Kill Your Completion - CYOA

[voodoo_eyes]

1 hour ago, DamagingRob said:

P.S. @voodoo_eyes, I may not need your help after all.. Could have sworn there was something requiring online, but maybe that was just for the Vita version. PS4 can supposedly do it via local multiplayer.

 

Yeah, online isn't mandatory- The 2 player trophy can be done online or offline, although I'm not sure if that trophy got fixed by now.

[MosesRockefeller]

18 hours ago, MarkusT1992 said:

Dragon Quest Heroes: The World Tree's Woe and the Blight Below (Day 3)

 

 

This game is not quite what I expected. I expected a game like Hyrule Warriors with long battles and conquering bases to advance. This game isn't bad though. It's a bit of another take on the musou games I played so far. Even so I don't know anything about Dragon Quest it's a great game. But I still prefere Hyrule Warriors and One Piece Pirate Warriors 3 just because I know the franchises.

 

I unlocked the missions which ask you to collect specific items or kill a given number of a monster type. You can use you airship to go to each city you saved and fight against monsters there to gain money, exp and items. You also have some treasure maps which unlock caves on the map where you can fight against the bosses again or do some other special fights.

 

A nice feature is that you can transform into Super Sayan Rose oh pardon me I mean that you can use High Focus (Is that the name in English?) to gain more power and get invulnerable for a short time. You can also use a special attack in this mode to kill all nearby monsters but this ends to High Focus.

 

It's a good game if you like these kind of games or know Dragon Quest. I would give this game a - rating. What it does, it does good.

 

Time played: 4h 30min

Trophies: 6/50

I've seen a few people mention the battles not being long, so can anyone playing Dragon Quest Heroes clarify this for me? I've tried to get into one or two of the "Warriors" musou games in the past (including Hyrule Warriors), but I've always gotten bored by the long battles fighting hundreds of enemies in one go, and having to run back and forth on a large map. I did however enjoy the more bite sized battles of games like Hyperdimension Neptunia U: Action Unleashed or Senran Kagura Shinovi Versus. So if this game is closer to them in terms of mission length, I'd be interested in trying it.

[crimsonidol38]

28 minutes ago, MosesRockefeller said:

I've seen a few people mention the battles not being long, so can anyone playing Dragon Quest Heroes clarify this for me? I've tried to get into one or two of the "Warriors" musou games in the past (including Hyrule Warriors), but I've always gotten bored by the long battles fighting hundreds of enemies in one go, and having to run back and forth on a large map. I did however enjoy the more bite sized battles of games like Hyperdimension Neptunia U: Action Unleashed or Senran Kagura Shinovi Versus. So if this game is closer to them in terms of mission length, I'd be interested in trying it.

 

I only played the first few missions of DQH (and that was about one year ago) but from what I remember it's somewhere in the middle between a "normal" Musou-game like a Dynasty Warriors those light-versions of a Action Unleashed or Senran Versus. You might want to test the demo of the second installment as that should give a good idea of how long those battles normally are:

https://store.playstation.com/#!/cid=UP0082-CUSA06769_00-DQH2EXPLOREREDIT

AFAIK the biggest difference between DQH and DQH II is that the second one has an open world (at least that's what I remember from playing the JP-demo) whereas the first only has an overworld map similar where you navigate just through a menu (like all Hyperdimension-games).

[dmland12]

3 hours ago, DamagingRob said:

 

@dmland12 Hitting a home run with Schwarber qualifies for 10,000 likes! Unfortunately, you'll likely have to settle for just one. :/ When they recharge, that is..

 

LOL, and I'm a Cardinals fan.

 

No worries about the likes.  I'm currently at the limit as well.

[Myu]

Day 10 - Oreshika

 

 

 

I started playing this game this morning and I had to force myself to put the Vita down as I've been playing it for 7 hours straight.

This game is very addictive, there's always something to do and I've been telling myself « just 10 more minutes! » again and again for the last 3 hours.

 

Here's what the story is about : you are part of a clan whose purpose was to protect four sacred items. The items got stolen and the whole clan was slained as a punishment. Some time later, some random god/goddess descends upon earth and decides to revive you. He/She can't do anything about the two curses that were put on you though.

So here you are, with three people forming you new clan. You must get the four sacred items back, have your little revenge on the mysterious entity who cursed you and try to survive while bearing two curses :

• the first one gives you and your family members a life span of 18 to 24 months.

• The second one prevents you from having children with other human beings. Instead you will have to collect enough Devotion points to get a God or a Goddess to have a child with you.

The child is ready to fight two months after his birth, and can start bearing children 6 months later.

Every action takes time and thus you have to be very organized on all fronts to prevent your clan from disappearing.

 

I've already retrieved the first sacred item, lost my two oldest clan members and made three children. I try to get the prettiest / most handsome Goddesses and Gods available of course but the results are sometimes.... meh.

 

Here is a beautiful example of a God I had high hopes in :

 

And here's what I got for my troubles (I was soooo hoping for the white hair ! She got his eyes though...) :

 

I'm keeping my hopes up with this one, I hope the fox ears and the red eyes get passed on :

 

One major drawback : the game doesn't let you take screenshots manually. You have to use the ingame option and sometimes, it's not even available.

[MosesRockefeller]

1 hour ago, Crimson Idol said:

 

I only played the first few missions of DQH (and that was about one year ago) but from what I remember it's somewhere in the middle between a "normal" Musou-game like a Dynasty Warriors those light-versions of a Action Unleashed or Senran Versus. You might want to test the demo of the second installment as that should give a good idea of how long those battles normally are:

https://store.playstation.com/#!/cid=UP0082-CUSA06769_00-DQH2EXPLOREREDIT

AFAIK the biggest difference between DQH and DQH II is that the second one has an open world (at least that's what I remember from playing the JP-demo) whereas the first only has an overworld map similar where you navigate just through a menu (like all Hyperdimension-games).

Thanks, I'll check it out.

[DamagingRob]

4 hours ago, voodoo_eyes said:

Yeah, online isn't mandatory- The 2 player trophy can be done online or offline, although I'm not sure if that trophy got fixed by now.

I seem to be able to play co-op just fine, even with my odd set-up of using the Vita as a second controller. Lol. Probably gonna leave that trophy for Rain Day, as most of the easy ones came naturally. I just have a few more levels to 5-Star and complete challenges in, and I'll be done. Fair warning, some of them were a real pain.. 3/10 difficulty, my butt. 

 

2 hours ago, dmland12 said:

LOL, and I'm a Cardinals fan.

[JoaoQuique]

Game Nº 3 [Madden NFL 11] - Last Day Report

 

 

First Report: Click here

 

Actually, I had not played this game so much yesterday, and I can not give enough additional information... (probably it would be the same if I had played a lot more anyway... ). However, I've started to change some rosters, to turn this game easier (on Madden Moments, any game settings are "turned back" to standard, but any changes on rosters are kept). This is not recommended to change rosters while completing Madden Moments because an edited team to being used can be after an opponent (for example, after sleep-time I've edited some Rams' rosters to being used against Colts, but apparently my next challenge will be myself using Lions against Rams!), however, I can also trade players from every team and these changes would be also kept (in my case, I will change boosted players between Lions and Rams and after change nerfed players between Colts and Rams) - it was a bit strange to see Aaron Rodgers wearing #12 Rams' jersey...

 

I intend to do this trick while all Madden Moments (even I still had to boost and nerf a lot of players to being this a lot more easy...) before starting other trophies - but it doesn't matter to KYC anymore...

 

Playtime: Approx. 3 hours besides time spent on editting rosters

 

Trophies obtained: 2 from 25 (Completion at 4% - Rank E)

 

Personal Completion: from 71,77% to 71,55% (Galaga included...)

 

 

Final Ratings:

 

Graphics: B - considering that it's a 2010 game, its graphics are OK. It's unfair conparing this game to Madden 17...

 

Sound: B+ - like previus game I've played, this game is more dependent of good sounds and noises than BGMs... But this game's menu have a lot of epic songs...

 

Gameplay: B - again, my lack of a proper judgement and my experience on Madden 17 works against this rating. Besides some unconsistancy on performance, this game works well..

 

Replay Factor: B- - if you like American Football and want some trophies, maybe you can have a fair fun about this (if you also wants challenge, just don't set rosters... ). If not, you probably will like playing this game so much...

 

Trophy-wise: B - since this game doesn't have online trophies, its Platinum is achievable even now - to helping with it, every trophy (besides one related to Madden Moments and one related to Pro Bowl) are task-related, being that you can also set rosters and game settings to make all things easier. Probably, the main deal is about non-(American)-Football addicted, which would not know about what some terms mean...

 

Personal grade: 

[DamagingRob]

Final review- Foul Play

 

Well, that went by pretty fast. :/ Not a lot to add, as I was already about halfway through the game when I posted earlier. But I enjoyed my time with it. Some of those challenges were brutal, though.. Either requiring strict time limits, or a number of Perfect Scenes. Not always easy when you're being ganged up on. For the most part, the game is fairly easy though. The final boss is the only place I came close to death. Of course, it may provide more of a challenge on higher difficulties.

 

So, yeah, it's a pretty fun beat 'em up. But I'll go with a  yet again, as it wasn't anything amazing. May be time for a second bonus game.. 

 

Time played: 8-9 hours, I think.

Trophy progress: 29/31 for 98% and an A rank.

Did it lower my completion? For the first time this round, no. Up an astonishing .03%. That's what happens when you've played over 400 games, I guess. 

 

[JoaoQuique]

Game Nº 4 [Hyperdimension Neptunia PP] - Expectations

 

 

What's about? It's an game from Neptunia series which, unlike other games, is almost an "Idol simulation".

 

My expectations: People said that this game is considerably awful, mainly because of lack of songs and this plot is not as good as "canonical series". Since I want to complete all Neptunia games at any moment, I can say I "must" complete this game anyway...

 

My gaming plan: I've made a personal "planning" about what to do on this game, so I will just follow my own plannings... (I hope my gaming plan is good enough...)

 

Which grade do I think I will give to this game? 

[MarkusT1992]

6 hours ago, MosesRockefeller said:

I've seen a few people mention the battles not being long, so can anyone playing Dragon Quest Heroes clarify this for me? I've tried to get into one or two of the "Warriors" musou games in the past (including Hyrule Warriors), but I've always gotten bored by the long battles fighting hundreds of enemies in one go, and having to run back and forth on a large map. I did however enjoy the more bite sized battles of games like Hyperdimension Neptunia U: Action Unleashed or Senran Kagura Shinovi Versus. So if this game is closer to them in terms of mission length, I'd be interested in trying it.

 

 I can't compare them to Hyperdimension Neptunia U or Senran Kagura but the definetly are much shorter than Hyrule Warriors. That mainly due to the changed gameplay of the game compared to Hyrule Warriors. I don't know if the missions get longer later though.

 

In the demo you walk over the world and start one mission, which ends in a boss fight. If this isn't too long for you you should be good with DQH.

[crimsonidol38]

Game 2, Final Review: Jotun (PS4)

Previous posts:

Day 1, Day 2

 

Final review already? And where's the impressions from day 3 and 4? They are non-existent cause I haven't played it the previous two days.

 

Today was rather productive as I was able to wrap up the last one and a half areas. One of them were the treetops of Yggdrasil. They were rather straightforward but sadly there was a giant hawk that attacked Tohra from time to time and you had to dodge in the right moment to take no damage. Guess what? Most of the time I either dodged too early or too late.

The boss fight against that areas Jotun (Hagalaz) was rather easy after finding a proper tactic to use her lightning bolts to damage herself.

 

The other section I had to clear where the two areas associated to the fire jotun Kaunan. One was rather lengthy and a bit annoying as you had to dodge rocks that were thrown at you but also had to use them to build some paths through the lava. The other area was associated to Ymir, the giant whose "remains" where used to form the world and this area also gave a quite nice impression about the birth of the norse gods like Búri, Borr and Odin.
The fight against Kaunan was a really simple one when it comes to the boss' abilities, but the boss theme was really cool and really made this an enjoyable fight.  Impressions can be seen here (obviously not my gameplay):

Spoiler

 

 

 

Besides beating those two bosses I also did a "No Gods Power"-run on Fe (after reading that Hem did it first try) and also got it now. The only annoying thing is that I'm now at the final fight against Odin, which I try to do either tomorrow or Wednesday.

 

All I could say about this game was already said. Overall it's not the game I had hoped for as there were only a few areas that were somehow fun to explore, mainly only the area tied to Ymir. Otherwise the areas more feel like they were used to solely introduce you to the boss' tactics as the main focus lies on those battles. Sadly, this is a thing I'm not really a fan of. I just hope that Thunderlotus' upcoming game Sundered will appeal more to me as the devs advertise it as a metroidvania with some type of morality system.

Biggest plus of the game is definitely the lore. I'm not really into any type of mythology but the game really seems to have a good way to introduce the player to some of the norse lore, even if it may be rather basic overall. But it seems to stay true to the original.

 

I'm not sure if I will continue to play this game much after finishing my initial playthrough, though. It's a good game but time trials, or a no damage run aren't appealing to me. But I guess everyone who wants a good challenge should give this game a try, it really deserves it!

 

Stats:

Rating: 
Total playing time: ~6 hours
Trophies earned: 11 / 37
Completion rate: 21%

Rank: A
Did the game lower my completion? Yes

 

My ratings:

 AWESOME!!!
 Fun to play, sure will continue playing these
 Good while it lasted, but let us just stay friends, kay?
 Be glad if you weren't deleted already
  Wait, who are you? I don't know you...oh shit, you are in my trophy list aka

Spoiler

 

Next game will probably be Zero Escape: The Nonary Games.

Edited July 10, 2017 by Crimson Idol
Fuck these crappy spoiler boxes

[Hemiak]

18 hours ago, Spaz said:

Is it already too late for me to enter this event or can I still join?

 

Even if I decide not to join up it's enjoyable reading what you guys have to say the games you play.

Since it's a choose your own adventure month I'm going to allow it. I will require you to choose at least 5 games, but if you want more than that it's fine as well. 

 

14 hours ago, Crimson Idol said:

 

That's the Kickstarter-backers as the original version of the game was crowdfunded.

 

I'm curious to hear what you will think about the boss fight against Isa, mainly the last section where he's in full rage.

 

 

Ah thanks. Pretty cool reward for backing the game. 

 

I did the fire region last night, which was pretty interesting. I got everything but the 2nd apple on my first run through. Like the Cave region it's broken into two sections, each with an apple and Rune to find. This area also introduced two new God powers, speed boost and a powerful ranged bolt.  Kaunan was a huge difficulty step up from Fe and Jera. I was consistently able to get him under 50% without being hit and not using God powers. Then he goes ape shit and it gets really rough. Took me almost an hour to beat him without God powers, but I had him under 10% several times before that. I'm just playing the areas counter clockwise, dunno if that's a good idea or not. Once I get all the God powers I'll go back to each boss and go for the speed kills, no damage kills, and special requirements. 

 

 

[MarkusT1992]

Game #4: Day of the Tentacle Remastered (Day 1)

 

 

I never played the original version of the game and probably never would have played the remastered version if it wasn't free with PS+. I did watch a Let's Play of the game though.

I have to admitt that I used a guide for this game. That's why I already platted the game.

Nevertheless it's a good game. But what is this game? I guess everyone at least heard about this game or Manic Mansion, which was the previous game. Manic Mansion is fully playable in this game by the way. Day of the Tentacle is a classic point and click adventure and still plays as on in the remastered version. You have a cursor and point to where you want to go. While pointing on objects you can use to show a menu to use things or talk to people or do everything you need to do. Like in every adventure you steal borrow object to solve various puzzles. Maybe I should write something about the plot first.

 

The game starts with an opening cutsceen where a green and a purple tentacle are at a river which is contaminated with wast. Purple tentacl trinks from the water and grows arms because of it. Now it wants to conquer the world, while green tentacle tries to stop him.

You play as Bernart, Haogy and Laverne and need to travel to yesterday to prevent purple tentacle to mutate and taking over the world. So professor Fred sents all three of you in the past but unfortunately the diamond he uses as a catalyst? isn't pure, which leeds to Haogy landing 200 years in the past and Laverne 200 years in the future. Bernart stays in the present. Your task now is to get Haogy and Lavern back and still travel to yesterday to save the world.

To do this you need to collect items in all three times and send them to the other people or put them somewhere to get picked up in the future. For example you wash a sweater for 200 years so that Laverne has a small one for a hamster. I don't want to imagine how much quarters the must cost.

It's nice that things you do in the past influence the future.

 

If you want you can even switch from the remastered version to the old version just by pushing the touchpad. This not only changes the graphics but also the sounds and the UI. You basically have the original game.

 

Although I used a guide and watched a Let's Play before it's still a good, funny game. It probably would be much better without a guide but it nontheless deserves a rating.

 

For the next two days I will go back to Horizon and try to make progress for Monthly Madness in this game.

 

Time Played: 2h 50min

Trophies: 58/58

[ItsMeMartyy]

Game #6  - Infamous First Light

Day 10 / 31

Time Played: 8 Hours 

 

Graphics: If you have played Infamous Second Son the graphics are pretty much identical. That is not a bad thing, being a launch title (second son) it looks amazing now and at the time I'd imagine it was revolutionary. In this game you play one of the NPC's you meet along your path in Second Son so you only get part of the package in terms of graphics because you only get one of the main abilities. The neon ability is probably the most impressive in my opinion though, the textures and particles are diverse and smooth while having a severe contrast with the world around you and that helps the overall vibe of the game. 

 

Sound: Nothing too fantastic here, everything sounds about how you'd expect , the neon abilities sound like lasers and environmental sound effects such as the slamming and cracking of the pavement are there but they aren't anything special. The voice acting in this game is solid, probably one of the best parts about it, the characters are believable within the environment.

 

Gameplay: Being a 3rd person action game it has a lot of competition on the ps4. I would say it's average in compassion to similar types of titles , there isn't a massive amount of diversity in what you can do and there are cool little mini type games implemented with the motion sensor of the dualshock controller but this game does get old pretty fast. Most of the missions are simply "go here kill x" or "protect x from y". This game does add an area type mode where you can fight waves of enemies to get higher score combos and it does have leaderboard support. However, this game-mode can only go so far when you only have a limited skill set at your disposal. I know the gameplay part sounds pretty negative but there is an abundance of great 3rd person action games on the ps4 so I believe that you need to critique based on what we have if we were lacking this type of game I would probably be less critical. 

 

Fun Factor:  The game has a good amount of fun up until about 5 hours then everything starts to just repeat itself; be aware of this if you decide to go for the platinum in this game because I can see it taking some people over 15 hours. 

 

Closing Thoughts:  This is definitely not a full AAA title and it was never marketed to be, personally, I feel like if you have played Second Son it's probably better to skip this game if you want an enjoyable experience because this is just a heavily watered down version of that. 

 

Rating: 6.0/10.0

 

Completion (Game) : 100% ( 1  , 7 , 11  , 6  ) 

 

Up Next: Metro 2033 Redux 

Edited July 11, 2017 by ItsMeMartyy
typo

[SyIaris]

Well, that didn't go as planned. Played one day and then just laid around in bed the rest. 

Keeps me from blitzing through things, at least, and it's the main reason I gave a longer gap for my games.

 

July 6th-10th

Batman: Arkham City  [PS3]

6 hours played

13/71 (15%)

-0.71% (from event start)

 

The one game on my list I've played before, yet it doesn't seem like I actually remember much other than a few annoying parts that I'd gotten stuck on - so far. I would really appreciate the memory of how to get some of these Riddler trophies popping up. Aaaaanytime now...

Fun fact: there's only one game on my PSNprofile older than my last achievement in the PC version.

 

Theoretically, I'm about a third of the way through the story? It's definitely enjoyable, but the story seems a bit more scattered than Asylum's. To be fair, that's probably more accurate to the comics than having them all connected. Can't say I remember Batman being that much of a jerk (Harley), either.

The facial animations are a little dated now, but not to the point of detracting from the game.

Combat is the Arkham games' strong point. Carefully stealth around or jump into the middle of a mob (not advised if they have guns...) and pull off combos in one of the smoothest beat 'em up systems out there. A few other games have since copied it, but that doesn't make it any less satisfying to pull off a flawless battle.

 

Still a great game, and one which I'm looking forward to getting back to. Unlikely I'll ever be able to plat it, but it's more than worth the time to play.

[Edunstar84]

 

FISHY TALES OF THE NEKOMATA

aka The Cat DLC, aka A Cat's Revenge

 

Playtime: 2 hours

Trophies: 0/6

Review: 8/10

 

Doooooods...this one is particularly difficult, fun but difficult. You play as a cat, duh, and you're seeking revenge on the people that killed your humans*. The environment and the enemies are pretty much the same, like in the main game. The saving grace in this DLC is the variety of attacks, the experience tree, and the bosses. So far I've only encountered two, but boy were they exciting! Wouldn't want to spoil it for you though. You're just going to have to find out for yourself.

 

*Sidenote: If any of you own a cat, you know that cats do not have owners 'cause they are never owned. They are guardians of the Netherworld and, therefore,  wouldn't condescend to a lower level, you know like dogs.

 

 

A CAUSE TO DAIKON FOR

aka The Farmer DLC, aka A Farmer's Plee 

 

Playtime: 1 hour

Trophies: 0/6

Review: 5/10

 

Don't know what I think about this one. The farmers are getting ready to revolt, and as the leader - supposedly - you have taken it upon yourself to ask the lord for more time to pay for taxes. It's the Japanese feudal system, you know. Like the previous DLC, you encounter the same environs and enemies. Haven't come to a boss yet 'cause it's a bit too difficult for me right now. I haven't even told you the best part. So instead of using swords, he (Genbo) uses a hoe, bamboo stick, and a sickle 'cause you know....farmers. The attack multiplier isn't very high, so I can see myself having to grind later on. I would say this is an average DLC compared to the other one and the main game. It might be the last one I try to 100%.

 

Edited July 11, 2017 by Edunstar84

[DamagingRob]

Bonus game- Abyss Odyssey

 

This game is... okay. I wanted to play it when it became free, and downloaded it right away. But never got around to it till now. It's a roguelike game, and you basically just keep going down through a number of rooms, until you reach the final boss. As you do, you'll fight enemies on each floor. If you die, you get a second chance, as you then get to play as a soldier. If you reach a checkpoint with the soldier, your main character will be revived, and you'll go back to playing as her. 

 

There are 3 different characters, each with their own moves and equippable weapons. 2 of them need to be unlocked, though. As you defeat enemies, you gain XP and level up. And then you can upgrade your skills with points you obtain from that. But honestly, I've barely done anything except regular attacks. They seem to work well enough, and dying means restarting the entire thing. So, not dying is the goal.  

 

It's not like it's that hard or anything, though. I got a Game Over once, but that's it. And that was with a new character, starting the run at Level 1. It becomes a joke after you've leveled up a bit. Which you do keep your levels and gold, despite losing any items you had. You can find weapons fairly often, though, so it hasn't really been a bother. There's also a guy that sells them and other things. You can fight him, too, if you want. All you get is a trophy/XP for it, though. Lol. 

 

I've completed 4 runs now, and each took an hour or less. So, it's pretty short. Trophies seem to be a bit of a pain, though, requiring multiple playthroughs to get them all. Not to mention, there's a luck factor involved with some of them.. I see @voodoo_eyes managed to fight and kill all the optional bosses. Any tips? I've gone to the bull room 3 times, now, and every time the boss wasn't there. I don't know if it's random or what. The trophy guide doesn't seem to indicate he is. But he also states 5+ hours to complete, too, when the fastest achiever here is way over that. :/ 

 

So, yeah. It's not the greatest, so I'm giving it a . Music and voice acting are pretty good, though. 

 

Time played: ~4 hours. 

Trophy progress: 8/14 for 61% and an A rank. 

Did it lower my completion? Slightly, but that may change if I complete it today. 

[dizzyshadow]

Game 3 : Destroy All Humans

Destroy all Humans is a third person shooter, you play as crypto-137 a furon who comes earth investigating what happened to Crypto-136 (who you are cloned from)  and to recover the lost furon DNA which is hidden inside humans and is needed to save the furon race. The game is very tongue in cheek and features a number a stereotypes, anything you've heard about UFOs and alien visitors is probably in the game somewhere. The game is set in cold war america and the government attempt to pass everything off as the actions of the Commies. All of which makes the game very humerous and fun to play, which is probably the point since its unlikely to to win any prizes for gameplay or graphics (given its a PS2) although to be fair, it actually looks better than i expected given it is a PS2 game.

 

The game is split into missions which typically require you to destroy something or someone, its not a simple destroy everything game though as the game uses a threat system where the more people who become aware of your presence the greater the response, it escalates from citizens, to police, to military, to majestic (a secret branch of the government trying to control the population (think men in black))which makes the game harder for you, which encourages you to use stealth, in particular a device which allows you to disguise yourself as someone else.  and while the majority of the game is on foot (or jetpack) you also get to fly Crypto's saucer in what becomes a very basic flight sim, and these sections typically involve mass destruction of an area.

 

the only thing stopping this getting a  rating is that the game is quite buggy, i've had a number of blue screen crashes which are very annoying when they mean you lose significant progress. However i really enjoyed the game overall, and this could possibly be the first game i go back to when KYC is over.

 

Play time: approx 7 hours

Trophies: 11/38

Rating: 

next up: Stardew Valley

[PerryToxteth]

KYC(CYOA) Game No. 2

Submerged

 

 

  This is Game No. 2 of 5 for the CYOA event. Once again, this game was started with no trophy guide, walkthrough or trophy list consulting.

Overview:  My theme of the CYOA event was "Short, Sweet, and Most Likely Stupid." The first game (Wheels of Aurelia) fit the criteria of short and stupid. But Submerged, an exploratory slow burn, qualifies for Short AND Sweet! So much for killing my completion though, I 100%ed it with three hours of gameplay...oops. So, in my KYC career that is only the 2nd game I have completed in the 22 games I have played during the events (The Order:1886 being the first). 

  Submerged takes place in a post-apocalyptic water world, but missing Kevin Costner and sadly, the T&A of Jeanne Tripplehorn.   The story is told very simplistically - there is no decipherable dialogue - yet the depth conveyed through one-cell, caveman-like pictures is astonishing. I've played AAA games that last 50+ hours that can't bestir the emotions like Submerged can.

Gameplay: Submerged takes place in an open-world where your character, a nameless young girl, drives around a boat and explores. You are in a flooded modern city, with only the tops of the buildings exposed and they are quickly decaying.  As you make your way through the canyons of decrepit skyscrapers, you explore and collect supply packs and collectibles, and you unfog the map. Areas that are accessible for climbing are easy to spot as the boat landings have red flowers around them.  Once you dock your boat, your character can climb the heights using platforms and ledges and search for goodies. The controls are easy to climb with, just joystick to the direction you want to go. As you acquire supplies, the story begins to unfold.  

   This game is much like Journey. Take your time and enjoy the trek of exploring your surroundings. The game has a very relaxed feel and is best enjoyed as your wind down your day before bed.  It would not be a good fit for getting angst out after having a shitty day at work.  It's basically a big collectible grab and don't fret about missing something, as there is a "Explore" section after you finish the story of the game. Again, the story is told through tiny cut-scenes and pictures you unlock as you grab supplies. There is a point where they story goes a bit haywire, as in, "did I just see that correctly?" Yes, you did. The ending is lacking but that's okay, it was the laid-back journey of that game that made it worthwhile.

- One tip, when you begin searching at a supply point (marked with a red package on the map), you will also see the amount of collectibles there as well (orange diamonds). To save time, try to collect ALL the collectibles BEFORE grabbing the supply pack. Once you grab the supplies, the game will automatically take you back to your home base. So all that time spent climbing will have to be done all over again to mop up for the collectibles trophy.

Billy Rating: . For the price-point the game is at, the hours played, the trophy requirements and considering it's a non-platinum, I enjoyed this enough to give it a top reward. There are things lacking and the game can lag at times, but I enjoyed every minute I played in Submerged.

 

KYC/CYOA

Games Completed/ Played - 74/52

Trophies Earned -2527

Unearned - 427

Completion % - 84.45%

Rarity - 43.63%

 

 

Next up - Day of the Tentacle

 

 

 

   

 

  

Edited July 11, 2017 by PerryToxteth

[voodoo_eyes]

3 hours ago, DamagingRob said:

Bonus game- Abyss Odyssey

 

I've completed 4 runs now, and each took an hour or less. So, it's pretty short. Trophies seem to be a bit of a pain, though, requiring multiple playthroughs to get them all. Not to mention, there's a luck factor involved with some of them.. I see @voodoo_eyes managed to fight and kill all the optional bosses. Any tips? I've gone to the bull room 3 times, now, and every time the boss wasn't there. I don't know if it's random or what. The trophy guide doesn't seem to indicate he is. But he also states 5+ hours to complete, too, when the fastest achiever here is way over that. :/

 

Both are random as far as I know. The one that summons the horse, if he shows up will be in the middle lane. On average I have needed to restart the the game 4-5 times for his symbol to show up on the "map flags". So what I do is generally run the first room of the middle lane, check the flag and if the bull icon isn't there I quit and load up the game again until he shows up. I still need to get his soul, but I've been getting bad RNG with him often jumping over it just before the cast goes off.

 

The chimaira or whatever can appear at either entrance (supposedly higher chance at the 2nd entrance), but only does so if you died. So basically enter the first room, get the character killed as well as the substitute, then when you are in the greyish "limbo" pick the middle option and hope for thm to spawn.

Fireballs with max damage help greatly with beating either of them, furthermore you can start casting with them off-screen and they should still get hit by them.

 

Edited July 11, 2017 by voodoo_eyes

[Edward_FOX_86]

How does this Bonus Game Works Guys?

 

Sorry for my ignorence 

[Melanogaster1987]

First things first: a slight change to my planned schedule. I had no time for gaming on my planned starting day (July 7), so I'm going to push back everything by one day. Here is my new schedule:

 

July 8 - 10: El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron
July 11 - 13: Wolfenstein: The Old Blood
July 14 - 16: Disney Epic Mickey 2: The Power of Two
July 17 - 19: Mafia II
July 20 - 22: The Crew
July 23 - 25: Remember Me
July 26 - 28: Crysis
July 29 - 31: No Man's Sky

 

Also, I wanted to let you all know that I will use BillyHorrible's scale for my ratings ( >  >  >  >  >  >  >  >  >  >  >  > ) - gives more granularity than the  >  >  >  >  scale that I used in KYC3.

 

So without further ado, my first review of the event:

 

Game #1 of 8: El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron
 

El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron is a hack and slash / platforming mash-up in which you take control of Enoch, a man sent by God to defeat seven "fallen angels" in order to save the world... at least, that's what I think is going on - I have found parts of the story a bit hard to follow so far for two reasons:

 

a ) It's apparently based on Jewish scriptures, and I know very little about Judaism.

 

b ) My instruction manual may well explain who certain characters are, but alas is no help to me, as I ended up with the Dutch version of the game (but fortunately the game still has English voices and subtitles).

 

Load up El Shaddai, and the first thing that strikes you is the aesthetics. The environments are absolutely beautiful and seriously trippy in places - it is one of the most aesthetically impressive games I have ever seen, and it's a shame that the PS3 doesn't allow you to take screenshots like the PS4 can. That feature was made for games like this, and I would love to see a remaster. Even the pause screen looks great; it's just like one of my favourite screen savers!

 

The hack and slash parts of the game will be familiar to anyone who's played God of War. It features three weapons - the arc, which is like a sword and can be used for quick attacks at short range; the gale, which allows you to launch projectiles at enemies from long range but is rather weak; and the veil, which resembles a shield and is very strong both offensively and defensively, but is slow and short-ranged. You can use both the square and triangle buttons to attack, but they both do exactly the same things; you simply don't get the array of moves and combos that you would see in the likes of God of War. This lack of move variety is a bit of a let down and can make combat feel rather one-dimensional. Also, the game could use more enemy variety; at first glance, there appears to be many different kinds of enemies, but when you look past the different skins, there are only really four types so far, one for each of the three weapons, plus a smattering of weak unarmed foes.

 

However, there are two extra dimensions to the fighting that I like - firstly, you can only wield one weapon at a time (if you want to change to a different one, you've got to knock out an enemy carrying that weapon and then steal it). I initially thought that this would be a big hindrance, but I've grown to like it because it makes you think more strategically about each encounter. Secondly, your weapon's power will degrade over time, but can be restored by "purifying" it. Doing so leaves you vulnerable for a few seconds, so picking your moment to purify is a skill that adds depth to combat sequences.

 

As well as the hack and slash gameplay, there's also a lot of platforming to be done, and in my opinion, this is the better of the two gameplay styles. There are both 2-D and 3-D platforming sequences, and they are proving to be somewhat challenging without being unduly hard. The controls feel tight and work well, and even here when there's no combat, weapon selection is important - holding the arc allows you to slowly glide down to land, hold the gale lets you perform a quick dash to cover long distances in mid-air, and as far as I can tell, the veil gives you no special platforming ability. These parts help the pacing, providing a welcome break from the at times lengthy enemy fights. However, things aren't quite perfect, as the fixed camera (more on this later) can make it tough to judge your jumps in some of the 3-D platforming sections, especially when jumping to the left or right.

 

There are a few more quibbles that I have with El Shaddai - most glaringly, the lack of a HUD on your first playthrough. Making on-screen meters an unlockable that requires you to beat the game is one of the most bizarre design choices I've ever seen. It means that I don't know what the many orange orbs you can collect are for (increasing your strength I assume - I don't think there are any upgrades to buy), and the lack of health bars makes some of the long boss fights seem like they're just never going to end. Also, there's the unskippable cutscenes; always a pet peeve for me! Die during certain areas and you could be waiting a good few minutes before getting back to the action. Finally, I really wish that the right analog stick did something - a God of War style quick dodge function would be very useful in combat, and being able to move the camera would be very helpful in certain platforming sequences - it's as if the developers couldn't decide which of these two things they wanted the right stick to do, and so delivered the worst of both worlds by giving it no function at all. Having said all that, it's not as if these things ruin the game, but it definitely takes things down a notch.

 

My rating: Gold/Gold/Silver .The hack and slash gameplay would get a Silver, the platforming is worthy of a Gold. The tremendous aesthetics push this more towards a Gold overall for me.

 

---
 
Trophies earned: 11 (11) for 165 points
 
Current completion rate: 62.21% [Down 0.62%]

Edited July 11, 2017 by Melanogaster1987

[dizzyshadow]

Vita Game 1:  Flame over

 

Ok so the first of my "commuting games" Flame over, you play as a firefighter (Blaze) and the game involves doing what fire fighters do, enter burning buildings and try to put out fires and save people (and cats). The game essentially plays as a twin stick shooter with fire as your enemy,  the levels are randomly generated, which leads to the usual problems/benefits of this approach (ie that luck plays a big part in your success), it also has some interesting features which add realism like electrical fires which can't be put out with water, which means you have to find the circuit box and turn off the power to make the level easier.

 

Now i mentioned when signing up that i'd been put off this because i heard it was difficult, having played it i definitely agree that it is difficult, i'm quite surprised that i haven't already unlocked the die 100 time trophy because I've died an awful lot, however it does feel fair, when i die its usually my fault and i could have avoided it. However given some of the requirements i'm not sure i'll ever be able get the plat on this.

 

Overall its a nice game and I would like to play more, however i suspect i may enjoy it on the PS4 better than the vita, feels like the bigger screen could help.It may be that there will always be something in my backlog more tempting than this.

 

 

Playtime : 4-5 hours

Trophies 8/36

Rating : /

Completion Rate: 49.64% (-1.0%)

 

next up: Root Letter

[Hemiak]

I had the TV to myself last night so I skipped over First Light and jumped straight into:

 Hem time game 2

6.5 hours played, 18/37, 38%

 

I had free reign last night on the TV so jumped straight into this. I continued my counter clockwise traverse of the hub and ended up in a frozen wasteland. There were a ton of icy islands connected by partially submerged rocks I could cross. Occasionally there would be a high pillar to ascend that would give you an overview of the surrounding area. This made it slightly easier to navigate in the right general direction. 

 

There were snow drifts that would occasionally block your path that you needed to hit with a heavy attack to knock away. Also, there would occasionally be a huge snow storm foe a few seconds. Being out in this immediately starts draining your hp at a rapid pace. Handily, most of the islands have a large vertical rock you can hide behind, so it really wasn't that dangerous.

 

After collecting everything there, I left and headed to the next section, which was a huge frozen lake. I basically skirted all the way around the edge. You can see shadows of small fish as you travel the ice, and if you get away from the edge you see the huge shadow of Jomung... Something. It's a giant water dragon that will occasionally break through the ice to damage you. It's pretty easy to see when and where he'll appear so it isn't hard to avoid him. 

 

Edit: FFS I was almost done with the whole post and lost it back to this point.

 

Boss

 

 

 

After clearing these areas you get to face Isa. This boss is your standard ice giant. He slowly walks around, occasionally trying to slam the player. He also attempts to charge, which is easy to avoid, and does a frost breath in an arc in front of him. At 50% the snow blows away and you get to run around on ice. A storm also begins blowing and worsens as you damage him, making it harder and harder to navigate. I found it way easier to move upwind and avoid him, and then use the wind to help me close the distance with him quickly when an opening appeared. I actually killed this guy 2nd try, which might just make him the easiest boss. 
 

 

 

 

Next I decided to shoot for some of the trophies so I went back to Jera. Using the speed boost and Thors hammer you can really poor the damage on fast and it wasn't too bad to get the speed kill trophy. Using pretty much the same technique, but playing a little more cautiously and using the shield power I got the no damage trophy out of the way. The no Tentacle kill trophy popped somewhere while working in these two. It's pretty random where they pop up so just killing fast and being marginally aware makes this pretty easy. 

 

I used pretty much the same strategies for Fe, except being more mobile, Fe took a few extra attempts at the speed kill. For the no damage I skipped the shield and dropped a decoy when I was getting rushed by dwarves. I also finished him(her?) off with the Gungnir (purple spear) power up from afar.

 

The misc trophy for Fe involves killing him(I don't care if I'm wrong I'm sticking with this pronoun) without melee attacks. You can use melee to thin out the dwarves, you just can't hit the boss. This seemed really hard, until I read that you can bounce his shield back when he throws it. Then it seemed hard again because I could not get the timing down with the heavy attack to make it work. Finally I remembered that you can actually charge the heavy attack and wait to release it. This revelation made the fight much easier. Also when the battle has gone on a while stalactites begin falling, which can damage the boss. At this point you can just focus on survival, kiting the boss around the middle area where falling rocks are more common. 

 

OK, back to the main story. The next area was for the storm boss. I started by going to an area where you walk on clouds in space (I think) There are areas with lightning you have to watch out for, and little electricity tendrils that you need to dodge. The main thing in this area are little crystals. You hit them to activate them, causing them to link to nearby active crystals with lightning. You use this to copy a pattern in the stars over the side of the cloud you're on. Most of these were shaped like deer or stags. Each one gives you a snippet of lore to listen to. 

 

After clearing the area it was time to climb Yggdrasil, the legendary world tree. Fortunately I only had to navigate a small section, as this thing is huge. Along the way I saw a giant eagle, with a hawk on his head, and a giant squirrel that does stuff for the tree. After a bit the Eagle starts dive bombing you, which is a pain to avoid. The attacks get more frequent as you approach its nest, and decrease once you are past it. In this area I got the trophies for fining all if the apples, and visiting all the God shrines, neither was particularly difficult. 

 

Boss

 

 

 

Next up was Hagalaz. She(I'm almost positive) begins lying in two halfs, but quickly Snaps together when you engage. She floats slightly above ground, but you can still reach her feet most of the time. Her main attacks are a directed stream of electricity that she telegraphs, and a series of lightning bolts focused on the player. These show up as a small white circle that slowly brightens. If you get out you get to see the bolt come down, if not your whole screen turns white for a second or two, making dodging the next bolts much much harder. She starts by throwing three bolts, dropping 5 or 6 at a time towards the end. 

 

There are also 4 lightning towers around the level that out out more of the electricity tendrils, which get more common later in the fight. These do minimal damage, so it's always better to hit one of these than her direct attacks. If you can get all 4 towers lit up at the same time she gets stunned and falls down. Giving you a couple free hits for extra damage. At about 30% she splits in two and retains all of her abilities. This actually doesn't really make the fight much tougher and can provide opportunities to have one stun the other. This boss took 4 or 5 shots, I'd get to a point, she'd throw something new at me, I'd die. Make it past... Repeat. So far this feels like it'll be the hardest to no damage because of the little electricity shoots. 
 

 

 

 

Finally I reached the final boss Odin. No build up or level to explore, you basically just walk up, he monologs, you fight. Not going to lie, this guy is an ass hole. 45 min later he was still alive, and I needed to go to bed. I did get him to around 10-15%, so it'll happen soon. 

 

 

 

 

Odin starts out stationary, and you can ready up and nail him with a heavy attack the second the fight starts. Then he starts floating around the area, pausing in place for a bit or slowly drifting in a direction. His main attack is a thunder spear amazingly. His aim is absolute shite however, so he'll almost never directly hit you which is good. The bad thing is that the spears begin circling and will come back after about 8-10 seconds. They aren't super fast, though you can't outrun them. The main issue is that their tracking is ridiculous, and they're very hard to dodge effectively. More good news though, If one hits you it disappears.

 

At about 80% he starts throwing a spear that immediately splits in three, which is fun. Good news is that they all come back with a couple seconds between them. This all felt completely impossible as they don't seem to despawn at any point. Then I realized timing a simple axe swing can destroy them and is way easier than dodging anyway.

 

At about 60% Odin decides that a fair fight is stupid, and starts inviting his friends to the party. The arena is a giant triangle, with two large circles on each side. Odin stops in place for a bit and summons a buddy to one of the circles. This could be any of the 5 previous Jotun, and each makes one attack before disappearing. After a bit he begins summoning 2 or even 3 at a time, and at about 20% starts throwing triple spears again.

 

Unlike the main game, Jera is by far the worst Jotun to get as she brings her giant poison cloud. There aren't any flowers to save you here, so it's get out of the cloud or say goodbye to half your hp. The cloud also covers about 70% of the arena, and spreads faster than you can run.

 

Next worst is Hagalaz and her GD lightning bolts, which come in a group of 5. 3rd is Kaunan and his belly flop, which is a pain when looking out for spears and other Jotun.

 

Isa brings his charge and Fe the shield throw, both of which ate laughably easy to avoid compared to everything else.

 

So at the end its basically hit Odin once or twice, break a spear, dodge some Jotun, break a spear or two while closing with Odin, try to hit him again... Repeat. When I finally finish him without powers I'll try to save the video and post it here.  
 

 

 

 

I really like the game. The art style is cool and the sounds fit the atmosphere and font overshadow the game. The bosses could maybe be a little more diverse but are cool even still. My only real gripe is the way battles are set up. If you are playing normally the strategies are almost identical. Since they all add more mechanics is and ramp up the ferocity later in the fight the basic strat is to whittle them down with regular hit and run early on. Get your hp back up around mid fight, and then start using shields abs decoys to buy yourself time in the late middle. Once you hit 20-30% boss hp, blow your speed boost and Thor's hammer and just nuke the boss as hard as you can. If it still isn't dead get some distance and nail it with Gungnir. You'd still need to learn each bosses pattern for the start, but this basically makes it to where the hardest part of the fight is over super quick without any hassle. 

 

@Edward_FOX_86The bonus game is just that. If you finish a game or decide that you're done with your current one, you can add an extra game to your list to play at the time. It's definitely not required, so don't feel pressured if you don't want to. 

Edited July 11, 2017 by Hemiak