Cassylvania's Miserable Little Pile of Platinums

[Cassylvania]

8 hours ago, Taruta13 said:

Well, for the record, I was playing Minecraft and I have my own scathing review about that.

 

What's wrong with Minecraft? It's basically the perfect game.

 

The good news is my backlog is now down to 102 games... at least, until the new monthly PS+ games drop later today. My goal is to get it below 100 and keep it there. I'm also going to stop buying new games unless I intend to play them right away. This is the year where I finally put a dent in my backlog.

 

Next up... hm. There are some Souls-likes I'd like to try, but I should probably finish (start) Elden Ring first. I'd also like to get to SoS: Pioneers of Olive Town. Cris Tales is tempting, and Dead Cells just dropped a DLC that's literally calling my name. There's also Scarlet Nexus. There's no way that any of those games could disappoint me.

 

...right?

[Puppeter04]

1 hour ago, Cassylvania said:

 There's no way that any of those games could disappoint me.

 

...right?

Right, maybe you lose a lil bit of hair but not disappointing in there. 

 

I'll start Scarlet Nexus soon too, looking forward to see if our opinions differ, i don't think so but hey, who knows! 

 

Good luck on keeping ur backlog below 100! Mine is huge too but I don't have my PS3 with me at the moment, I'll fix it whenever I can ?

 

Also I have a deal with Copanele, if I plat both versions of Catherine before he plat the PS3 one, he'll pay for my coffee but imma give him a lil bit of advantage so I'll do that on June/July, I bet he hasn't platted it by then ?

 

Keep it up! 

[Rally-Vincent---]

14 hours ago, Cassylvania said:

 

Thanks for that. I watched the first couple episodes. It does look like my kind of game...but two things worry me. The first is the controls. I wonder if it would be better with a keyboard and mouse. The second is the difficulty. I think I could get around it, but I'm not sure I need more frustrating games in my life.

 

With the turn-based mode, controller controls are fine. RTWP obviously would be easier with mouse/keyboard, but the options have like 20 different sliders for auto-pause during combat, and you can always manually pause combat to enter actions or moves.

 

Difficulty: I assume you start at a high difficulty and clean up at lower, like I do. Some parts can be very frustrating on unfair. Some encounters are balanced badly. Still, unfair mode is doable, it just takes quite some reloads and/or save scumming in the ealy parts of the game. The more levels you gain, the easier it gets on unfair. The difficulty is artificial, as in padded enemy stats and the RNG. At some point, the D20 will fall for you. I only recommend keeping a couple of saves before each encounter, just in case. Of course, you can also learn the system on a lower difficulty and then min/max your unfair playthrough. I prefer starting high, though, as the difference is so much bigger than "usually".

[Taruta13]

8 hours ago, Cassylvania said:

What's wrong with Minecraft? It's basically the perfect game.

 

Oh, the game isn't the problem, I could probably platinum both titles if I went on some seed that gave me the perfect RNG(because I can't find Iron Ore to save my life)... it's the DLC trophies that are annoying. Two DLCs require you to have the oldest version of the game because they removed the battle modes from those expansions when they upgraded to Bedrock, so I have to buy an actual physical copy to get all of the trophies for DLC 2 and DLC 5.

 

Also, been too busy with other stuff to play Minecraft. About to pop the Wild ARMS platinum stack for PS4(did the PS5 version a while back) and then I have to do some POWGI game and then hit LEGO DC Super Villains for that platinum before I go to Florida for my Hogwarts Legacy pilgrimage, and I have to buy a giant hiker's pack because the plane doesn't have cargo so you can only carry enough items that you can put under your plane seat and I'm definitely taking the PS5 so I can play Hogwarts Legacy. (My PS4 has overheating issues and I don't want an inferior Hogwarts Legacy experience.)

 

I applaud you for trying to keep your backlog under control. I have four RPGs that need to be worked on, including two physical copies(Ni No Kuni Remastered, FFXII The Zodiac Age) that I am dreading to play. I thought you might try Mighty Switch Force Collection... then I recalled that I am going to platinum Shantae Half-Genie Hero and how PAINFUL the Officer Mode, which was a testament to that series, was, and cringe. HARD.

 

I'm sure you had your reasons to abandon DOOM Eternal and House Flipper too. Well, good luck on your attempts to keep the backlog down.

Edited March 8, 2023 by Taruta13

[Cassylvania]

On 3/7/2023 at 0:28 PM, Puppeter04 said:

Also I have a deal with Copanele, if I plat both versions of Catherine before he plat the PS3 one, he'll pay for my coffee but imma give him a lil bit of advantage so I'll do that on June/July, I bet he hasn't platted it by then ?

 

Eh, I'll join in too. I've been wanting to try that game out anyway.

 

On 3/7/2023 at 1:26 PM, Rally-Vincent--- said:

Difficulty: I assume you start at a high difficulty and clean up at lower, like I do. Some parts can be very frustrating on unfair. Some encounters are balanced badly. Still, unfair mode is doable, it just takes quite some reloads and/or save scumming in the ealy parts of the game. The more levels you gain, the easier it gets on unfair. The difficulty is artificial, as in padded enemy stats and the RNG. At some point, the D20 will fall for you. I only recommend keeping a couple of saves before each encounter, just in case. Of course, you can also learn the system on a lower difficulty and then min/max your unfair playthrough. I prefer starting high, though, as the difference is so much bigger than "usually".

 

I think I'm in the opposite. Depends on the game. If it requires two full playthroughs, I'll usually do the first on Easy so that the second playthrough offers something different (i.e. a challenge). If it requires a full playthrough on Hard and a partial playthrough on a lower difficulty, I'll usually do it that way so that the second playthrough feels more like a victory lap. Tails of Iron is a weird exception because I did my Easy/Hard playthroughs simultaneously. Easy first to practice a boss, and then Hard once I felt comfortable. Kinda doing the same with Ys Origin, but we don't talk about that game.

 

Started Dead Cells today, so Catherine and Pathfinder will have to wait a bit.

 

On 3/7/2023 at 7:53 PM, Taruta13 said:

I'm sure you had your reasons to abandon DOOM Eternal and House Flipper too. Well, good luck on your attempts to keep the backlog down.

 

Yeah, I'm not paying $20 for each of House Flipper's DLCs. That's highway robbery. I have a real house I'm trying to flip.

 

DOOM Eternal is... yeah... There's a reason you guys don't see me play many FPS games.

Edited March 9, 2023 by Cassylvania

[Taruta13]

I really enjoyed your reviews and am thinking of doing a review blog which reviews all of the games I've platinumed a la Jirard Dragonrider's Completionist Videos. (I might make them a video series if I can figure out how to use OBS ) and here is my rating system:

 

100% Complete It!: Get EVERY trophy including all the DLC!
Platinum It: Get the platinum trophy, it's a fun journey!
Casual Clear: Complete the main story, but don't bother trophy hunting here.
Try It Out: Play it a bit, it might not be for you.
Wait For Sale: Don't pay full price for this game, it's okay but not worth paying for.
Avoid x3!: Don't even bother buying this pile of toxic waste!

[realm722]

22 hours ago, Cassylvania said:

Started Dead Cells today, so Catherine and Pathfinder will have to wait a bit.

 

I got giddy when I saw it on your profile today. One of the best games I've ever played. I can only imagine how daunting the game's content must be as a new player (I remember platinuming it back in 2019 pre-DLC) but the gameplay is some of the finest of any roguelite on the market. I think it's precisely the game you need after laboring through a few duds. AND a new Story of Seasons? Feeling ambitious this March eh Cassy?

[Cassylvania]

1 hour ago, realm722 said:

I got giddy when I saw it on your profile today. One of the best games I've ever played. I can only imagine how daunting the game's content must be as a new player (I remember platinuming it back in 2019 pre-DLC) but the gameplay is some of the finest of any roguelite on the market. I think it's precisely the game you need after laboring through a few duds. AND a new Story of Seasons? Feeling ambitious this March eh Cassy?

 

Feeling sick, actually, so I figured why not. (I have covid for real this time.) The good news is my immediate reaction is that I don't hate either game.

 

I see you started the super ultra rare game called Frost. I can save you some trouble by letting you know that trying to save scum may invalidate some trophies. I remember tracking down the devs and they were like, "How did you find our private Discord sever!?"

 

I have my ways, devs... I have my ways.

Edited March 9, 2023 by Cassylvania

[Taruta13]

30 minutes ago, Cassylvania said:

I have my ways, devs... I have my ways.

 

Speaking of which...

 

 

Nice try, Gears for Breakfast, but if I am going to torture myself again with your cute little demonesses and their Super Mario Odyssey speedrun shenagins, I'm going to get a TON of trophy-free practice first!

 

Yeah, that means I had to deleted a Pokemon game, but after I got a Hisuan Zorua in a Surprise Trade(which I was doing in parallel to the Kaledioscope event), I decided to just get myself over it and suffer Snatcher's annoying evil mischief more than trying to meet the god of Pokemon.

 

This way, when the time comes to plant this game on my trophy file, I won't be hating myself because I'll have some experience.

[Cassylvania]

Platinum #371 - Story of Seasons: Pioneers of Olive Town

 

Pioneers of Olive Town is the latest farming sim to be released by our guys and gals at Marvelous, the original creators of the beloved Harvest Moon series. But is this a story you will o-love or should you o-leave it alone? (Can you believe I write my own material?)

 

There is no getting around this fundamental truth: there is no video game series I want to succeed more than Story of Seasons. I grew up with the Harvest Moon games and I am beyond disgusted with what Natsume has been doing with the IP ever since the breakdown. (For those of you who don't know, Marvelous and Natsume (the Japanese localization team) parted ways a few years ago. Natsume retained the rights to the "Harvest Moon" name, while Marvelous was forced to rebrand as Story of Seasons. Like a spiteful ex-girlfriend, Natsume has basically turned the series into a cheap, money-grabbing mockery. It's like they took my favorite pet and now I'm being forced to watched them skin her alive over and over again.) There is a seething hatred inside of me every time I see Natsume release another game, and now they're doing it AGAIN with Harvest Moon: The Winds of Anthos this summer. (I'm sure it's only a coincidence that Marvelous is releasing another SoS entry at the same time.) I will throw money at any company willing to compete with them. That is especially true with Marvelous, who did a commendable job with the Friends of Mineral Town remake and I guess with the Doreamon spin-off too, even though I want on a rant with that review. I say this so that you understand that if I EVER wanted a reason to gush over a game, it would be this one.

 

But I can't. I can't honestly say this was a good game. It was an OK game that faithfully attempts to recapture the magic of this series, but ultimately falls short. I'll try to explain why.

 

First, I have to remember that this is a game review, not a trophy review. The grind to the platinum basically doubled my playtime. That admittedly soured my experience. I'd say I had my fill of the game around 40 hours in and I got the platinum in just under 80 hours. I'm going to try to keep this review to the first 40 hours. There IS a precedent for me not doing that. I was trying to 100% these games long before achievements were a thing. But as much as I want to complain about how terrible it was to max out all of your skills or complete all of the museum exhibits or finish all of Lovett's requests, none of that would matter if the gameplay was good. So, let's talk about where the game succeeds and where it fails, beginning with the positives.

 

The graphics are nice. The early game progression feels good. I like that flower petals fall across the screen in the spring. Being able to milk your cows and shear your sheep by hand is nice. There is a good variety of crops.

 

Everything from here on is a rant.

 

Before that, though, I need to discuss what I want out of a farming game. Why do I play them? I play farming games for the same reason most people play RPGs. I want to be immersed in that world. I want to experience the life of a farmer without the need to get up at 4 AM or get my hands dirty. I want it to be more fun than manual labor, sure, but don't try telling me you'd really want to be caught in a zombie apocalypse or be a lone soldier going up against an army of killer mechs. Video games are supposed to be entertaining. It's the job of the developers to make these experiences something you'd enjoy going through.

 

What slice-of-life games and simulators offer that power fantasy games don't is the ability to realistically put yourself into the shoes of the main character. It's why I think Kingdom Come: Deliverance is a better game than Skyrim, even though I put more hours and many more playthroughs into Skyrim. KCD is simply the more immersive experience. So, to me, the best farming game would also be the most immersive. That requires characters and world-building. The characters should feel like characters, not NPCs, and I should feel like I'm part of that world, not that the world only exists to serve me. Nobody plays Dark Souls because it's convenient to do so.

 

I bring this up because this is where Pioneers of Olive Town failed. Nothing in this world happens without your input. The townspeople are robotic, with limited schedules and dialogue, and the entire world feels contrived. I'm trying very hard not to use the word "soulless" because I want to save that for Light of Hope and One World (the Harvest Moon-in-name-only games), if I ever get to them, but "lifeless" isn’t far off. It’'s arguably just as bad.

 

Let's start with the plot. The plot is your grandfather died and you inherited his farm, which is such a tired trope to this genre that even GameFreak is beginning to cringe. I don't mind, though. The advantage to being a newcomer to a video game world is that you essentially have a blank slate to work with. That's good for an RPG if you want to have a self-insert protagonist. (Think of the intro to Dark Souls or Skyrim.) The mayor of Olive Town welcomes you and asks for your help in turning this quiet seaside town into a bustling tourist destination. You do this mostly through bulletin board requests (nowhere near as bad as the Atelier games) and giving the mayor your opinion whenever he asks a question. I don't understand why the latter is even a thing because the mayor will almost always ignore what you say and do his own thing. I think the only time he listened to me was when he asked what the town mascot should be and I jokingly said his son.

 

There are essentially only two areas in the game to explore: the town and your farm. (Three if you count the mines and four-ish if you count the late game "sprite worlds", which are nowhere near as exciting as that sounds.) The town is extremely basic, with only a few rows of shops that you can enter. The residents of Olive Town apparently live in these shops, which I guess cuts down on the number of "houses" the developers have to make, and all the doors face your farm for easy entry (or lazy programming). It's all too convenient. Correct me if I'm wrong, but most small towns aren't centered around the local farm. It's weird that the places people would frequent the most, like the general store, would be the furthest from the town square. You may think I'm nitpicking or that this decision was simply done to make life easier for the player, but I will remind you again that this is a farming simulator. This IS the game. Part of the joy is exploring, but that's taken away if you never have any reason to venture beyond the first row of stores. (And you don't because everything you can forage is at your farm.)

 

Next, let's look at the characters. There's a respectable number. They have personalities. I don't think the dialogue writing is terrible. The problem is their daily schedule. I didn't study (stalk) any of them long enough to be sure, but I'm fairly certain that every character only has two schedules: one for the six days of the week they work and one for the day they don't. It's possible the children have even less since they don't have to work. This makes the NPCs easy to find, but again... It's sacrificing immersion and world-building for the sake of convenience, which is this game's theme. There's a reason people still go to Ma & Pa stores and I feel a farming game ESPECIALLY should be able to capture that. It's annoying when every game design decision feels like it was made specifically to cater to the player.

 

NPC movements are robotic too. There's a clock on the corner of the screen and you can watch them obey it religiously. If follow a character around for a day, you can watch them eat breakfast at the same time, arrive at work precisely on the hour, and stand there lifelessly for the rest of the day until the exact minute it's time to close shop. If there are multiple people who work in that building (such as the museum, which you'll be going to a lot), their movements are synchronized. It breaks any sense of immersion. It doesn't even feel like any of these shops get any customers besides you, even though there are sometimes tourists who walk around.

 

Dialogue is the same. I think this bothered me the most. You get the usual thing where characters only have three or four repeatable lines and nothing they say is all that interesting, but the bigger problem is that all seemed to be tied to the same internal clock. If a festival is coming up or some major change just happened in town, it's ALL they will talk about. New benches? Everybody has to give you their opinion. Fishing tournament around the corner? They all have something to say about that too. Something like that SHOULD be welcome in an RPG because it shows the characters have a basic understanding of the world around them, but it feels hollow when it's following such a static and predictable formula. It doesn't help that every festival is the same. There are two every month, someone will show up at your door exactly three days beforehand to let you know it's happening, it's all the townspeople will talk about for those three days, and it's all they'll talk about for a few days afterward. And before you ask -- yes, these festivals do repeat annually and have virtually the same dialogue every time. You're kidding yourself if you think there's any variety here. If it sounds like I'm beating a broken record, IMAGINE HOW THE GAME FEELS.

 

The developers didn’t even TRY with the festivals either. One of the first ones you get is an egg hunt and they ruin it by making the entire thing a cutscene. What the actual fuck? How hard would it have been to program some eggs to randomly appear in various places across town? That could've been a great way to reward the player for exploring and knowing the layout of the town. "But Cass, maybe the developers didn't have time to program an event like that." Oh, they did. There's a mushroom hunt event in the fall where you DO get to run around and collect items. And guess what? It's shit because they're literally out in the open and the NPCs move so slow that I basically won after three seconds. Are you kidding me? The only event worth participating in is the fishing tournament and even that is a joke because IT'S ALREADY A FEATURE YOU CAN DO AT ANY TIME. Characters...no, let's call them what they are... NPCs don't even do anything at these events. They just stand there and wait for you to talk to them. There aren't even character portraits like there were in the Friends of Mineral Town remake, which makes the NPCs even more forgettable.

 

Do I sound angry? I hope so. When you play a farming sim, you should WANT to talk to the townspeople. This is the one video game genre where NPCs matter. But once you talk to one NPC, you know every other NPC in town is going to say some variation of that line on the same day. So, I just stopped. I stopped talking to everyone except my waifu. I basically just ran to her every day to give her a present and ignored everybody else. That's...OK, honestly, that's probably pretty close to how I'd handle things in real life too. Point to the developers.

 

But do you know what I mean, guys? It's like going into Walmart. The things you need are all there, but they're presented in such a boring and uninspired way that you don't want to stay any longer than you have to. Why would I want to play a game like that? If it's too hard to program unique schedules for every character, then get rid of the shop mechanics and just have the characters wander around aimlessly. At the very least, I’d feel like I’m living in a town with crazy people instead of robots. As it stands, I basically chose to play this game as a hermit, which is more akin to a survival game.

 

That's not to say it's all bad. The dialogue that is there is OK, if you're a child. It's wholesome. It just suffers from being too cute for its own good. That was my same complaint with Ni no Kuni. What is realistic about a world in which everybody loves you? Again, I bring you back to the older Harvest Moon games. Duke was a drunk. He was a likable character, but he had issues. Characters were more than just one or two word stereotypes. And don't tell me you can't put colorful villains into children's games. Gary remains Ash's best rival in Pokemon to this day because of his, “Smell ya later!” line. Three words that inspired me to a hate a man for the better part of my life. That's all I need, guys. Just give me a reason. Why should I care about ANY of these characters? Make me love them. Make me hate them. Make me want to know more about them. Do ANYTHING to keep me from spamming the X button. Make everybody an asshole if you want. Graveyard Keeper did it and it was awesome. Here. Here's a better idea for a game, guys. Your grandfather dies and leaves you his rotting, stinky ass farm. The townspeople HATED your grandfather. Your dad did too. That's why he left. But your life sucks, so you decide to try out the farming thing for a while, but nobody trusts you. Why would they? You're from the city. You're an outsider. You're the descendant of someone who let his farm go to shit. None of this even changes the fundamental premise of these games! Maybe you only have one friend in the beginning. The girl who runs the ranch next door. She tells you your grandfather used to be a kind man, but something changed. Oh, look. Now we have a story. What happened to your grandfather? What didn't your dad tell you? There could be clues sprinkled throughout the world. Maybe the townspeople know more, but you have to get them to trust you first. It doesn't need to be anything crazy. It could. It could be a deep mystery, or it could be simply that your grandfather stopped caring after your grandmother passed away. Maybe there's a magical Earth Fairy or something and your grandfather used to be able to communicate with her, but he lost that ability when he got older. Sorta like a Peter Pan thing. But since you're young, you can seek her out for answers. Maybe each resident has their own optional storyline and their routines could change as you progress further into their storyline. For example, let's say the carpenter refuses to sell anything to you early on. Your grandfather owed him a huge debt, so now he's expecting payment. Maybe that's how you get your ax. As you work off your debt, he gradually opens up to you. It no longer feels like a chore to go see him every day. Or maybe he's always willing to sell to you, but he works alone and has to chop down all the wood himself, so he's only open one day a week. This gives you an incentive to help him. Maybe you can even hook him up with an apprentice. And as you do this, his shop grows and changes, and so does his attitude towards you. But maybe there's a consequence. If you get the apprentice a job there, maybe there's no one to help the town baker, so she's forced to shut down her shop. Your actions directly affect the town, which means your playthrough will be unique. Maybe you're forced to decide if it's better to sell your produce at a higher price so you can make a profit or offer the townspeople a discount so they'll like you more. I don't think every game needs choices or consequences, but it does make a world feel more alive. I'd especially like to see rivalries brought back. I heard they were removed because the Japanese fanbase didn't like them, but it made the series so much more engaging to see things happen with or without you. Characters SHOULD have lives that aren't directly tied to you. They should get old and married and maybe even die.

 

Oh, right... We're talking about this game. Have I even gotten to the review yet? So, you can play as a boy or girl. There are five eligible bachelors and five eligible bachelorettes, but you can have same sex marriages, so that's ten options for everybody. You even get to choose what you want to wear on your wedding day, so you could totally be a straight male wearing a wedding gown, which was too good to pass up. As for my girl... You know me. I always go with the redhead. But she wasn't an option in this game, so I went with Laura instead. She's the town's tour guide and the only marriage candidate NOT inside a shop for most of the day, meaning one less loading screen to talk to her. I found her extremely easy to woo. In fact, everybody and everything in this game is easy to woo because there's no such thing as a bad present. Horrible, horrible change. Look, I get it. It's annoying to lose friendship points when you give someone something they don't like. Get over it. That's life. You don't know until you try. You take a girl to a sushi restaurant, she throws up all your over your egg rolls, and now you know she's allergic to shellfish. Congratulations. You now have a memory and an experience. Isn't that more meaningful than her saying, "Oh, I like this" to EVERY SINGLE PRESENT you give her? Seriously, Laura? You like chicken feed? You like low quality toast I've had sitting in the fridge for a year? Here's a clump of dirt. It's ridiculous, guys. Every character should have a list of things they like and things they don't like. They should have things they LOVE -- and they do in this game -- but I think you should have to work to figure those things out. That would give you a reason for befriending other NPCs. (Now, admittedly, I played on the easier difficulty. Yes, there are two difficulties in this game. It's possible "Normal Mode" is more realistic, but I doubt it. I think it just makes it harder to make money and level up your skills.)

 

Friendship never goes down if you ignore someone. I confessed my love to Laura in Autumn of the first year (the day before the Fireworks Festival because I'm such a romantic) and didn't talk to her again for two months. I wanted to see if she'd get mad and break things off. (She actually DID scold me after we got married and I stayed out a little too late one night, but it was the weakest confrontation you've ever seen.) But, like everything else with this game, NOTHING CHANGES once you get married. The only difference is she leaves for work from your house. This did make it easier to give her presents, though. I chose to give her wood every morning. You would do the same.

 

If it's not obvious by now, my main complaint with this game is how it chooses to present itself. The world is catered to you. Olive Town would remain stagnant for the rest of time if you didn't come along and...honestly, do very little to actually change it. The main storyline is mostly just the mayor showing up at your doorstep every now and then and asking for stuff like fancy dog treats so he can upgrade the town's lampposts (?). I like to think the mayor is actually insane and the townspeople only let him pretend he's in charge. He's presented as a bit of a loser and many of the NPCs playfully jab him from time to time.

 

That's...another thing. The humor in this game is cringeworthy at times. There are cutscenes that intended to be lighthearted and comical (in a Saturday morning cartoon kind of way), but they almost always miss the mark. Like, there’s one scene where you're in town and a cow suddenly shows up. Everybody acts surprised and then we find out it's just a person in a cow costume. That's the entire joke. I don't think I laughed once.

 

Alright. On to the graphics. They're the best part of the game. The character models are generally good and the world is vibrant and colorful. I liked the visible change in the seasons, with the aforementioned flower petals in the spring and leaves in the fall. I usually judge a farming game's graphics by how much I look forward to winter. But, like everything else I described so far, we got another lipstick-on-a-pig situation. It looks nice when you look at footage, but then you go to play the game and you notice the pop-in almost right away. It's so unbelievably bad that I don't know why they even bothered with a camera control button. You can't rotate the camera, but you can tilt it slightly up and down and there are three levels of zoom. I instinctively played in the full zoomed-out position with the camera tilted slightly down and there was never a moment where there wasn't pop-in on my farm. It only became worse during poor weather conditions, which this game loves. (Seriously, it rains or snows like 80% of the time. Don't even bother trying to let your animals graze.) There's even a first-person camera mode that you have to use a bunch of times for a trophy and it's laughable how bad it is. Trees and other objects will only appear when you've practically rammed your face into them. You guys know I rarely harp on a game's performance like this, but how is this acceptable with a modern console? Because, you know, nothing speaks "immersion" quite like textures appearing and reappearing as you move around in a game that's about moving around.

 

Lazy. Lazy. Lazy. Everything in this game is lazy. Did I mention all the characters share the same animations? They all do the same shimmy shimmy dance whey they get excited. They all have the same surprised expression. If you breed an animal, you get to watch the same UNSKIPPABLE cutscene every time. Your tools make the same sound every time. The music constantly loops. There's a different track for every season, but that doesn't stop the same song from playing every day. In a game that belongs to a genre that is inherently repetitive, why can't there be some variety in the experiences you have?

 

I'm ranting again. I'll stop. Let's talk about the gameplay. I swear I'll get to this review.

 

You have all the usual tools in this game: an ax for chopping trees, a hammer for mining (and bonking moles because animal abuse is apparently OK), a sickle for clearing grass (but NOT harvesting), a fishing rod for fishing, a hoe for tilling, and my personal favorite, a bucket. Why is it my favorite? Because it's the first unique idea this game has had. Puddles, guys. Over time, puddles will appear on your farm and you can use your bucket to clear them. When you do so, you get clay, which you can use for crafting. I legitimately thought this was the most creative thing in the game. You can even use the bucket to clear out ponds or lakes, but it takes much, much longer. Fortunately, there are tools to help out with that too.

 

I don't think I need to explain the basics. You grow crops and sell them for money. You can also cook with the crops you make. Some crops only grow in certain seasons and it takes a while for them to grow, so you have to manage your time and resources carefully. Well, "carefully" might be an exaggeration. I found time passes quickly in this game compared to other farming games, but you rarely need to make use of it. I was done with most of my chores by noon every day because, again, there's very little to do. Time does not stop indoors.

 

Your farm is actually pretty big. I'd say your starting area is only about 10% of the total size it can become once you've unlocked the other areas, which you can do by repairing the bridges. This takes a lot of resources. Even so, I never used the other areas, except for growing trees. I found the starting area to be more than sufficient for making money and growing all the crops and livestock I needed. This part of the game was actually fun. I enjoyed planning out my farm and constantly changing it as I unlocked new items and coming up with new ideas. Like, in the beginning, I had a small plot of land just south of my house for growing crops. I eventually moved this north when I had access to the chicken coop. I then wanted to put a fence around the crops. This was purely decorative. Then I added a path to the chicken coop because I got tired of clearing out weeds and puddles. There's this really nice progression where you always feel like you have something to do and something to work towards and it's so easy to lose track of time. This was a very good way for me to recover from Covid.

 

As I said, you can unlock various things that make your life easier. This is convenience through gameplay. One of these tools is a sprinkler. This waters any space adjacent to where you place it, including diagonally. This gives you a reason to use the classic 3x3 grid layout for your crops. Later on, you can unlock an even larger sprinkler that waters TWO spaces away. Four of these made me feel like a farming god. This was the most fun I had playing the game. It was neat to see the farm evolve over time and discover new ways to increase my efficiency or be creative.

 

That brings us to probably the most controversial decision the developers came up with: makers. What is a maker? A maker is a processing tool. You stick an item into it and that item is converted into something else after a period of time. The simplest example would be turning logs into lumber, which requires a Lumber Maker, or ore into ingots, which requires an Ingot Maker. There are a LOT of these. Each maker takes up a 2x2 grid on your farm, with the larger versions taking up a 3x3 space. What happens if you need to process multiple things at once? You need more makers. What happens if you need to process two different kinds of ore? You need more makers or you have to wait for the maker to finish processing, which could take several days, depending on the material and how many you are trying to process at once. The problem here isn't so much the time component. The problem is how ugly and unattractive these makers are. They're essentially like factories, and you'll spend much of the game running between them in order to collect your processed materials and refill them. Is this a farming sim or a manufacturing sim? I think one or two of these would have been fine, but you'll likely have dozens of these spread out across your farm by the time you reach the late game. You need them for pretty much everything, from converting crops to seeds or cooking material to turning wool into cloth and then yarn. It's a much worse system than Graveyard Keeper's zombie DLC, which was a fun and welcome way to automate some of the more tedious tasks in the game. I wouldn't even really consider this automation because you still need to fill the makers and collect the material they produce. Not to mention that you'll need an ungodly amount of this material to get all the upgrades in the game.

 

The developers knew what they were asking was too much because you begin to unlock "sprite worlds" when you've come close to maxing out a skill. These are simply tiny areas separate from the main game that have a crazy amount of resources for that skill. For example, you'll unlock a mining area that just puts you a single room full of every type of ore, so you can gather everything you need without...you know, playing the game. Are you sensing a pattern here?

 

I could go on. I think this game has some good ideas and I want to believe the developers' hearts were in the right place, but I suspect they were in over their heads for whatever reason. Many of the decisions were sloppy or poorly executed. Take house decorations, for example. Regardless of how many upgrades you have, you can only decorate a tiny portion of your house. It's essentially the size of a closet, and it's tucked away in the corner. The only reason I can think for that is the developers couldn't figure out how to program NPC pathing if you were able to put furniture in their way. What you end up with is a house that feels mostly empty because there is SO much space between everything. Same thing with the makers. They take up a predetermined grid, but there's a lot of empty space on the sides to allow you to navigate between them. Same thing with the barn and chicken coop. You're going to want to run a fence alongside them, but there will always be a sizable gap between the structure and the end of the fence. It's hard to make an area look pretty when the game's own mechanics don't allow it.

 

Would I recommend this game? ...Maybe. Here's the thing. If SoS fails, Natsume wins. I can't fairly say the newer Harvest Moon games suck because I haven't played them. Now that they're free on PS+, I might. But from what I've seen in footage of those games and having platinumed this as my third SoS game, I feel confident in saying these are at least a better representation of what farming games SHOULD be. Most of my complaints are fixable. Some are just my personal opinion. You might not agree with me, and there are probably people out there who think this is a great game. I can see that. If I was playing this as my first farming game, I might even love it. There's enough stuff here to like that I think someone playing casually and NOT going for the platinum will have a good time. But because the game is so repetitive and predictable, I don't think this is something you're going to want to put multiple in-game years into. I don't know how much changes from year to year. I finished in the middle of Year 5 and I think the only change I noticed was that I had a baby who had become a child. The town looks a little different from when I first started, I guess, but I feel largely uninspired.

 

As far as rankings go, I'd put this game either directly above or below the Doreamon spin-off. They suffer from the same problem. Friends of Mineral Town is the clear favorite among the SoS games. It had its issues, but most of those were tied to trophies. You'll notice I completely restrained myself from talking about them in this review. In short, Pioneers of Olive Town is a respectable attempt at making a farming sim, but doesn't do anything to push this series or genre in the right direction. I'd give it a solid C-.

 

But what should I expect from a game whose acronym is PoOT?

Edited March 25, 2023 by Cassylvania

[Taruta13]

Wow, that was one huge review, Cass. Have you played Stardew Valley? For the record, I just purchased it on my Vita. I know there are two trophies requiring you to do a deathless run of one of their arcade games, the twin-stick shooter. I hate that arcade game, but I know I have to complete it, so I will die inside in frustration as I die over and over again until I get those damn trophies. I bought it with the Sly Collection(because I feel like Sly deserves to have rep on my permanent account) so I have something to keep me occupied on the plane. I might also buy LEGO Batman 2 for the Vita just to do something else but I only have $596 and I want to save $200 for my trip to Florida as it'll be used to buy Universal Park souvies and lots and lots of unhealthy park snacks like butterbeer. (I am going to the Harry Potter parks to get in the mood for my marathon runs of Hogwarts Legacy in the hotel. )

[Cassylvania]

1 hour ago, Taruta13 said:

Wow, that was one huge review, Cass. Have you played Stardew Valley?

 

I have. Haven't done it on this account, but I put a lot of hours into it on PC when it first released. I'm trying to save it for when I get overly frustrated with other games in the genre. (Despite my anger in that last post, I don't think I've sunk that low. Light of Hope or One World will break me.)

 

That said, maybe I can start it. The arcade game has been patched to be much easier, I think. I just know it's a grind and I don't like having multiple 40+ hour games going at once.

 

I'm going to make the biggest mistake of my life and pre-order Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life. Somebody bookmark this post and slap me when I get around to that review.

[Taruta13]

1 hour ago, Cassylvania said:

The arcade game has been patched to be much easier, I think.

Really? Maybe on the PC version but I haven't heard of a patch or update for the Vita version and there probably isn't one because Vita is no longer supported. Still, at least I can bash my head into Valley of the Mountain King while on the plane to Orlando.

1 hour ago, Cassylvania said:

I'm going to make the biggest mistake of my life and pre-order Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life. Somebody bookmark this post and slap me when I get around to that review.

Your mistake won't be as monstrous as the mistake I'm going to make as soon as I return back to this house of mine on the 24th... Mainly re-subbing to my Square-Enix account and booting up FFXIV again to get the plat for the PS5 version of that game which I know I will never 100%. But then again, I just earned all of the DLC trophies for Shantae: Half Genie Hero I will ever earn and after suffering through Friends to the End... well, just know that I'll be at 70% forever especially since I also intend to platinum A Hat In Time, Kingdom Hearts III and Ni No Kuni II and god forbade I even TOUCH the DLC on those jerkwads.

 

So when I get back from Orlando(I probably won't be able to access the forums until then because despite having Internet, I don't plan on bringing a computer with me and the tablet I have is busted because I forgot the unlock code weeks ago so I can't use it), I'll mix us BOTH up a nice tall Zero Suger Dr. Pepper Creme Soda milkshake and we can sip it while we sob and blow our noses at our bad life decisions.

Edited March 17, 2023 by Taruta13

[Grotz99]

18 hours ago, Taruta13 said:

Really? Maybe on the PC version but I haven't heard of a patch or update for the Vita version and there probably isn't one because Vita is no longer supported. Still, at least I can bash my head into Valley of the Mountain King while on the plane to Orlando.

 Patch 1.5 on PS4 made it easier.

[Cassylvania]

4 hours ago, Grotz99 said:

 Patch 1.5 on PS4 made it easier.

 

There you go. Nothing to it but to (Star)dew it.

 

That's going to be my motto going forward.

[Taruta13]

6 hours ago, Grotz99 said:

 Patch 1.5 on PS4 made it easier.

Oh, that's PS4, not Vita. *sigh* I guess I could play the game on PS4 instead, especially since I checked the changelog and it says there is a new island to explore there. Also, from the changelog it says you can save and resume the game, which don't know anything about. If I die, can I get the trophy by resuming the quick save or does it not count?

 

EDIT: So what from I am seeing, you can beat a level, exit to the next level, quit out of the machine, go to sleep to save your game, go play the arcade again, and if you get killed, log out of Stardew and reload the game and that death won't be recorded. Sort of like using save states on an emulator. But I don't think the Vita version has Patch 1.5.

Edited March 18, 2023 by Taruta13

[realm722]

[Cassylvania]

@realm722 I can platinum them faster than they can make them. We're good here.

 

That said... man, I don't know. Ryza 1 was my favorite game in the series and Ryza 2 was one of my least. I don't understand why it took me 92 hours to finish. They're also, you know, remaking the older games, so I'm going to have to do those too.

 

This is why I'm not a series completionist!

[Cassylvania]

Platinum #372 - Axiom Verge 2

 

Axiom Verge 2 is the sequel to the critically acclaimed (?) action-adventure game from 2015. But is this Metroidvania wannabe on the verge of success or should it just be axed? (I'm getting better at this.)

 

As you guys have probably noticed, I usually try to tie my current review into the last game (or games) I played. I feel it provides some sort of continuity between my posts. You may not think this game and Pioneers of Olive Town have anything in common, but you'd be wrong. They both have loads of cow manure. (I jest.) No, it's actually my inherent bias. If you recall, I said I had every reason to love and defend PoOT. I wanted that game to succeed. Can you imagine how brutal of a beatdown that review would've been if I was actively rooting for the game to fail, like people did with that new Velma show? Well, you don't have to imagine. I have every reason in the world to hate Axiom Verge 2. The original made me break my controller. I'm reminded of that game every time I hit the R2 button and graze my finger against that crack. I probably wouldn't have even touched this sequel if it hadn't been given away for free. But I have this thing where I add every free PS+ title to my library, regardless of whether I intend to play it or not. If I truly think I'll never play it, I'll hide it, like I did with Battlefield 2042 this month. (Can you seriously imagine me playing that?) But if I think I might someday get around to it...well, there it sits. Taunting me. I wasn't going to let this game get under my skin.

 

Now, to be serious for a moment, I didn't dislike the original only because the final boss made me rage. I disliked it for a number of reasons, but it begins with the setting. I don't like futuristic sci-fi stuff. I never have. (See my The Surge review.) Sure, I have a soft spot for Star Wars, XCOM, and the original Total Recall, but I generally don't care for anything involving robots or aliens. I didn't like Transformers as a kid and I always preferred The Flintstones over The Jetsons. Probably why I got into geology. I like studying the history of our planet and how we got here. Survival games are fun for me because they bring us back to our roots. I have thousands of years of evolutionary knowledge to work with. I know it's possible to make fire. I know I can forage for food. Science fiction, on the other hand, is like enabling God Mode. Everything is advanced and super powerful. Any problems can be solved by just making up something that doesn't exist. It doesn't interest me because it's too far out of the scope of our current reality.

 

I know I'm rambling again, but I need to set the stage for my next review. Let's get into this one.

 

So, in my limited research before playing this game, I noticed the fanbase was divided with some of the changes the developers made from the original Axiom Verge. Apparently this was less like a Metroidvania than the original. Well, that was a promising start, since the only reason this series was on my radar in the first place is because I'm obviously a connoisseur of those kinds of games. After playing it, though... I don't know. Seems like a Metroidvania to me? You navigate around on a 2D map and gain upgrades that allow you to reach areas that were previously inaccessible. I'm all for criticizing games when they present themselves as something they're not, but this one seemed pretty faithful to the formula. Is it because you have two forms you can play as? Is it because the second form is clearly better and more fun than the first? (Or is that just projection?)

 

Either way, let's start with the story. It's crap. It's unnecessarily convoluted and all the character/area/weapon names are gibberish. Even the font is bad. I'm insulting THE FONT in a video game. It's like the developers went out of their way to make the story unbearable to listen to. There IS a semi-interesting "twist" about midway through the game, but it's ruined by the fact that any sane person would've given up on the plot after the first twenty minutes.

 

The music is...OK at times. It's very repetitive. I actually liked the desert setting. Maybe I'll make a separate post about this at some point, but I feel like desert areas almost always turn out amazing in video games, despite it being one of my least favorite biomes in real life. I'd like to see more games that take place in Egypt. There's so many cool things they could do with mummies and ancient curses.

 

The graphics are fine. Hard to talk about them without mentioning the second form. Essentially, you gain access to a drone, which has a different movement set than your human character. The human can jump, grab onto ledges, and use a melee weapon. None of those are very fluid. I think that's the main gripe people have with this game. You're used to gaining the ability to move faster or jump multiple times in a Metroidvania, but the human form is very limited. Your only long ranged attack isn't even very useful. In contrast, your drone form only gets better as you get further into the game. I guess maybe the developers are trying to make a statement about the limitations of mankind. More like mankinda lame if you ask me.

 

So, what makes this game a little unique is that there are also two different worlds, with the second world (called "The Breach") essentially an LSD version of the overworld. Only your drone can visit this world, and many of the collectibles require entering or exiting The Breach at specific locations. This is more annoying or confusing than it is novel. It's pretty frustrating to reach a location, only to realize you need to backtrack to a portal where you can enter The Breach and then return there. It's nowhere near as interesting as the inverted castle idea in the Castlevania series.

 

Part of the reason this game sucks is the combat. Not only is it pointless (the only thing you gain from drops is health, which you would only need because you entered combat), but almost all of your abilities are short-ranged melee attacks, regardless of which form you're in. That's not fun. Enemies aren't limited like that. In fact, enemies make the game worse because of how ANNOYING they are. Again, I'm convinced the developers hated their fanbase. They specifically designed these enemies to be as infuriating as possible. Many of them are near ledges you have to climb or platforms you need to cross, and you can bet their attacks will hone in on you and knock you in the opposite direction you want to go. They're also generally much faster than you. There's one section where these spiders will drop down just as you're trying to cross a pit and then immediately zip back up so that you can't hit them. You can't make it to the other side without killing them and you can't hit them while you're in midair because you don't have a double jump to slow your descent. You're basically just jumping and slashing at the air in the hope that they'll run into your tiny little blade. The game design just isn't on par with the original, and I can't believe I'm saying that. I agree with the fans. This is a poor sequel.

 

Did I hate the game? Well, yes. But it's not without some good merits. The compass is kinda useful, once you understand how it works. The map is pretty convenient. I like how it has a separate checklist for items and map completion for each area. I guess you could in theory platinum this game without a guide. I know I don't usually shout out guide writers, but props to @Optinooby for putting together a great video walkthrough of the speedrun/associated trophies. Dude cleared the game in just over an hour, and that was WITH collecting a lot of optional items. Really made a series of trophies I was dreading a lot more bearable. But I did my first playthrough without a guide for as long as I could. Took me 20 hours. It got really confusing at some parts because I wasn't sure where I was supposed to go. Despite what you may expect from this genre, I think the actual game is more linear than it appears. If there are, say, a dozen movement/skill upgrades in the game, you basically need to collect those dozen upgrades in a specific order or you won't be able to advance. If you wander in the wrong direction, you're essentially just wasting your time, and it's not always clear which way you're supposed to go. Maybe that's just me, though. There's usually an indicator on the map to direct you. I just found that sometimes reaching that location required traveling to the opposite side of the map.

 

I'm a little scared that this review is going to have me defending the original. I don't want it to get to that point, so I'll just say it's probably not worth a play unless you're a diehard fan of the original. Of course, if you are a diehard fan of the original, it sounds like you won't like it either. Basically, this game was made for no one. I think the developers just wanted to see the world burn.

 

OK. Well. My copy of Ryza 3 just arrived. Let's see if that's a better sequel.

Edited March 25, 2023 by Cassylvania

[Taruta13]

Good luck on Ryza 3, Cassy. Just got back from Florida and I have to say Hogwarts Legacy had its issues. The camera is hard to control and you have tank controls with the camera, so you have to point the camera where you want to walk, which is stupid. They should have camera lock on and have your wizard move like Sora in Kingdom Hearts. It would be so much easier.

 

Combat and spellcasting, decent, though I accidentally blew-a-thunk accidentally by tapping L2 instead of holding, but the hold L2 spells are pretty good. Just got Expellarmius and will put the game to sleep until April Fool's Day for RPG Mania.

[Cassylvania]

7 hours ago, Taruta13 said:

Good luck on Ryza 3, Cassy. Just got back from Florida and I have to say Hogwarts Legacy had its issues. The camera is hard to control and you have tank controls with the camera, so you have to point the camera where you want to walk, which is stupid. They should have camera lock on and have your wizard move like Sora in Kingdom Hearts. It would be so much easier.

 

Combat and spellcasting, decent, though I accidentally blew-a-thunk accidentally by tapping L2 instead of holding, but the hold L2 spells are pretty good. Just got Expellarmius and will put the game to sleep until April Fool's Day for RPG Mania.

 

Yeah, I played the game for that one day and haven't touched it since. It looks good, though. My biggest complaint so far would be the camera. It does feel like it's really janky to control. I'll get back to it once all the bugs have been ironed out. As you can probably tell, I chose a different game in my active backlog to continue with...

 

I'm going to start up Ryza today. I'm a little disappointed I went with the PS4 version, but I like how all the tiles for the Atelier series are the same size. And hey, maybe we'll platinum the PS5 version for every game in the series once we're done.

 

...

 

...I'm kidding.

Edited March 25, 2023 by Cassylvania

[Taruta13]

4 hours ago, Cassylvania said:

Yeah, I played the game for that one day and haven't touched it since. It looks good, though. My biggest complaint so far would be the camera. It does feel like it's really janky to control. I'll get back to it once all the bugs have been ironed out.

Well yeah, I get ya. I have to get back to it but I will do so in April when the RPG Mania event starts as it's already at 68.95 points because its rarity is lower than the others. And I already have 15 other RPGs to deal with during the year...

 

I'm not too upset at the camera, it is just a hassle. I hope you do enjoy Ryza 3 though. As for me, I am speedrunning Illusion of L'Phacia because I just HAD to get another Kemco RPG to play on the plane... and I forgot to get the EXP boosting DLC so I kept dying late game. A lot.

[Cassylvania]

You know, it's tough to review a game every week when I'm not starting a new game every week. Let's see if we can't knock a few games out of the ol' backlog.

 

Platinum #373 - Mighty Switch Force! Collection

 

That's right, guys. Not only is this a game you've never heard of, it's a collection of FOUR games you've never heard of! But you might recognize the art style because they were all developed by WayForward -- the same people who brought us your favorite purple-haired genie. I guess this was their pre-Shantae phase. I went into this on name recognition alone. That may have been a mistake because I thought what I was getting was an action platformer, but what I actually got was a fast-paced puzzle platformer with quick reaction-based mechanics. A speedrunner's wet dream, but a C-dawg's worst nightmare.

 

Now, the four games in this collection are: MSF1, MSF2, MSF1 HD, and MSF You-wish-you-had-friends. We'll kinda discuss the games in general first and then review each of them in a little more detail, but there isn't a huge difference between each of the games.

 

In all four games, you play as Patty Wagon. (No, really.) Patty can run, jump, and shoot, which is all standard fare for a 2D platformer, but the main gimmick of these games is that you can use the shoulder buttons on the controller to swap colored blocks from the foreground to the background. While they're in the foreground, Patty can jump on them, but they also block her path. You need to swap them to the background in order to pass through. Accidentally pressing the shoulder button while Patty is standing in the way of a block will (hilariously) squish her against the screen, making you a murderer. Your goal is to reach the end of each level, collecting the five hooligans along the way, while not murdering Patty. What's a hooligan? It doesn't matter. There are checkpoints in each level, but running out of health will force you to restart the level. Patty doesn't have very much health to start out with, but most levels have health pick-ups along the way and enemies sometimes drop them too. Fortunately, most levels will only take you 1-2 minutes (if you know what you're doing), so it's not a huge setback if you die. And you will die. And die. And die. And die.

 

So, the gimmick probably doesn't seem complex enough to build an entire game around it -- let alone four -- but it's used in a lot of creative ways. I'll talk about one of those ways because it's the one that'll drive you crazy. You'll occasionally come across different colored blocks. Let's say blue and red. If one blue block is in the foreground, they're ALL in the foreground. Same with the red blocks. They may or may not be synchronized, though. So, it could be that all the blue blocks are in the foreground while the red blocks are in the background, or they could be in the same place. You can "lock" one color by standing on a block of that color and pressing the shoulder button. That will cause the blocks of the OTHER color to switch, while keeping the blocks of the color you're standing on in the same place. Why would you want to do that? Well, let's say there's a red block on top of a blue block. Patty can only jump one block at a time, so there's no way for her to reach the top if both blocks are in sync. They’re either both going to be in the foreground, which means she can't climb them, or they're both going to be in the background, which means she'll just pass through them. What you want is the blue block in the foreground and the red block in the background. This allows her to jump on the blue block. Now you can hit the shoulder button and -- NO, you just murdered Patty. I told you not to do that. You have to jump first, and THEN hit the shoulder button. This will cause the red block to move to the foreground UNDER Patty so she can land safely on it. You gotta think three-dimensionally here. It's actually pretty clever when you think about it because you're not used to considering foreground or background objects in a 2D game. It also makes you feel a lot more guilty than when someone like Mario or Megaman falls into a bottomless pit. "I pressed the jump button!" you want to say. But in this game, pressing the button that moves the blocks makes you actively responsible for whatever happens to Patty. It's essentially the video game version of the trolley problem.

 

If that last paragraph confused you, don't worry. It's just as confusing in the actual game. Oh, you'll understand HOW it works, but wrapping your head around it in the short time frame the game expects you to is a whole other story. You almost have to rely on muscle memory because stopping to think will often cause Patty to fall to her death anyway. I should also point out that there are par times you have to beat for every level, so you're in a rush even when you don't have to be. And, of course, the levels are full of enemies, traps, and other hazards, so you have to watch out for those too.

 

There are even gimmicks on top of gimmicks. In the first three games, there is a level towards the end where the shoulder button no longer works. Instead, blocks will swap positions at a preset interval. Something like every three seconds. (Patty has a siren on her outfit that will alert you when the swap is about to happen.) During this time, you're either racing to get to a safe place to stand because Patty is about to get squished or fall, or...you're just standing around because there's a block in your way. It's annoying. These are also the longest levels in the game and they have the tightest timing/platforming. In the game’s defense, I will say that I rarely felt a death was unfair because I didn't know what was up ahead, but you're often given very little time or room to maneuver, so I blame the game anyway. Some of the hit boxes are questionable at best.

 

That's pretty much how all four games go. In MSF1, you have 16 levels (called "Incidents). They're all pretty short, except for the last one. Once you beat all 16 levels, you unlock a weapon upgrade that makes getting the par times FAR easier, so you really want to wait until that. In fact, that's how you want to play all the games. Beat it first, and then go back to get the par times.

 

MSF2 switches (ha) things up, but not really. Patty is now a firefighter for some reason. Instead of a blaster, she has a hose, which can kill enemies and destroy “mud” blocks, but is also useful for putting out fires, which exist in every level as a hazard. You still have to rescue the five hooligans in each level, but now there's a baby that serves as an additional collectible. The baby is trickier to find and sometimes hard to reach. Your reward for “rescuing” the baby is watching Patty kick it. The way she squeals, “You're saved!” while launching the baby into the stratosphere is the dopamine rush I didn't know I needed.

 

You would think MSF1 HD would be just MSF1 in HD, but you'd be wrong. They doubled the number of levels in the game. This game essentially wants to shit all over you in terms of difficulty. I haven't really talked about the order in which I played these, but you probably want to do MSF1 first, followed immediately by this. I kinda did that, but I took a long break before going for the par times in this game, so I started up MSF2 when I got back, then went to MSF You-wish-you-had-friends, and saved the rest of MSF1 HD for last. That might be a good approach too since this is the hardest game in the collection. What they do is make you play through the original levels again, but the levels are a lot harder because there are additional obstacles in your way. They call this "Hyper" mode, and this is where I struggled the most by far. I guess you have HD Patty to make it worthwhile...?

 

MSF Academy (what have I been calling it?) is the last game in the collection. This is intended to be a multiplayer game, but you can play most of it solo and you can actually get the MP trophies by yourself if you have a spare controller or three. Because this is a multiplayer game, the levels are generally only a single screen, which means Patty is super small, but it also means it's a lot easier to see what's going on and plan a route to your next hooligan. I think I may have actually liked this game the most because of this. It does have the most annoying final boss of all time, though. Most of the "bosses" in these games are easy, but this guy is a dick for some reason. The problem is this game introduces the concept of Patty being able to "pass" from one side of the screen to the other. So, like, you can jump through the bottom of the screen to appear back on top. During the final boss fight, though, you have this giant worm that appears from random directions and you have very few places to stand. It's so easy to get caught in a position where you're going to get hit if you stay where you are or if you move because you'll simply pass through the screen and take damage when you come out the other side. The nice thing is the timer resets if you die on a boss fight, so you don't have to redo the ENTIRE level again. (Which is good because that last level is bullshit too.)

 

It may sound like I'm complaining a lot, but that's what this game does to you. It wants you to rage. I know I haven't played Super Meat Boy, but I feel it's that kind of game. You're expected to keep failing and retrying until you press all the button prompts in the precise order to complete the level. Your jumps, shots, and switches have to be carefully timed. (I didn't talk about the blaster much, but the upgrade you get basically destroys everything in one hit. The drawback is that it slightly pushes Patty back, so it's very easy to mistime a jump because you just fired your blaster and lost some momentum.) The other thing that's a bit jarring is the "freeze" that happens whenever you swap blocks. Yeah, the main gimmick of these games actually causes the game to stutter. This is intentional, but it's also something that will take some time to get used to. It reminds me of that temporary stun lock that would happen every time you take damage in Hollow Knight (which was my biggest complaint against the game if you recall, as it inevitably led to me taking additional damage because it messed up my rhythm). I didn't find it as aggravating here, but I could see how someone might get annoyed by it.

 

The trophy guide says 15 hours to platinum. I'm going to blow the bullshit whistle on this one. I think, technically, that's possible. Like, if you consider every level might take an average of 1-2 minutes, and there are only x number of levels in each game... If you multiply by two because you'll likely have to play most of them twice... Yeah, I guess I could see how you could get 15 hours. But it won't happen. Nobody's even finished this game in under a day. I'd say 6-8 hours per game is more realistic. This is easily a 25-30 hour platinum. I'd say I'm moderately OK at these kinds of games and that's where I ended up.

 

Now, is it worth playing? Maybe. I didn't have a bad time. It kinda reminds me of Kaze and the Wild Masks from last year. That was a 2D platformer with short levels and fast-paced action. Deceptively hard, but not to the point that you'd throw a controller through the wall. I do feel I got shafted for only getting one platinum for what feels like four complete games, but I guess it makes up for some of the VNs I've played over the years. Still would've rather had Shantae 6.

 

I'd put this in the category of games I wouldn't recommend but still want someone here to play so they can share their experiences. I'm curious how this stacks up to other precision platformers.

Edited April 7, 2023 by Cassylvania

[Taruta13]

On 4/6/2023 at 11:28 PM, Cassylvania said:

you might recognize the art style because they were all developed by WayForward -- the same people who brought us your favorite purple-haired genie.

They actually have a mode in Shantae Half-Genie Hero called Officer Mode that uses the same mechanic of hitting a button to switch blocks, you have to save five Space Hooligans(which are just Skye, Risky[who is doubling down on cameos as she's also a boss], Rottytops, Salt and Vinegar dressed in prison garb with ball-and-chains on their ankles) and all the stage music comes from that collection. I really enjoyed the music a lot, but this review put me off the idea of playing MSF collection.

[Cassylvania]

Platinum #374 - Atelier Ryza 3: Alchemist of the End & the Secret Key

 

86 hours. I swear, if somebody writes a guide and says 40 hours to platinum again...

 

Thicc thighs save lives. It's summer again and that can mean only one thing: Ryza is going to cause a lot of trouble. This game wastes no time at all in trying to make you feel nostalgic about the first two games in the trilogy. I wouldn't be against that, but this is my fifteenth Atelier platinum and I don't exactly need to travel far down memory lane to reminisce on #13 or #14. Rorona seems so far away now.

 

If you'll recall, Ryza 1 is probably my favorite game in the series, while Ryza 2 is somewhere near the bottom. I chalk that up to this series getting further and further away from its roots. I think Ryza 1 was a breath of fresh air and I actually enjoyed the story of that game (possibly the only Atelier game where I can confidently say that), but actually trying to platinum Ryza 2 was a slog. I did NOT like the Exploration Book. I felt like I was fumbling around menus way too much and it didn't have the same charm as the first game. I liked the whimsical nature of a group of kids building a secret base on a remote island and solving a mystery. Atelier Firis had one of the better storylines in my opinion for similar reasons.

 

The story here is...decent, I guess. I don't ask much from my Atelier games. Just point me in the direction of some baddies I can beat up and some resources I can gather. I'll make my own fun. All that nonsense of having to carefully manage your time or do some advanced calculus to figure out how to transfer traits from one material to another through eight rounds of synthesis is gone. Just like the other two games, you can play on the easiest difficulty and I rarely found myself struggling to win battles after I upgraded my gear a bit. I thought they would make this game a bit more complex, but this felt like the easiest Atelier game yet. I don't even know how half of the mechanics work (including the "key" thing that is in the title) and I did just fine. The alchemy system is really bare bones this time. It almost makes me want to recommend playing these games in reverse chronological order.

 

I will say one thing I appreciated is that Ryza is ridiculously fast (at moving and gathering) and gets all of her gathering gear (e.g. hammer, axe, net, etc.) very early in the game. You'll eventually need to upgrade them to access more materials for resource nodes, but it means very little backtracking. This is good because there are actually a lot of areas to cover in this game. (More than it first appears, but that would be a spoiler.) You can also ride dolphins. I don't think any game is complete without that.

 

Combat is...also decent, I guess. I don't know. Sometimes I think Gust does things just so they can parade it around as an "innovative" change. Why does every Atelier game have to completely revamp the alchemy and combat system? Here, you have three active characters and two on standby. You can only control one character at a time, but battles take place in real time. You need to wait for a progress bar to fill up before you're able to perform an action. Generally, your action will either be to use an item (which requires CC, but the item is NOT used up in the process) or perform a melee attack, followed by a series of skill attacks. I don't know how complex this would be on the higher difficulties. I basically just used Ryza the entire game and spammed buttons. Worked fine for me. Now, Ryza has NINE companions that you can choose from, but I pretty much just stuck to Klaudia (best character in this trilogy) and Lila. It would be way too annoying to swap between gear if you're trying to use everybody.

 

One annoying thing about the menu screen is that the background picture changes each time you progress to a different point in the story. Conceptually, this is really cool because it will reflect the changes in your party size. If a new character joins the team, you'll get an updated still image to show all your characters interacting together. The problem is when you actually go to equip them, as their placement changes each time the image is updated. So, for example, if Ryza is the default selection at one point in the story, someone new might join and you'll have to scroll through multiple characters just to find Ryza. This gets particularly annoying when they decide to have "foreground" and "background" characters. This is what I mean by having to fumble around menus too much. And, unfortunately, that's pretty much the story with the rest of the game. The menus are bad. I like that you can hold a button to speed up the cursor movement across the map, but trying to find or select a place to fast travel to is a pain. There are multiple regions and each region has multiple sections and each section has multiple fast travel points.... And then there's this one quest where you have to give a lady an item from your inventory (multiple times), but there's no easy way to search for that item. The best thing you can do is use the filter section, but you'd have to know what category that item belongs to, and that would require going to the Guide and scrolling through those items, which are sorted randomly instead of alphabetically, so it's just as frustrating.

 

I also have to say -- and I can't believe I'm saying this -- but I miss the English VAs. I just don't feel as invested in a story when I have to read subtitles just to understand what's going on. I'd rather have cringey voice acting with the option to switch it off than to not have it at all. I doubt it's ever coming back to this series, though.

 

Hm. This is a pretty negative review. I feel bad. The game is good. I'd put it on par with Ryza 2. (Yes, I know I said I didn't care for that one, but it still sold well. It's still a good game. I'm just a curmudgeon who wanted the older style games with better graphics, story, and QoL improvements.) We'll have to see how the Atelier Marie remake does. If this is the way the series will go from now on, I'm OK with it. It's a cozy JRPG, which is a genre that should exist from now until the end of time. And even if I've yet to convince even one person to play a single game from this series, I will continue to keep my 100% series completion alive. Wham, bam, thank you, ma'am -- that's #15 in the books.

 

See you in three months, Marie.

Edited April 14, 2023 by Cassylvania