#148 Old Mans Journey (PS4)
Not much to say about this one. Not as memorable or emotional an experience as I had been led to believe. Less than two quid, couple of hours to complete.
On to the next one.
@JudgeDredd
Congrats to the missus then. @MightyDemon82
Nice one... though I've never heard of it! Any good?
“We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”
Congrats to everyone on recent platinums.
I just need to complete online races to get the GT7 plat, and am also working through 428: Shibuya Scramble - I think I’ll see it through to platinum, really enjoying it, very chilled experience and a lot of fun.
Firstly, I'd say the trophy hunting and the enjoyment of the game are two separate experiences. You're required to complete the game on Nightmare difficulty which you will certainly find punishing at the beginning. What's worse is there isn't much help in the online forums, only those who gloat about "how they install patches to make it harder". I also hate difficulty trophies in RPGs because you're usually forced to pick certain races/classes to take advantage of certain bonuses to make areas smoother. Whilst this isn't the worst example of this you will probably benefit with some more than others.
I found myself doing a lot of grinding to boost my level and get better gear to beat seemingly simple stages of the game. This is really time consuming and frustrating. The size of this thing is easy over a hundred hours and Bioware fall into the trap of believing size matters. Fair enough it's expected that you get a fair bit of meat on an RPG but this felt overwhelming with not a lot of variation.
It does a decent enough job of exploring wider events alongside the main story by travelling to different regions to help out in the stuff going on there but it doesn't really have an effect on the main story like Origins did.
Speaking of the main story, this is actually its weakest part in my opinion. The villain is actually someone you meet in DA2 DLC which is a cheap move by Bioware. It's not necessarily pivotal that you have the backstory knowledge of him from this previous encounter but it certainly helps in terms of world building especially when a couple of characters talk about the last time they fought him throughout the game and the reason why. I didn't encounter him in DA2 so felt like I didn't really understand what was going on.
The villain himself was quite underwhelming also. He had a strong introduction but that's as far as it goes. His motivation and supposed knowledge of the world really undermines what is thought to be established lore and whilst acknowledged here and there, the implications of what he's saying feel somewhat glazed over. He doesn't look particularly intimidating and the final fight against him as well as how it comes about feels quite rushed.
I also can't help stating how disjointed the whole story is. I know with RPGs you can get too engaged in side content to the point where you forget what the main story is about but I didn't feel this was the case with Origins or even DA2 for that matter. I found myself completing main and side quests purely going through the motions without much knowledge of why I'm doing it. "Go to location A and kill B for C". I'm sure it was explained why I was doing it but either the amount of content was overwhelming my brain, or the reason for doing it was just so run of the mill it didn't really matter.
Once you get Nightmare difficulty out of the way and clean up on Casual it's a much more enjoyable experience and is probably a better game because of it.
Another point which makes it difficult to immerse yourself in the world was the lore you discover. For instance you're given a codex which allows you to read up on things and provide backstory to regions, monsters, characters etc. Only problem is instead of telling you about something directly, it usually gets described to you in the words of someone elses journal entry. Instead of saying this is a ... and it does ..., it's described more as "today I was walking down the road and came across a walking skeleton, my wife told it a joke which it did not find funny. It then stabbed my wife." - Journal found in Redcliffe.... obviously this is an exaggeration but you get the point. I'm not really wiser about how the skeleton came about, their frequency and aims but I do know what some guy wrote about it.
Soundtrack is actually quite decent, especially in the bigger battles and quite a nice part at the end of the Trespasser DLC.
DLC - The Descent
Owning the GOTY, this is the first DLC I played halfway through the game. Breaks no real new ground, doesn't add much in terms of gameplay and without going too much into it, you end up in the Deep Roads fighting darkspawn and dwarves. The story left me with more questions than answers and really makes you ask yourself what you've just experienced.
Biggest challenge you'll face without a doubt are the dwarves who have automatic crossbows which make the Gatling gun in Terminator 2 feel like a pea shooter.
DLC - Jaws of Hakkon
In this campaign you are tasked with gaining the allegiance of a barbarian tribe to fight another barbarian tribe hell bent on bringing about a doomsday scenario. Again, I don't feel this breaks any new ground and the second last level is badly designed. You go up against a boss who hits harder than an enraged Mike Tyson which you can't back out of unless you have a previous save meaning if you can't beat him and have no other nearby save...well.....
DLC - Trespasser
Picture this, you've cleared Nightmare difficulty and nearly all main story content, your character is a badass who can take on anything thrown at them, you complete what is actually a decent post game wrap up unlocking the story related trophies. You check your trophy list to find out it isn't 100%, you think "what could I have missed?".....TRIALS!
Trials are in-game modifiers which make things more difficult in return for a chance to earn special loot. Adds a bit of replayability but Bioware added trophies attached to Trials which can only be completed at specific parts of the game meaning if you don't have previous saves, you're in for another campaign play through which I did. On Casual difficulty it won't take ages, I got it wrapped up in about 20hrs (won't take ages relatively speaking).
The Trespasser DLC is best of the three by a mile though.
Summary
In the trilogy, Inquisition is better than DA2 but not by much I'd say. Origins is still the crown jewel.
Would I play it again? Yes! I actually would but will do it in the run up to DA4 being released to refresh my memory of the story and do an actual play through making decisions based in what I want to do.
As for going for trophies in this game it's absolutely possible to do it, just be prepared to sink in a lot of time and a hell of a lot more if you actually want to play the game as normal and enjoy it for yourself first.
Remember this is only my opinion and sorry for the long review but the amount of time and effort I sunk into this prompted me to write my review just to help anyone else who has this on their to do list.
Congratulations to everyone else on their recent plats though!
Congrats @sorteddan, another big annual total for you this year… well done!
And a huge pat on the back to @The_Moose, well done dude. I remember us talking about this one a few times. I think you first mentioned it in around August and then again around November-ish. Massive achievement… and thank **** I’ll now know who to come to when I need advice on plating this myself 😅
edit. I’m not implying that someone actually do this… but feel free if you like of course… but it would be quite interesting to see how many collective plats us square-pushers popped in 2022. I’ve only been around since late 2020 but this year definitely seemed a marked step up from from 2021.
@RogerRoger Cheers mate. Yeah, if I was a Dev and coming up with trophies I wouldn't necessarily make it easy but I certainly wouldn't be as sadistic as these guys were.
A gem cannot be polished without friction, nor a man perfected without trials. – Seneca
Platinum #121 - Assassins Creed: Brotherhood - really good game fair play, which might have something to do with all the dlc content that has been automatically included in the Ezio Collection remaster. An absolute ton of content, most of it very good. The platinum itself is a bit frustrating though… as you need to be able to do everything perfectly… and those old AC controls don’t make perfect easy 😅!
@colonelkilgore
Congrats on your latest and your first of the year, only 29 more to go!
Glad it was one you enjoyed.
I only ever played one AC game myself and only for around an hour or two - was put off by the compulsory stealth sections - think it might have been the first game.
“We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”
@sorteddan@The_Moose yeah I get you both on the repetitiveness… I’m just one of those weirdos that quite like Ubisoft games for some reason 😅.
Having said that, I didn’t touch an Assassins Creed game for over a decade after hating the first one back in 2007. I finally gave another one a go as I’m a real sucker for Ancient Greece (Greek Myth in particular), so AC: Odyssey was mana from heaven for me tbh. Ended up liking it a lot and not just the Greek stuff, the actual Templars vs Assassins (although the assassins weren’t technically abouts at that time 😉) stuff was pretty cool also… so ended up picking up every other AC game available. Been playing one or two a year ever since.
and as for myself, just popped #150 overall and first of the year with Horizon Zero Dawn (PS4)
Had been putting this off for years and took a while for me to gel with as I get a bit overwhelmed with big open-world games but blimey! - I now see why many people rate this as a gaming masterpiece and one of the best games of the generation. The story had me gripped by the end and was pleased I could help Aloy and the gang to save the world and the new humanity.
Incidentally the last trophy I needed for the platinum was the gold one for completing the game, which turned out to be my 999th gold!
Still not entirely finished with it as I may have to venture back into the Frozen Wilds at some point and maybe have a nosy at the NG+ trophy requirements but happy to have the main game done for now. Took around 55 hours according to the save game counters if anybody was interested.
“We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”
@sorteddan Congrats mate. I enjoyed it as well and the Frozen Wilds is a decent DLC. NG+ can be completed fairly quickly even on Ultra Hard so don't be put off if you're worried about it.
A gem cannot be polished without friction, nor a man perfected without trials. – Seneca
@sorteddan nice start to the year there bud… and totally agree, it’s a great game. The sequel seems to be particularly divisive but I really liked it. Something to add to the backlog if you haven’t done already 👍
@The_Moose
Thanks. No wasn't so much worried about the requirements, except for the time commitment. I've spent quite a lot of time in the last few days attempting to get it finished and think I could do with some time away to play other things first.
@colonelkilgore
Cheers pal. But no, I'm currently trying to avoid adding to the backlog! Will keep in in mind for future consideration through.
“We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”
@jdv95 congrats buddy, that’s a pretty good return on a series in which the plats can be both tricky and arduous. As someone who has only played one of them but plan on playing through them all eventually, which ones did you play and what were the plat blockers on the ones you didn’t?
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