Cassylvania's Miserable Little Pile of Platinums

[CJ_Mystery]

As soon as I saw Bats, I thought about the Scooby Doo theme song.

On 3/24/2018 at 8:50 AM, Br1ste said:

I've wanted to play Ni No Kuni and 2 as well,

Be careful for the wish to play Ni No Kuni 1 because that platinum is tedious and frustration central. Damn Scrolls of Truth! ? Also, Cassy, I read the comic and went . Nobody loves Fournival the backstabbing bastard. (Then again, I will never play Dark Souls so I don't know who he is.)

Edited April 6, 2018 by CJ_Mystery

[Cassylvania]

9 hours ago, Br1ste said:

Ugh...seems like lazy programming to me. I hate features that seem like an afterthought. With things like this, I just imagine a group of stoners sitting around going, "dude...what if they were invisible...that'd be so bad-ass man." It's more fun when it is relevant to the story and less a tack-on to add some content.

 

Yeah, Countdown Mode is even worse. If there's one thing I hate more than multiplayer games, it's timed games. Especially ones that put an emphasis on stealth. That doesn't even make sense to me.

 

Barry's Episode 3 was probably the worst yet. The majority of the level is played in the sewers, where you have to switch between Barry and Natalia to kill monsters/open sluices. They REALLY decided to skimp on the time for this one. Without a co-op partner, I'm not sure it's even possible to complete that section. Even with one, you really need to know what you're doing.

 

The worst part is the end of the sewers. There's one section where you need to play flawlessly for almost two minutes because of the terrible checkpoint system. You barely have enough time to reload your gun, so every shot has to count, and you have to contend with a bunch of zombies and dogs that run around like they've been drinking Red Bull. I think it took us about a dozen tries to formulate with a strategy that works. (Hint: shooting fire extinguishers makes glasps visible temporarily.)

 

The boss at the end is a joke because you can just walk past him.

 

Still need to do Barry 3 on Invisible Mode, but I've had to redo that level so many times tonight that I could probably beat it on In My Sleep Mode.

Edited April 6, 2018 by Cassylvania

[Cassylvania]

OK, we're on the final stretch. We completed Claire 4 and Barry 4 on both Invisible Mode and Countdown Mode. Claire's campaign was much easier this time because (a) the only enemies are glasps, which are invisible anyway, and (b) it's like ten minutes long. Fortunately, Barry picked up the slack by making sure his level as long and as hard as...okay, I can't think of a PG simile. Point is: it sucked. It sucked hard. Between the toxic gas in the mines, the groups of invisible zombies roaming the narrow corridors, the survival wave of enemies in the final room, and the most annoying boss since my last job, I was lucky to get through unscathed. You really need to utilize Natalia's brick-throwing ability (apparently Barry is so manly that he refuses to use anything that doesn't go bang-bang or boom) if you want to conserve ammo and health. I strongly recommend co-op for Invisible Mode, as this is one of the harder games I've played, even with help.

 

So, what's left? Well, it's mostly playing through Episode 4 one more time for medals. There's one for getting 100% accuracy in Claire 4, which isn't as bad as it sounds (and yet I've failed it on my 5+ playthroughs of this stage), and another for beating the final boss without getting hit. No way in hell was that going to happen in Invisible Mode.

 

I'd also like to get the good ending. It's not required for a trophy, but this can't all be for nothing.

 

Wait, wrong father/non-biological daughter game.

[Cassylvania]

Platinum #106 - Resident Evil Revelations 2

 

I have THIS.

[AJ_Radio]

I see you got 99 percent completion Cassy. That's pretty damn impressive.

 

I'll probably never get that high of a completion rate because I would have to force myself to get all the online trophies done. And I would rather not have to boost for old PS3 games. Red Dead Redemption is a good example because there are hacked lobbies and a number of players I have run into glitch the game. Very likely I will never obtain all the trophies.

 

===

 

You planning to fully finish Super Meat Boy Br1ste? I would probably start practicing Cotton Alley since I consider that to be the most difficult. I've practiced a bit on Light Cotton Alley and it's not as difficult as I initially assumed it would be. Dark Cotton Alley is an absolute nightmare. So many spots to mess up, I probably died 2000+ times on those levels alone.

Edited April 9, 2018 by Spaz

[Cassylvania]

3 minutes ago, Spaz said:

I see you got 99 percent completion Cassy. That's pretty damn impressive.

 

I'll probably never get that high of a completion rate because I would have to force myself to get all the online trophies done. And I would rather not have to boost for old PS3 games. Red Dead Redemption is a good example because there are hacked lobbies and a number of players I have run into glitch the game. Very likely I will never obtain all the trophies.

 

Thanks! I would've been at only six unearned trophies if Shantae hadn't come along and surprised me with another DLC. This one looks longer than the other two. I'm not sure when it releases, but maybe it's a blessing in disguise. I would've hated only seeing Arkham Knight standing between me and 100%.

 

(Actually, I did try one of the combat challenges yesterday. On my third try, I beat Crime Alley as Batman without getting hit. Except I did get hit. In round two. But I kept going because I thought I'd need the practice in the later rounds. I then proceeded to fail at it a dozen more times before quitting.)

 

I wouldn't worry about trying to reach 100% or even 99%. It's not worth boosting trophies. I swore when I made this account that I wouldn't play any online games, just because I hate MP so much. I made an exception for Plants vs. Zombies, just because it's so much fun (and doesn't really require boosting, except for the Boss Hunt in the sequel, I guess) and Paladins, because I knew the plat was easy and required minimal boosting. But beyond that, online trophies can shove it. I'd rather do the Arkham Knight trophies blindfolded.

 

I noticed everybody else has been rather quiet this weekend. I assume you're all making good progress on your games. As for me, I finally started God Wars -- or, as I call it, The Adventures of Booger and Waifu. I'm sure you can figure out which is which.

 

 

Joining me on my journey are Old Lady, Satan, Boobs, Pimp, and a random bear (pictured above). There's also a girl dressed as a bunny for some reason. The further I go into this game, the weirder it gets, so part of the excitement is just seeing what else Japan has in store for me.

 

Surprisingly, this is another one of those games that -- yes, you guessed it -- plays itself. "But C-dawg," you say, "isn't this a tactical, turn-based strategy game, similar to Final Fantasy Tactics, that requires careful strategy by the player in order to advance to the next level?" And the answer is no. You just have to set all of your companions to be controlled by the AI and laugh as Waifu kills everything in sight because she's already 20 levels ahead of everybody else.

 

You probably think I'm kidding.

 

 

I'm not.

[AJ_Radio]

Well to be honest I haven't played much these past couple weeks. Open world games burnt me out on trophy hunting since a lot of them are just running around aimlessly for hours getting mundane, trivial tasks done that the developers insisted you absolutely have to do for the platinum trophy. Ugh.

 

Then Assassins Creed Syndicate decided to completely crap out on me Tuesday when I got stuck on a loading screen. You can't back out or pause during a loading screen so I was forced to quit to XMB and try again. That didn't work so I ended up deleting my save files and spent two hours getting back to where I was in the game. Same problem happened, so I flew into anger mode and deleted the entire game off my PS4.

 

I just recently reinstalled, redownloaded and got all the patches for Assassins Creed Syndicate. In the past that was the surefire way for me to get technical problems fixed.

 

I just hate when crap like that happens, because I took a few days off from trophy hunting as a result. Oh well, that's life I suppose.

 

18 minutes ago, Cassylvania said:

 

Thanks! I would've been at only six unearned trophies if Shantae hadn't come along and surprised me with another DLC. This one looks longer than the other two. I'm not sure when it releases, but maybe it's a blessing in disguise. I would've hated only seeing Arkham Knight standing between me and 100%.

 

(Actually, I did try one of the combat challenges yesterday. On my third try, I beat Crime Alley as Batman without getting hit. Except I did get hit. In round two. But I kept going because I thought I'd need the practice in the later rounds. I then proceeded to fail at it a dozen more times before quitting.)

 

I wouldn't worry about trying to reach 100% or even 99%. It's not worth boosting trophies. I swore when I made this account that I wouldn't play any online games, just because I hate MP so much. I made an exception for Plants vs. Zombies, just because it's so much fun (and doesn't really require boosting, except for the Boss Hunt in the sequel, I guess) and Paladins, because I knew the plat was easy and required minimal boosting. But beyond that, online trophies can shove it. I'd rather do the Arkham Knight trophies blindfolded.

 

I noticed everybody else has been rather quiet this weekend. I assume you're all making good progress on your games. As for me, I finally started God Wars -- or, as I call it, The Adventures of Booger and Waifu. I'm sure you can figure out which is which.

 

I have one of the Shantae games. But I prefer to play a series properly, starting with the older title and working my way up to the newest one.

 

That's not how I did it with Assassins Creed, but in most cases I generally always play the oldest game first, so I can experience a story to it's fullest.

 

Great job on Arkham Knight. I actually gave up several times on those challenges, only to come back a month or two later and try again. Youtube videos definitely helped a lot.

 

The key is to Evade. Countering leaves you open to far too many attacks since the game generally fails to get Batman or anyone else you're playing to properly counter and attack the goon trying to hit you off guard. Crime Alley was by far the worst for me. The map itself is very small and you run into Brutes and goons with machine guns, both can easily hit you. The fourth round is a bitch, two Brutes and around 4 - 5 guys with guns, with Ninjas and I believe two Medics, you can't get hit by any of them.

 

I hate online trophies. That's one reason why I haven't put The Last of Us on this account. I played through the story on one of my alts and it was a fantastic experience from start to finish. But I don't see why Naughty Dog didn't just make it like Uncharted where you only have to play a few matches. Why do I have to pour 25 - 28 hours into the multiplayer just to get all the base game trophies? If I want to stack both the PS3 and PS4 versions that is doubled, over 50 hours of multiplayer I would rather NOT do.

 

Naughty Dog seems to have a thing with putting a lot of emphasis on multiplayer. I will probably never touch the PS3 Uncharted multiplayer because it is absolutely ridiculous. Sigh.

 

Uncharted 4 has microtransactions. I believe you can buy your way to better gear and whatnot. I also hear Naughty Dog completed screwed over some weapons and came out with newer weapons that absolutely dominate the multiplayer battle.

 

I have two trophies remaining in the Survival DLC but I have to beat all the maps on Crushing. Someone posted that they soloed through the entire thing, which is absolutely bonkers. I definitely do not want to reinstall this entire game just to go after those two trophies. They are probably more trouble than they're worth.

 

Grand Theft Auto V is another game I'm hesitant to do. Plus I was dumb enough to stack it which makes for countless hours going for online trophies. To top that off, the PS3 version is now unobtainable, because of a certain trophy with requirements that Rockstar decided to remove from GTA online.

 

It's funny that four years after the PS4 version is released I'm still getting updates on the game.

 

Yeah, I hate online trophies.

Edited April 8, 2018 by Spaz

[Cassylvania]

@Spaz I agree about The Last of Us. Loved the game -- didn't even mind playing through it three times -- but I'm not doing the MP. Not for the platinum and certainly not for the DLC. Then again, I might have considered if Naughty Dog hadn't fucked up so bad with Uncharted 4.

 

I had a lot of fun a couple of years ago with the Uncharted Remastered trilogy. They replaced all of the online trophies with much better single-player challenges. Yeah, Brutal mode was unfairly hard at times, but I enjoyed it. I could play at my own speed, on my own time, without the need of organizing a boosting group -- and all the joys that come with that -- or trudging through hours of boring online play (with the added risk of losing all of your progress and having to start back on Week 1). But once they pulled that pay-to-win crap in Uncharted 4, I was done. All I needed was a reason, and they gave it to me.

 

We all know I'll be playing Shadow of the Tomb Raider when it releases, but I'm going to be very leery about every online game from now on. And GTA V? Not happening. (Which is just as well, because I prefer the Saints Row series anyway.)

 

As for the Shantae... You can pick up the first game on the 3DS, if you have one. You can play all of the others on the PS4. All of them are great, but Pirate's Curse is probably the best of the bunch.

[AJ_Radio]

Yeah it sucks.

 

Oh well. If I can keep a 95 percent completion rate or better I don't care how many games I have that are unfinished. I have OCD and understandably, it irritates the crap out of me when I see F ranks and E ranks on my own profile. Eventually I will get them all to A rank, which looks much nicer.

 

I'll probably play the remastered trilogy again on my new account. The first game has skip glitches so it can be done pretty quickly. With Brutal it's fairly easy with the glitches, without them well, good luck on your sanity.

 

Yeah I can imagine the efforts of going through multiplayer only to lose all that progress. These days it's just not worth it to play a game like World of Warcraft unless you are already up to date on all the content. MMOs were a thing for me in the 2000s but anymore they're just a way to consume all your time.

 

I missed out on a lot of the Playstation 3 and Vita library which is why I'm still getting games for those consoles.

 

Speaking of Tomb Raider, the 2013 reboot has online trophies. Not sure how it is, don't know how the new Tomb Raider plays but every time I look at that game I see a whole bunch of boosting sessions. If I absolutely have to do multiplayer, I try to play it legit, not be forced to boost. Tomb Raider reboot does not look like something I want to get into.

 

Plus, you can imagine that those with mics will scream at you whenever you do something wrong. I still have nightmares over that when I played Call of Duty games. Just adds a whole new layer of drama.

 

I have Saints Row the Third and Saints Row IV. Looking at the trophies I see a lot of people got them done pretty quickly, considering both have a lot of trophies. Is Saints Row IV pretty easy? It's on my backlog after all.

 

Did you ever think on getting The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt?

[Cassylvania]

15 minutes ago, Spaz said:

Speaking of Tomb Raider, the 2013 reboot has online trophies. Not sure how it is, don't know how the new Tomb Raider plays but every time I look at that game I see a whole bunch of boosting sessions. If I absolutely have to do multiplayer, I try to play it legit, not be forced to boost. Tomb Raider reboot does not look like something I want to get into.

 

The good thing about the Tomb Raider plat is that the only lengthy MP trophy is one that you can grind solo. (You basically create a private match and run around for 8-10 hours lugging suitcases.) It's not that bad.

 

19 minutes ago, Spaz said:

Plus, you can imagine that those with mics will scream at you whenever you do something wrong. I still have nightmares over that when I played Call of Duty games. Just adds a whole new layer of drama.

 

Yeah, or getting hate messages. I got that when I was on Paladins. Some guy wanted to "fight" me because I guess I killed his character or something. Like, seriously, I have enough to deal with in real life. I don't need random strangers on the internet sending me verbal threats.

 

23 minutes ago, Spaz said:

I have Saints Row the Third and Saints Row IV. Looking at the trophies I see a lot of people got them done pretty quickly, considering both have a lot of trophies. Is Saints Row IV pretty easy? It's on my backlog after all.

 

Did you ever think on getting The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt?

 

Saints Row IV is fairly easy. Some of the DLC trophies are a little tricky, but it's mostly just an open-world grind. Think Arkham City, but with superpowers.

 

The Witcher 3 has been on my list since it first came out. But it's in the same category as Stardew Valley and Breath of the Wild. Those are games that I know, once I start them, I'm going to blink and realize three months have gone by. I really, really need to make sure I have nothing else going on in my life before I start.

[AJ_Radio]

2 minutes ago, Cassylvania said:

The good thing about the Tomb Raider plat is that the only lengthy MP trophy is one that you can grind solo. (You basically create a private match and run around for 8-10 hours lugging suitcases.) It's not that bad.

 

As long as it's not Red Dead Redemption lengthy, then maybe. But I got enough games on my backlog already, as you have already seen.

 

2 minutes ago, Cassylvania said:

Yeah, or getting hate messages. I got that when I was on Paladins. Some guy wanted to "fight" me because I guess I killed his character or something. Like, seriously, I have enough to deal with in real life. I don't need random strangers on the internet sending me verbal threats.

 

My situation in real life isn't all that great at the moment. Which I will not get into, but I'll just say I've been having it a little rough at work.

 

I typically find most strangers to insult others to be pretty young. You never know, I've had older people in their 40s talk down to me before online but yeah. I just use the Mute option every time, surefire way to get a better online experience.

 

4 minutes ago, Cassylvania said:

Saints Row IV is fairly easy. Some of the DLC trophies are a little tricky, but it's mostly just an open-world grind. Think Arkham City, but with superpowers.

 

The Witcher 3 has been on my list since it first came out. But it's in the same category as Stardew Valley and Breath of the Wild. Those are games that I know, once I start them, I'm going to blink and realize three months have gone by. I really, really need to make sure I have nothing else going on in my life before I start.

 

You played City on the 360?

 

Been trying to get back into that game, but there are some difficult sections.

 

There is a remastered version of Asylum and City on the PS4. Not sure if you're going to get them.

 

Yeah The Witcher 3 is a pretty long one. I already invested 40 hours into one of my save files and I've barely made progress in the second area. This game is huge, you can easily spend 10 - 20 hours just running around, plus there's a crap load of side content, much of which isn't needed for the platinum but it's definitely worth going after.

[Jens]

[...]

Edited September 27, 2019 by Jens

[AJ_Radio]

3 hours ago, Jens said:

And I felt bad for dumping Witcher 3 despite liking it, just because my urge for completion slowly burnt me out on this game  That's comforting to know that I am not alone.

 

I think even if you were to do a reasonable run, plus the two DLC packs, you'll be spending 120 - 150 hours on the game at least.

 

The second area of the game is HUGE. I practically spent a lot of my time going after the various sidequests out in the woods, haven't even touched the city yet. So many question marks it drives me crazy.

 

I'm saving The Witcher 3 for my 150th platinum.

[Cassylvania]

5 hours ago, Spaz said:

You played City on the 360?

 

Been trying to get back into that game, but there are some difficult sections.

 

There is a remastered version of Asylum and City on the PS4. Not sure if you're going to get them.

 

I played Arkham City on the PS3, back when we had one. Didn't bother with the platinum, but I might consider the remastered version someday. It's a good enough game to play a second time.

 

Personally, though, I'm Batman'd out. I loved TAS growing up, and I'm a huge comic book fan (as you probably know), but Batman was always one of my less favorite superheroes. I always thought the only thing that made him great was the villains he faced, and maybe this is the jealous side of me speaking, but I hate the fact that he's been done "right" so many times, whereas Superman -- my personal favorite (along with Supergirl) -- has only been done right in Smallville. Seriously. Every time a new Batman movie or game or whatever comes out, I die a little on the inside, wishing Superman would get his day in the spotlight. AND NOT FLYING THROUGH STUPID RINGS.

 

I have high hopes for Spider-Man, though. It's a step in the right direction.

 

5 hours ago, Jens said:

And I don't know one thing about your game Cassy, but I already like it a bit because of the puzzle-piece trophy images  That's one genre I kinda want to get better in, but it just never happens. I just completed XCOM because I watched a bunch of it on youtube, without it the game would've whooped me.

 

Yeah, Gravity Rush had something like that too, with stacks of trophies showing Kat off in different uniforms. That's another game I need to pick up the sequel for.

 

There isn't much to really say about God Wars. It's...pretty mediocre, I gotta admit. The narrative isn't bad, but it's ruined by terrible voice acting, like most Japanese games. I think I really need to take up Japanese, like my friend is doing. I think it's the main reason I just can't get into anime. Which is unfortunate, because I really did like Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke.

 

Tactical, turn-based RPGs are probably my favorite kind of game, next to farming sims. There's just something I enjoy a lot about building up an army and having my characters develop relationships. It leads to all these fun mini-stories that happen inside the main narrative, making each playthrough unique. Like, thinking back to XCOM 2, I remember one mission where my specialist Zoe had to sneak into a building from the roof, disable the computer inside, and then break through enemy fire to reach the evac point. There were so many moments where she almost died, but my team moved forward and blew open a wall to help her escape. Nothing like that was planned or rendered as part of a cut-scene. That was a player-driven moment where the outcome was totally unknown. That, to me, is more exciting than most games I play, and why I think XCOM is a series that everybody has to try at some point.

 

Fire Emblem is like that too, and it's what I was hoping to see in God Wars. It has some good ideas -- I like the idea of characters having jobs and sub jobs, and the Japanese mythos is neat -- but it's not pulling me in the way FE does. Some of my best FE playthroughs were when I created arbitrary rules for myself, such as beating the game with only a handful of characters, or having to sacrifice one unit per map, but the "tactics" in this game are too shallow for allow for that. Most maps are just wide open areas, and the battle system isn't refined. In FE, I have to consider each move carefully, taking into account my position, which weapon I'll use, and the risk of missing an attack or getting hit by a critical shot. There's an art form to FE. In this game, you have way too many options, and there's no risk in dying. As long as you clear the map, all of your characters are alive for the next battle.

 

If I had to guess, I'd say SRPGs are the single worst-represented genre on modern consoles. Outside of XCOM and Disgaea, what do you really got? FE had one good game (Path of Radiance) and one not so good game (Radiant Dawn) for the Gamecube/Wii. Ogre Battle 64 is one of my favorite games of all-time, but I don't know if that'd even qualify as an SRPG. To this day, I cry when I think how good that game was. The graphics weren't very good, the main characters were a Breakfast Club of stereotypes, and the dialogue was hilariously bad at times, but that's what gave it charm. It's the gameplay that mattered. And I wish to hell there were more games like it.

 

But alas, they just don't make 'em like they used to.

[AJ_Radio]

2 hours ago, Cassylvania said:

 

I played Arkham City on the PS3, back when we had one. Didn't bother with the platinum, but I might consider the remastered version someday. It's a good enough game to play a second time.

 

Personally, though, I'm Batman'd out. I loved TAS growing up, and I'm a huge comic book fan (as you probably know), but Batman was always one of my less favorite superheroes. I always thought the only thing that made him great was the villains he faced, and maybe this is the jealous side of me speaking, but I hate the fact that he's been done "right" so many times, whereas Superman -- my personal favorite (along with Supergirl) -- has only been done right in Smallville. Seriously. Every time a new Batman movie or game or whatever comes out, I die a little on the inside, wishing Superman would get his day in the spotlight. AND NOT FLYING THROUGH STUPID RINGS.

 

I have high hopes for Spider-Man, though. It's a step in the right direction.

 

The fact is Batman has been overly exposed.

 

He's definitely a good superhero and he amongst the greatest superheroes of all time, both comic book wise and his legacy. But his story has been done so many times, that I think someone else should take the spotlight.

 

Superman on the other hand, has a long history of bad luck and is a hero whom I considered "jinxed". The old star of the television Superman series several decades ago ended up committing suicide. The star of the 70s - 80s era Superman movies got into a bad accident involving a horse. Superman 64 is one of the worst Nintendo 64 games and is widely considered one of the worst games period, due to how terrible the controls are and the lackluster gameplay. The list goes on.

 

However, that Angry Video Game Nerd episode on Superman 64 was fucking hilarious. Easily one of his best, the way he expressed his emotions and feelings on that game was exactly how I felt when I rented Superman 64 back when I had a N64 console.

 

Spider-Man is headed by Insomniac Games, and they haven't done any wrong. Although for a while a couple of their Ratchet and Clank games didn't receive all that good of attention.

 

2 hours ago, Cassylvania said:

If I had to guess, I'd say SRPGs are the single worst-represented genre on modern consoles. Outside of XCOM and Disgaea, what do you really got? FE had one good game (Path of Radiance) and one not so good game (Radiant Dawn) for the Gamecube/Wii. Ogre Battle 64 is one of my favorite games of all-time, but I don't know if that'd even qualify as an SRPG. To this day, I cry when I think how good that game was. The graphics weren't very good, the main characters were a Breakfast Club of stereotypes, and the dialogue was hilariously bad at times, but that's what gave it charm. It's the gameplay that mattered. And I wish to hell there were more games like it.

 

But alas, they just don't make 'em like they used to.

 

I think Deus Ex is a sort of a RPG type game with some science fiction, at least the old original was. Haven't played it in ages.

 

I'm already missing Goldeneye 007 and Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. So many great games came out of the late 1990s.

Edited April 9, 2018 by Spaz

[det_gittes]

@Cassylvania and @Spaz, great job on keeping up this great conversation, I really enjoy reading threads like these, content-packed but also with a touch of personality, which is much appreciated as one can relate to similar experiences from their own life. I will probably have little to contribute as I have very meager console gaming experience (bought my first console as I was approaching my mid-30s and been playing casually ever since, i.e. for the past 3,5 years, recently also purchased a Vita and I'm very glad that I did) but I've already followed you both and hope that you will continue sharing your thoughts about games (not to be rude to other people's posts, I will read them too ).

 

On a side note, I am not a complete stranger to games, I just never had any gaming console prior to PS4 - I don't think they were very popular in Poland, especially back in the 90s, I imagine they must have cost a shitload of money and not many people could afford them. But my family did own a PC in mid-90s and I played quite a bit then - the only problem was that with story-driven games Polish was hardly ever available and I only knew English at a basic level so I was missing out on a lot of content (still remember being in awe of Relentless: Little Big Adventure or Discworld even though I could probably only understand a little part of them). From early 2000s, when I went to university, I was on a hiatus from gaming until 2014, which mainly explains why I lack a lot of basic knowledge from recent gaming history.

 

As for the relevant stuff, I did play the Witcher 3 right after it came out (I imagine it was very popular everywhere but even more so here in Poland as the developing studio is from Poland and there was a lot of hype around it) and I absolutely loved it. It's not on my profile because I made one of my most stupid mistakes to buy a gaming laptop pretty much for this one game (I consider it a stupid mistake because I basically played no other games on it and it's heavy and unwieldy). On the plus side, however, I probably experienced better graphics and shorter loading times, finished the main game in around 120 hours and it was a great ride all along. It helped me that I knew some of Sapkowski's books, so the Witcher universe felt very familiar, and also the game has many references to Slavic mythology, which was a bonus - I even played the game in Polish, which I never do but because of so many references I figured it made more sense. Needless to say, I recommend it to everyone, but make sure you have a lot of spare time. As for Stardew Valley, this game is brilliant, I played it for about a month last spring/summer and it was a fantastic experience, it's one of these games that make you forget about everything else, but in fairness I stopped having fun when I cleaned up most of the easy trophies and the ones left were mostly RNG-based ones (collecting artefacts for the museum collection) or super hard (Fector's challenge). Fortunately for me, I am not a completionist, so I just moved on, although maybe in the summer I will revisit it.

 

tl;dr I enjoy your posts

[Briste]

Happy Monday everyone. Figures a good back and forth gets going on a weekend where I couldn't be on much. That's ok though, my son had a great 4th birthday at the nature center. It's fun to see someone who gets genuinely excited for everything. The pure joy on his face when he got to hold a snake was priceless. Of course he's going to hate me in 5 or 6 years, so I'll enjoy this time now.

 

With my Souls adventure, I was able to beat the frat boys again with the big boy going down second. I also was able to beat Priscilla and get the dagger AND beat Nito. It was a pretty efficient couple of hours for me  Next up is the butterfly and Sif.

 

18 hours ago, Spaz said:

You planning to fully finish Super Meat Boy Br1ste?

The plan is to finish, however I'm not going to stress about it. I'm going to finish up Space Hulk first (I'm playing SMB on my vita) and then I'll go back and work on the Rapture worlds. It may be a couple of months though because 40,000 kills is some tedious bull shit for this platinum. I'm basically working on that game for about an hour or so each night while I watch TV with my wife. I maybe get 500 kills a night sooooo in roughly 80 days I'll have 40,000 kills....

 

17 hours ago, Cassylvania said:

Joining me on my journey are Old Lady, Satan, Boobs, Pimp, and a random bear (pictured above). There's also a girl dressed as a bunny for some reason. The further I go into this game, the weirder it gets, so part of the excitement is just seeing what else Japan has in store for me.

lol I feel like most of the female characters in these games could be nicknamed Boobs. Can you read Japanese? I can't tell if the game is JP or NA. One screen shot shows the JP text where in your other screen shot, the information is in English. I feel like I miss out on a lot of good games since I can only speak English (and poorly at that.)

 

17 hours ago, Spaz said:

I hate online trophies. That's one reason why I haven't put The Last of Us on this account. I played through the story on one of my alts and it was a fantastic experience from start to finish. But I don't see why Naughty Dog didn't just make it like Uncharted where you only have to play a few matches. Why do I have to pour 25 - 28 hours into the multiplayer just to get all the base game trophies? If I want to stack both the PS3 and PS4 versions that is doubled, over 50 hours of multiplayer I would rather NOT do.

In general, I agree with you here however I didn't find the Last of Us MP to be that bad. The servers were pretty stable, I don't recall getting d/c'd that often and you could cheese through quite a bit of the grind by quitting out of sessions right after they started. I probably only played 1 in 3 or 4 matches. I don't think the game needed it, since it was one of the best stories I think I've ever played. The story had me hooked right from the prologue and it didn't disappoint throughout. I wouldn't rush to stack the plats right now since I just beat the game about a year and a half ago...but I absolutely may in a couple years if I'm feeling nostalgic.

 

9 hours ago, Cassylvania said:

Personally, though, I'm Batman'd out. I loved TAS growing up, and I'm a huge comic book fan (as you probably know), but Batman was always one of my less favorite superheroes. I always thought the only thing that made him great was the villains he faced, and maybe this is the jealous side of me speaking, but I hate the fact that he's been done "right" so many times, whereas Superman -- my personal favorite (along with Supergirl) -- has only been done right in Smallville. Seriously. Every time a new Batman movie or game or whatever comes out, I die a little on the inside, wishing Superman would get his day in the spotlight. AND NOT FLYING THROUGH STUPID RINGS.

 

I have high hopes for Spider-Man, though. It's a step in the right direction.

Growing up, Spider-Man was my favorite...and it wasn't even close. Then Spider-Man 3 happened and it just left a horrible taste in my mouth. I didn't mind the first Andrew Garfield Amazing Spider-Man movie, but the second one was pure garbage as well. With Batman, I loved Michael Keaton's version and then the Val Kilmer/George Clooney ones ruined that as well. I almost didn't watch the Christian Bale series since I figured it would suck too. I am so glad I did. That trilogy, coupled with the Arkham game series, propelled Batman into first for my favorite comic book hero. I like that he's not a super hero and is just a regular (billionaire, genius) guy that is doing extraordinary things. I like his dark side...I like that he can be beat.

 

I've never fully embraced Super Man solely because he shouldn't ever lose. He can do anything he wants, so I expect him to come out on top. My favorite one of his comics was the Super Man dies series since it was unexpected. It doesn't help that most of his movies/video games have been trash on top of it...but he's just never been one of my favorites.

9 hours ago, Cassylvania said:

Tactical, turn-based RPGs are probably my favorite kind of game, next to farming sims. There's just something I enjoy a lot about building up an army and having my characters develop relationships. It leads to all these fun mini-stories that happen inside the main narrative, making each playthrough unique. Like, thinking back to XCOM 2, I remember one mission where my specialist Zoe had to sneak into a building from the roof, disable the computer inside, and then break through enemy fire to reach the evac point. There were so many moments where she almost died, but my team moved forward and blew open a wall to help her escape. Nothing like that was planned or rendered as part of a cut-scene. That was a player-driven moment where the outcome was totally unknown. That, to me, is more exciting than most games I play, and why I think XCOM is a series that everybody has to try at some point.

This experience sums up why XCOM is awesome perfectly. It was so fun how you could incorporate or negate areas of the map by blowing up walls. I had a similar experience on that same level (or one like it) I think. I had cleared out most of the bad guys and was running low on turns left. So I ran ahead with my ranger and the Beserker Ruler appeared. I had to jet up with my grenadier, blow a hole in the wall and try to stun the Berserker since he got to move every time I did. It was about as nerve racking a mission as I had done and it was really satisfying when I maneuvered my way out of it. I definitely agree that everyone needs to give that series a try.

 

 

Edited April 9, 2018 by Br1ste

[Cassylvania]

Oh, wow. Lots of comments. Let's see if I can get to them all...

 

@Spaz It's almost unfair how many good iterations Batman has had. If you take away some of those godawful movies in the 90s, he's basically untouchable. I can't even stand Injustice because it's so blatantly pro-Batman and anti-Superman. It's like the only way they feel they can include Supes in anything is if they take away his powers, turn him evil, or introduce alternative universes. Like, seriously? 

 

I really hope they give someone like Rocksteady the rights to a Superman game, because he deserves better.

 

@det_gittes Hey, welcome to the patch! There's nothing wrong with being a late bloomer. I think I've discussed this before, but I didn't really get into gaming until I was in college. Most of my teenage years were spent playing Pokemon and a few games for the N64, like Harvest Moon and Banjo-Kazooie. It was actually my sister who got me into Playstation. I started with the PS3 and got more into gaming when the trophy system was introduced, but I missed out on a lot of the earlier games, like Crash and Spyro. It's cool to see all of the remasters coming out, but I feel like I'll never catch up. I've only played the first Resident Evil game (well, and Rev 1 and 2), I've been chipping away at Chrono Trigger for the past year, and I still have the entire Final Fantasy series to cover. But it's kinda cool for people like us because we have such a huge selection of games to choose from. I can't really complain about that.

 

@Br1ste I wish I could read Japanese. The first screenshot is just from the internet. The second is from my playthrough. I probably should update the image, because the difference in levels is even more ridiculous now. Waifu is 99, while everybody else is in their early 30s. I'm not even sure why that's happening, because I'm letting the AI do everything. (Seriously, the game has been playing itself all morning, while I work around the house.) My only guess is that Waifu is casting buffs on everybody, which is giving her an outrageous amount of experience. Sometimes I'll look over at the screen and see she's the only one on my team still alive, but none of the enemies can hurt her because her evasion is so high. It's actually pretty hilarious to watch.

 

My healer is also almost maxed out, so I'm guessing she's keeping Waifu at full health, even when she doesn't need it.

[AJ_Radio]

I’ve been making very good progress on Demons Souls. Got Pure Darkmoonstone drop on first attempt on crystal lizards.

 

Should have everything done by Wednesday. 

 

I’m an idiot for waiting so long to finally play through this game.

 

I see you have Demons Souls done @Br1ste and is working on Dark Souls. I really hope there’s none of that World/Character Tendency crap, because you can really screw yourself if you enter a world alive and not in Soul Form.

[Cassylvania]

6 hours ago, Spaz said:

I see you have Demons Souls done @Br1ste and is working on Dark Souls. I really hope there’s none of that World/Character Tendency crap, because you can really screw yourself if you enter a world alive and not in Soul Form.

 

They removed that from the later Souls games. If they ever remastered Demon's Souls, I hope they remove it from there too, or at least explain to the player how it works. That's probably my biggest gripe with Demon's. Next to the name. Which also doesn't make sense. Demon's's's's Soulssss.

 

So, I decided to test a theory today. God Smores has these things called shrine requests, which are your standard replayable side quests that you can use for farming and grinding XP. Most of the requests requiring killing a bunch of enemies, but some require doing additional tasks, such as clearing out rocks or protecting a fisherman while he...fishes. (Um, maybe don't fish where there are hungry monsters?). Anyway, the rock mission isn't over until you destroy all of the rocks on the map, so I got the idea to clear out all of the enemies and then set my entire team to support/heal. Rather than finishing the mission, they proceeded to run all around the battlefield, casting buffs and heals on each other, while I cooked lunch, went shopping, and took a nap. When I finally looked back at my TV, the whole lot of them were level 99. This has got to be the most hands-off tactical RPG I've ever played.

 

There really isn't much to the trophies, other than maxing out everybody's levels/skills/jobs, and finding the hidden treasures on each map. I'm a little over halfway through the game and I've seriously only played about 4-5 hours. Most of that time has been spent reading dialogue and watching cutscenes.

 

A dancer, some dude, and a frog (turtle) joined my team. The only thing that surprised me about the last one was that it wasn't a cat. I kept saying, "I bet it's a cat," when the dude told me we had to rescue his "friend." You're not even trying anymore, Japan.

 

According to my math, there should still be two or three more companions who join up with me before this is over. I need to figure out what jobs to assign them before I start power-leveling them (literally) in my sleep. No sense in leveling up multiple units with the same job.

 

Hope you're all rested up, PS4, because you're pulling an all-nighter!

Edited April 10, 2018 by Cassylvania

[AJ_Radio]

You should be a blog writer. Your writing style is perfect for that.

[Jens]

[...]

Edited September 27, 2019 by Jens

[Briste]

11 hours ago, Cassylvania said:

They removed that from the later Souls games. If they ever remastered Demon's Souls, I hope they remove it from there too, or at least explain to the player how it works. That's probably my biggest gripe with Demon's. Next to the name. Which also doesn't make sense. Demon's's's's Soulssss.

I wouldn't have minded it as much if it wasn't shared and being online could screw you up. I think it's a neat (but unexplained) wrinkle in the game. I just thought it was dumb that you could do everything you were supposed to to make the world a certain tendency and then have the online portion of the game screw it up for you. It incentivizes you to play offline.

 

17 hours ago, Spaz said:

I see you have Demons Souls done @Br1ste and is working on Dark Souls. I really hope there’s none of that World/Character Tendency crap, because you can really screw yourself if you enter a world alive and not in Soul Form.

A lot of the changes were made for the better. I like the bonfires, I like that every time you leave your inventory storage you don't hear "You have a heart of gold...don't let them take it from you," I like how connected the world is and I like the additions they made to combat. It's not perfect. I wasn't a fan of the change in spells and I don't really like the relative lack of story/direction. Don't get me wrong...I love the open world concept and everything, but you would honestly miss at least half of the game without a guide since there is no real story development or explanations of things and no obvious clues or directives. Beyond the sheer challenge of the game, I could see how people would get frustrated and stop simply because they have no idea what they are supposed to do. I used the trophy guide on here, so I kind of knew which area I should go to next and what to look for...but without it...I'd probably still be roaming around the first couple of zones.

 

18 hours ago, Spaz said:

I’ve been making very good progress on Demons Souls. Got Pure Darkmoonstone drop on first attempt on crystal lizards.

 

For me the longest grind was the Pure Bladestone. I spent just about 3 hours farming that skeleton before it dropped...which all in all wasn't too bad. That's awesome though that you got the Pure Darkmoonstone quickly.

 

13 hours ago, Cassylvania said:

Anyway, the rock mission isn't over until you destroy all of the rocks on the map, so I got the idea to clear out all of the enemies and then set my entire team to support/heal. Rather than finishing the mission, they proceeded to run all around the battlefield, casting buffs and heals on each other, while I cooked lunch, went shopping, and took a nap. When I finally looked back at my TV, the whole lot of them were level 99. This has got to be the most hands-off tactical RPG I've ever played.

lol this is pretty brilliant. I may look into this as my next game on the Vita since I usually play that while I'm watching TV with my wife...it wouldn't be bad to have a game that can play itself in that situation

 

[AJ_Radio]

4 hours ago, Br1ste said:

I wouldn't have minded it as much if it wasn't shared and being online could screw you up. I think it's a neat (but unexplained) wrinkle in the game. I just thought it was dumb that you could do everything you were supposed to to make the world a certain tendency and then have the online portion of the game screw it up for you. It incentivizes you to play offline.

 

It was likely pretty interesting back in 2009 when the game released.

 

Demon's Souls is fantastic and it holds up really well, even when compared with today's AAA games. It's just that one mechanic that throws me off track. I've been carefully monitoring a checklist off PST.org (Playstationtrophies), I even wrote an actual checklist of items to cross off.

 

4 hours ago, Br1ste said:

A lot of the changes were made for the better. I like the bonfires, I like that every time you leave your inventory storage you don't hear "You have a heart of gold...don't let them take it from you," I like how connected the world is and I like the additions they made to combat. It's not perfect. I wasn't a fan of the change in spells and I don't really like the relative lack of story/direction. Don't get me wrong...I love the open world concept and everything, but you would honestly miss at least half of the game without a guide since there is no real story development or explanations of things and no obvious clues or directives. Beyond the sheer challenge of the game, I could see how people would get frustrated and stop simply because they have no idea what they are supposed to do. I used the trophy guide on here, so I kind of knew which area I should go to next and what to look for...but without it...I'd probably still be roaming around the first couple of zones.

 

I've went as far as the first boss and the first bonfire on an alt account, then pretty much given up not long after that because I had no idea what to do.

 

Bloodborne was very straightforward. The only times I used any Youtube video were on finding all the weapons and trying to tackle a few of the bosses, notably the Orphan of Kos, Mergo's Wet Nurse and obviously that dreaded Watchdog in the Defiled Chalice dungeon.

 

Demon's Souls on the other hand I've pretty much had to resort to a guide from the very beginning. Even accidentally hitting Stockpile Thomas or Blacksmith Ed with your long range Halberd is enough to completely screw you over until your next playthrough. That's one thing I'm always afraid I might do unintentionally whenever I am duping Demon Souls or just mats (shards, chunks and pures) to upgrade my weapons. 

 

I couldn't get into this game when I first played it because I died a bazillion times to those blue eyed and red eyed knights in the first area. That was the same thing with Bloodborne, but once I got used to both the games were a whole lot easier. It's really all about surpassing that high difficulty curve both games throw at you.

 

Thankfully someone was kind enough to post an entire Youtube walkthrough dedicated to platinuming Demon's Souls, the Dark Souls trilogy and Bloodborne. Been following his videos for Demon's Souls, but I've branched off a bit and made my own build and did some things differently.

 

It's very easy to screw up in Demon's Souls, and I would rather not end up spending two additional playthroughs to get everything.

 

4 hours ago, Br1ste said:

For me the longest grind was the Pure Bladestone. I spent just about 3 hours farming that skeleton before it dropped...which all in all wasn't too bad. That's awesome though that you got the Pure Darkmoonstone quickly.

 

Still working on getting Pure Moonlightstone, which I haven't gotten just yet.

[Cassylvania]

16 hours ago, Spaz said:

You should be a blog writer. Your writing style is perfect for that.

 

Ha, thanks. But isn't this thread already my blog?

 

That's such a weird word. Blog. Blog. Bah-logg.

 

5 hours ago, Jens said:

Maybe I have to recommend Ni No Kuni 2 to you afterall  Because there is a... "side mode" where just waiting around is pretty beneficial (and yes I'll stick to the "0% spoilers" shtick; maybe some people are waiting for it and want to know absolutely nothing about it, who knows Although it's probably pretty well known at that point...). Just imagine how clean your house and how filled your stomach could be for the next..... week or so!

 

Yeah, I probably will play NNK2 at some point. Unfortunately, it's kinda in that good-game-but-requires-a-big-chunk-of-time category, along with The Witcher 3 and every Final Fantasy game ever made. Such is the curse of loving RPGs and never having the time to commit to one.

 

But, looking at your trophy list, you never let that stop you!

 

4 hours ago, Br1ste said:

I may look into this as my next game on the Vita since I usually play that while I'm watching TV with my wife...it wouldn't be bad to have a game that can play itself in that situation

 

It's a perfect game for TV or movie watching. You probably want to play "normally" for the first few hours, just to get the hang of how the combat and job system works. If you set the AI to do everything, most of your time is spent between battles on the upgrade screen, figuring out what jobs and skills you want your characters to use. The only problem I've really run into is that some battles require you to keep certain characters alive. You know how annoying it is to protect NPCs in other games? Yeah, now imagine a whole team of NPCs trying to protect an NPC. It's a freakin' free-for-all.

 

This is why I don't fear a hostile machine takeover any time in the near future.