Lord of the Rings' standards. 

 

Combat is mostly hand-to-hand, and you can counter enemy attacks with . You also get a bow, so you can attack enemies from afar. But you only get so many arrows, before you need to find more. The stealth part of it reminds me of Assassin's Creed. Enemies have a bar appear over their heads, once you're in their sights, just like in those games. Starting out as yellow, and once filled turning to red. Hiding in bushes, making noise to lure enemies to you, and killing them stealthily is probably a good strategy. Of course, I try to do this. But usually end up getting spotted, swarmed by enemies, and killed.  When you die, it's not necessarily over, though. You get a chance, in a quicktime event, to counter a killing blow. 

 

There's a lot of creatures from the Lord of the Rings' mythos. One of them, I was even able to jump and ride on. Which scared the orc captain I had to kill shitless.  Lots of stuff to do outside the story missions. Hunting and plant gathering challenges, side missions, things to collect, and more. You even get missions to avenge someone on your PSN friends' list who was killed. I failed the first time, but the second time, I did not let @doordie19822015 down! 

 

Story is good, and has a lot of a certain well-known character from The Lord of the Rings in it. Hunched back, weird voice, kind of crazy, and obsessed with "his precious"? And I helped a lowly orc rise to greatness, and become the war chief I knew he was capable of. :') All hail Ratbag! 

 

So yeah, fun game so far. But I probably need to level up more or something. 

 

Time played: 3 hours and 59 minutes, according to the game.

Trophy progress: 7 of 75 for 9% completion.

Edited March 1, 2017 by DamagingRob

[xFalionx]

This day is almost over so let me give you another perspective on TorqueL. (I'm copying Billy's template since this is my first KYC and I liked that one. ) 

 

Game #1: TorqueL (on PS Vita)

First day
Total playtime: about 2 hours and 30 minutes

 

I've completed 3 of the 7(+1) routes by now and I'm fairly certain that I've got the game figured out by now. Let's start with a general description of the game.

 

This is game describes itself as a "2D Box Rolling & Extend Platformer" and that's pretty much as accurate as you could get. Basically, you are a guy in a cube, which sides you can extend by about 4 times the length of the cube itself using the buttons , each representing a side of the cube. You are able to extend all four sides at once but you usually don't need to extend more than 2 sides at once to get around any of the obstacles. You move around by rolling your cube. What makes this concept really interesting is that you always move around your center of mass, which you can adjust using you sides. You can take advantage of that to climb over gaps, reach high areas or, if you're good at it, to keep up a relatively high momentum. That's pretty much everything there is to know about the controls of the game. They're really simple but rather hard to use efficiently without some practice but more on that later on in my review.

 

You use these controls to navigate around small chambers, which take between 5 seconds and 1 minute to complete. In these chambers there are multiple types of obstacles including gaps, platforms, some of which can be rotated by your the weight of your cube or move on their own, and most commonly the red areas which instantly kill you if you happen to touch them. There are about 20-25 of these chambers on each route, some of which are reused depending on the routes you take. I completed my first route within 50 minutes, the next one in about 30 minutes and the last one in about 40. What makes the short routes take so long is that the game is really difficult. At times I needed 5 seconds for a chamber because it was fairly simple, on other occasions one chamber took me up to 30 minutes because it was just that hard to beat them. Usually you will encounter 2 or 3 very hard chambers ramdomly scattered throughout each route, the others are usually a lot easier to complete. The obstacles in these chambers usually require you to work out strategies to beat them, then improve on these until you can consistently overcome that obstacle. This usually leads to you dying a lot in the harder stages but you'll make it further and further into the level with each try. You'll come to find that once you've gained some knowledge on certain ways you can use your extended sides, you tend to do better overall.

 

What I really like about the game is that you could theoretically complete the whole game including all of the routes within 30 minutes if you were a godlike gamer, but even if you aren't that good the routes are still reasonably sized. Another great thing about the game is that it feels rewarding to beat a stage and whenever you die it doesn't feel like the game screwed you over but rather like you made a mistake and could have done that better. This is contrary to Billy's review, but it's the way I feel about the game. To me every move my character makes is either one that I knowingly made or one that I made on mistake. The levels feel challenging and well designed to me, creating lots of different obstacles to conquer using the very minimal selection of terrain hazard and the simple but at the same time complex controls and physics of the game.

 

There are, however, a few things which I don't really like about the game and I've already elaborated on these when discussing the game with Billy. To make it short, the controls are weird and require a lot of practice to be used effectively. To extend multiple sides of your cube at the same time and still react quickly and precise to your terrain, you need to play the game with 2 fingers on your buttons. That's a really awkward position and starts to hurt after an hour or so of play.

The other thing, and my major complaint about the game is the respawn time. You die a lot in this game and the chambers are really short, so it felt like I spent a third of my playtime in the 5 second long respawn animation after repeatedly dying to the first few obstacles. If this game had a 0 second respawn timer, I wouldn't be able to complain about it because there isn't really a way to implement these kind of controls in a better way, so I'm letting the first of those points slide.

 

Overall I'd say this is a great game for the Vita, and despite it's few flaws managed to entertain me for almost 3 hours already and will probably continue to do so for more to come. It's also great to play when you're frequently getting interrupted as the game saves after each of the chambers, so you can't loose any of your progress and single chambers are really fast to complete. Over a few minutes you could easily finish a few of the easier chambers or make progress towards a harder chamber. 

I think I'd currently give this game one of these babies: , especially considering that I got it for approximately 69 cents off PS+, which is cheaper than a pizza in most cases.

 

I'm looking forward to playing this for 2 more days and we'll see how I feel about it when I've completed all of the routes. 

[Alpsmile05]

Midnight approaching so time for an update

 

Game 1 Day 1: Knack

Time played: somewhere between 8 and 10 hours

 

 

First of all I need to tell you guys that for me wednesday-thursday is my weekend so that will explain why I managed to play this much. 

 

You play as Knack, which is a living thing that consist of relics, it's not a robot, nor an animal but it's alive! You have to fight your way through the story killing many things like robots, goblins, animals, ... To do this you can just hit them or use your special powers, sometimes you obtain more relics so you get bigger and stronger, sometimes you have to do it as a small adorable little Knack.

 

So far I'm liking this game alot, and I'm happy I've choosen this one to get this event going. I started off on easy mode and I'm already approaching the end of the story, but it seems that multiple playthroughs are needed so I won't finish this one in the 3 day timelimit. Allthough the game does get repetitive the story keeps me wanting to continue and the gamestyle is exactly what I like (at times it makes me feel like I'm playing Ratchet & Clank).

 

At the moment I would rate this game with a  trophy, but we'll see if it stays that way after 3 days.

 

So far I've obtained 13/42 trophies which gives me a whooping 18%. Let's see how far I can get before moving on to game 2.

Edited March 2, 2017 by Fredoline05

[MarkusT1992]

Game #1: Root Letter (Day 1)

 

 

 

This is a Visual Novel so not much gameplay here. You could compare it with the Ace Attorney series.

You can do a few things apart from reading though. On the right side of the screen you have some sort of menue with a few commands. The commands are: Move, Ask, Check, Inventory, Think, Guidebook and Smartphone.

So let's talk about those commands. The first is move which lets you move to another place, obviously.

Sometimes there are other characters which you can ask something which you do with the Ask command.

Check lets you investigate the area you are right now and click on a few things to advance the story or hear something about it.

With Inventory you can show items you have to other people, which gives you new clues about what to do next or where to go.

Think is some kind of hint system. When you don't know what to do you can use think to think about your next move you should do. It sometimes is needed to advance the story because you get a new area to explore.

With the guidebook you can read about the area you're in and it's also sometimes required to get new places where you can go to.

Smartphone is just the menue. There you can see all items you got and save/load the game.

 

The game is divided in several chapters and I'm at the beginning of chapter 3

 

The interesting thing in a Visual Novel though is the story. And so far I'm hooked. For all of you who don't want to know the story, don't open the following spoiler. You are warned!

 

The story starts with you sitting on your desk and finding old letters from your penpal from 15 years ago. While looking through the letters you discover an unopened one without a postmark. You open it and it reads something like this: "I killed someone. I won't write you anymore"

You then decide to investigate what happend and move to Matsue where the letter was sent from.

Ariving at the address you jst find an empty lot where the house was supposed to be. After talking to a woman you learn that the house burned down some years ago and that the family living there died in that fire. Of course you ask about you penpal, which name is Fumino Aya by the way. You won't belive what her answer was! She supposedly died 25 years ago.So who wrote you the letters? That's what you try to find out.

You know from the letters she sent you that there were several people in her class which are important when you want to find clues. You go to a place you read about in one of her letters to investigate. Some time after you learn about a person which could be one of her classmates. Her nickname was chatty b**ch and she now is a caster on tv. You go to talk with here and she obviously knows something but don't want to talk to you about her. But you overhear her talking with her boss about another person who fits the describtion of another classmate of Aya called Four-Eye. You then proceed to meet this person and in fact he is the one you're looking for. After completing what I mention later he admits he know here but after asking him to tell me something he suddenly changed his mind. He even shows me a classlist which clearly shows Aya wasn't in the same class as him. Sou you found the one Aya mentioned in his letter and he admited it that he was meant but no sign of Aya's existence.

I really don't knwo what's going on in this game but I want to know.

 

You can open your eys again. Story time is over.

Remember me saying it was like the Ace Attorney series? I had a scene where I had to talk to someone to learn something about Fumino Aya (For those who didn't read the spoiler. She's my penpal from 15 years ago and you need to find her) That was done in a questioning where you had to show evidence to things your opponent said to prove they know something about her.

Like in the Ace Attorney games you have 5 lives, represented by letters in this game, which you loose when choosing the wrong thing.

 

I don't know if I'll write another update because I don't want to spoil the story. It's really good in my oppinion and the only reason you should play a Visual Novel is the story. Maybe I'll write another story summary in a spoiler for those who want to know. So let me know if you want to hear more.

 

PS. A link to the trophy page is on the game picture.

 

Trophies earned: 4/27

Completion: 7%

Time played: about 2h 30min

 

[Kevvik]

So I've put 1.5-2 hrs in on TorqueL. I think it is a very challenging game. I finished the L route in like 1:20 or something like that so it is on the trophy list.

 

XFalionx has written a very good review on this so I'm not going to re-invent the wheel on the front. ++kudos. 

 

I don't think the controls are bad. All my mistakes are my fault. That said, I certainly am not great with them (playing on vita) though I am getting better slowly. My fat fingers make working multiple buttons at the same time accurately and effectively a little difficult.  I don't see myself ever getting 100% on it as the no mistakes and low completion times will likely be beyond my ability. Finishing the route was very satisfying though.

 

I can see how this wouldn't be for everyone but I'll keep plugging away at it. Not sure how much time I'll get the next couple of days to keep at it but not bad. 5/10 right now, may improve as I get better with the controls but will likely not exceed 6/10 for me.

Edited March 2, 2017 by Kevvik
Added stuff

[Mendant909]

Game #1

Day 1

 

htoL#NiQ: The Firefly Diary may be a horrible name for a game, but it's certainly a game for a niche audience that enjoys the first Prince of Persia or a combination of ICO and Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective. Like Prince of Persia (1989) the animations of the protagonist is vital to do precise platforming without dying as swiftly as a lemming. Despite the protagonist, Mion, dying frequently from head trauma, compression, or explosions the death animation is the same with blood sometimes added. Similar to ICO Mion is this game's Yorda and she can't do much to save herself from shadow monsters. Fortunately this game's Ico has been replaced by a pair of fireflies, Lumen and Umbra, who aid Mion in her adventure. Firefly Diary seems to have followed ICO's minimalist mindset in regards to buttons as Mion follows Lumen's path, with left and right being used to either walk a platform or push a box, up used to climb a ladder or box, down used to descent a ladder or let go of a box, and X to interact with buttons/levers. Umbra has a little more freedom as Umbra can move within the shadows of the world and squish shadows or activate machines out of Mion's reach, similar to Ghost Trick's puzzles.

 

The setting itself is a barren ruin in which machines are running fine while shadows want Mion gone. By contacting some mysterious flowers Mion gets glimpses of her past, which does give more of the story's lore than Lone Survivor which was up to the player. The flashbacks themselves are pixelated which is a sharp contrast to the Romantic aesthetic of the core game. So far I'm having a pretty good time with the game and it actually feels like it'll pay off its mystery more so than Lone Survivor and Freedom Wars.

[voodoo_eyes]

Day #1 - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1

 

 

Total playtime: 1h 6m

Trophies earned: 9/45

 

As last time I try and avoid giving an opinion on the game until the final day. First day will be introductory, 2nd day progress update and 3rd day the final impression.

 

What is it?:

 

Well, this game is Third-person shooter in a somewhat restrictive environment. There are also stealth sections which turn your screen all blurry. The stealth seems to be linked to a timer, so when that expires or get to close to someone you turn visible again.

First thing I wanted to try was the challenge mode, which seem to be 5 challenges on each of the difficulties (easy, medium, hard). I did one of the challenges (according to the leaderboards, no one from my friend list has this game, and I can't blame them).

Anyway I started the story mode on hard, did a few missions and that's pretty much it so far.

[Oobedoob S Benubi]

Game #2: Four Sided Fantasy

First day
Total playtime: just over an hour

 

 

... Yay, the world is good again!

 

After some initial problems (something with my old main controller, the game would correctly register that I held R2 (the R2 icon in the tutorial message would turn darker) but it was too sensitive to actually lock the camera), I finally could start playing this game.

 

At first I was still annoyed with the game because of the controller issues but thanks to my second controller (which has only been used those rare times my wife joins in on a LEGO or co-op platformer game) working like a charm, and thanks to the game being beautiful and a lot of fun, I was quickly enjoying myself again.

 

In about an hour of playtime (bit hard to guess as I was chatting with someone on PS4 during the first part of the game), I played through the entire game once. I knew the game was short which is why I didn't buy it when it was released for €10, but now it is on sale for €3 it's a very nice game to buy.

 

Four Sided Fantasy is a pure puzzle platformer. You need to manipulate the level by locking the camera in place - once you lock the camera, you can walk to the left off-screen and you turn up on the right side. Or, you jump off the edge, falling down and you'll keep falling from the top of the screen.

 

The game has a nice art style, that changes each world. It's fun to look at and while I have already forgotten the music in the game, I do remember that it felt fitting.

 

It's a simple mechanic that is used in a variety of ways. Each world adds a different theme to these puzzles, ensuring that the game will remain interesting. That makes the lack of length in the game a good thing - it's a small bite in between larger games, and it's too short to get bored by the gameplay. This way, the game also manages to keep throwing new puzzles at you every time, you'll rarely see a puzzle you've already done again so you keep having to think about how to solve the new puzzle.

 

The game was not that hard, though today (day two) I will try New Game + to see if it adds more fun and difficulty to the main game (I hope so). In the main first playthrough, I had to think about how to approach a few puzzles but I never got the feeling I was "stuck" - the parts of the level that needed to be used were often obvious, it was just a question of how to use them.

 

During my first playthrough, I obtained seven of the eleven trophies in the game - six are story related, one was a trophy that I got by accident. The four remaining trophies are for completing New Game +, finding a secret level, and completing the game with a minimal amount of either camera locks or screen wraps ("screen wrap" being the term for when you exit the screen on one side and turn up on the other side).

 

In short: Four Sided Fantasy is a beatiful puzzle platformer. It's very short but this is a good thing as the game never repeats itself and keeps you wanting for more instead of boring you after a while.

 

If you think you'll enjoy the game, it's still on sale in the EU store for only €3 people!

[wtru9]

Day 2

Game #1: Need for Speed Rivals

Playtime: Just over 2 hours

 

Didn't play as much today as I wanted top/ had planned, unfortunately my PS4 decided it was done reading discs for the day, so kept spitting the disc out whenever I tried to put it back in :/

Nonetheless, I played a bit more on the racer side, and had a fun enough time. I think I came across a bit too harshly on the game yesterday; I do find Rivals fun, it just doesn't knock my socks off (and, to be fair, it doesn't really feel like it even tries to).

 

Today I had a bit more experience with the multiplayer element of the game. You see, in Rivals there is this sort of seamless multiplayer element wherein there are 6 or so players driving around the open world as cops or robbers, and anyone can interact with anyone regardless if they're in free roam or doing a mission. I like the idea, in concept it's a nice relatively subtle multiplayer experience, and there was an amusing moment today some 10 year old kid (at least that's what they sounded like from the low volume muffled noises I heard in game chat) playing as a cop at very low health came up and rammed me from behind out of nowhere right before a corner, absolutely wiping them self out in the process, while I got off with only a little damage and a front row seat to an unexpected aerobatics show.

 

However, this system can also quite annoying at times. In about an hour of game time, I experienced 4 host migrations, in which the game stops what you're doing for 30 seconds or so, only to start playing the game again from where you left off in the background while you still stare at the migration screen for an extra 5 or so seconds, which can really fuck you over in a close race/ time trial. I also had to attempt a single easy difficulty race three times today. It's supposed to be a straight fight between 'racers', but the first time some guy in a Lamborghini police car was absolutely determined to prevent me from getting anywhere near first place... or even the finish line as it would turn out  . Then the second time a random joined the race in his McLaren P1, one of the fastest cars in the game, whilst I had to try (completely unsuccessfully) to keep up in my shitty Mustang, one of the first and slowest cars unlocked.

 

Tomorrow I'll try out the Cop side of the game, and hopefully my PS4 is a little more cooperative then. (luckily most of the rest of the games on the list I "own" digitally)

 

(Also for the first time ever I ran out of likes today. Yay!)

Edited March 2, 2017 by wtru9

[Oobedoob S Benubi]

11 hours ago, xFalionx said:

This day is almost over so let me give you another perspective on TorqueL. (I'm copying Billy's template since this is my first KYC and I liked that one. )

 

Nice! Yeah I've been using this template since the first game of the first event. I've got a cool template for my final event review as well. I changed the final review for games template a bit with this event, doing a big picture of the game instead of just the same small one again and doing my review in haiku instead of limerick.

 

Why am I doing a final review in limerick at all, you ask? Well, this conversation is at fault, as is me saying stuff before thinking:

 

On 28-6-2016 at 11:31 PM, Hemiak said:

Feel free to make a video if you want. Creativity and diversity are welcome and encouraged. I might have a few guest reviewers help on a few of the games.

 

On 28-6-2016 at 11:41 PM, voodoo_eyes said:

Sounds good. Should definitely be interesting having different sorts of reviews.

 

On 29-6-2016 at 0:04 AM, BillyHorrible said:

Verily! I shall write me a poem, lads!

Hmmmm. That WOULD be fun!

 

... And I naturally didn't want to back down after this, been doing limericks throughout all of KYC1 and KYC2.

 

[DamagingRob]

@BillyHorrible It's already the 4th over there? 

[Oobedoob S Benubi]

11 minutes ago, DamagingRob said:

@BillyHorrible It's already the 4th over there? 

 

See my earlier postings with Hemiak.

 

I hated TorqueL with a passion and didn't want to play on. I'm already spending some time on game #2 because tomorrow I'll get the Switch, so this way Four Sided Fantasy could get the attention it deserves. I'll barely play on PlayStation the next week, and what I do play will also be in Witcher III. So the choice was: start one of my other games too soon, or be inactive in this event for a few days.

[crimsonidol38]

Game 1, Day 1: Shantae and the Pirate's Curse (PS4)

 

Shantae seem to be a rather popular series in the 2D-platformer/Metroidvania-genre, although the games the first game was a rather late release GameBoy Color-game and the second (Risky's Revenge) and third (Pirate's Curse) installment were only released as Nintendo eShop-games for the DS or 3DS. The versions released on Steam and the current gen consoles are more or less straight ports of those handheld-versions and you can directly see it as they have a rather pixelated look with only the text-boxes, menus and portraits being in HD-resolution.

 

The game follows a simplified Metroidvania-concept where you have to make your way through various regions, collect items and solve simple quests to open up new passageways or get new opportunities to reach places you couldn't reach before. The story itself is not really worth to mention as it's the typical dark being wants to rule the world/kingdom one.

 

So far I only played a small part of Risky's Revenge on Steam (never finished the story, though) and I finished the latest installment Half-Genie Hero, so I was curious how the game in between would work. Risky's Revenge was more like a classical Metroidvania with a completely connected world which worked with different layers you could reach by pressing or   in certain points. On the contrary, Half-Genie Hero has smaller worlds/areas that are losely connect by an overworld map where you can select the next level. Pirate's Curse seems to be somewhere in the middle. There are several areas connected together like Scuttle Town and the nearby Scarecrow Fields and Tangle Forest (I hope I got the names right, I'm bad at memorizing those things) but there are several islands you have to travel to and you reach them by navigating through a level select screen.

 

When it comes to the game-mechanics Pirate's Curse seems to take a different route than RR or HGH. In those two games you use a bellydance-move to transform into different animals or other beings so you can reach new areas or perform special moves whereas Shantae can't use this feature in PC. The reason for this seems to be the fact that she lost her magic abilities at the end of RR. Instead, she has to resort to her basic hair whip and it seems like she will use standard gear like e.g. pistols to hit faraway switches or enemies.

The presentation seems to be rather typical for the series with light-hearted dialogs and (more or less) carefree Shantae. E.g. in one early point two girls request you to fill up a pool with some water and you have to use the stink of a nearby ham to fulfill this quest by...

Spoiler

releasing that stink near a giant monster that starts to drool as soon as it smells the ham. The drool now starts flowing down a hole and fills the pool. The girls  take a bath in the pool and comment about the viscious water smelling like bathsalt but they are happy about that. 

So anyone who enjoyed the dialogs from any other entry will surely have a good time with this one, too.

 

Didn't make that much progress so far, though. I'm right at the end of the first "real" dungeon and have to fight that boss. I'm still undecided whether I want to do as few runs as possibile to earn the trophies (some require you to not get hit by the bosses) or if I will spread it across multiple runs. Overall I think the game is okay so far but the controls feel a bit stiff after enjoying HGH.

Edited March 2, 2017 by Crimson Idol