Topic: Push Square Game Club Spooktacular: Resident Evil 4

@R1spam The random targets and Alerts that pop up can largely be ignored unless you want to grind or are just enjoying the combat. They are not essential. I did a few of those from time to time when the target popped up nearby or close to a fast travel point. Otherwise, it’s probably better to stick with the actual missions. I did all the side missions and most of them are worth it in my opinion. Of course I loved the game and platinum’d it, so if you’re not loving it then maybe you can skip side missions but I recommend doing them.

The Board Countermeasures are useful and will need to be done for some of the trophies. However, if you don’t like any of the ones offered, you can accept one and then immediately discard it and the game will randomly generate another one. Some of them are really hard to complete because it will tell you to, say, kill a certain rare enemy with a certain gun form or in a certain way and it’s just a pain and will take forever to find one of those enemies. I usually accepted the board countermeasures that would be easy to come by in the natural course of playing through the missions. But you will need to do a certain number of them for a trophy, if memory serves and it’s best to be gradually doing them early on and throughout the story in a natural way so as to avoid a grind at the end. You also get decent rewards sometimes for completing them.

As far as Expeditions, when you get that far there will be a place you can go to engage in optional “Expeditions”. I tried some of those but they are pretty tough and not linked to any trophies and are completely optional, if I recall correctly. I spent a decent amount of time working on them, but really it’s not essential so you can ignore those too and go back to them later if you want. With the main game and all side quests and the two DLC’s, you’ll have plenty to keep you busy.

Edit: Sorry, I checked and I forgot there is a trophy for doing Alerts. A bronze for doing 1 Alert and a silver for doing 5 Alerts. I forgot about that. It’s fairly easy to knock out 5 of them without too much effort in the course of the game.

@R1spam I’ve been making some good progress. Having already played it through once I had a good idea of what to expect but things seem to be coming round faster than I thought they would. I’ve been largely ignoring the optional missions for now so perhaps that’s got something to do with it.

They style of the game never fails to impress though. There were a few areas I went into tonight that properly mess with your mind. The map is also making my head hurt but not in a good way.

@render Yeah, you bring up a couple good points —

The audio especially is really disturbing in some parts. The chanting and nonsensical rambling is just so creepy. The whole thing does kinda mess with your mind.

And secondly, the map. Of course you know this but PSA to everyone whose playing for the first time — the map might make you more confused. You can try to use it but don’t expect it to be all that clear to help you know where to go. It’s easier to follow the in-game signs throughout The Oldest House. They will point you which way to go to get from one department to the next, just like you’re really in a big office building.

@Th3solution The map legitimately meant I got lost for several hours. It’s just objectively dreadful and a shame given how good a lot of the game is!

I never had many problems with the map but I think I was expecting much worse after it was such a complaint of the game (and after the mess of the map in Jedi: Fallen Order too).

There are enough signs around to help guide you though.

@Th3solution that's a really helpful breakdown, thanks!!! I have only done three side missions but they seem to be really important for unlocking things so will keep bashing away at them. I'm not normally a trophy hunter but I'll have to try a couple of board countermeasures out as I've not done any yet.

Similar to others I've found the map tricky but the signs more straightforward. Worth noting that when you bring up the map button inputs still work. I managed to dash off a ledge last night while looking at the map 🙈

@R1spam haha nice, yeah I'm looking forward to it!

@R1spam Yep forget that every time 😆

I've played a bit of Control over the last few days. I am not really into the meat and potatoes of it yet. I've played a couple hours and I've got the gun and a telekinesis power so far.

My initial thoughts:

I am a bit gutted to play this on base PS4 instead of the mid gen upgrade One X. The graphics are noticeably poorer than Quantum Break. I am 99% sure it's because of the difference in hardware though as I think QB might have been outputting at 4K whereas this isn't on a base PS4. The graphics are still good but everything just looks a lot smoother than QB.

I've not experienced any glitches or frame lags yet but I am not that far into it.

So far, this seems like the scariest Remedy game I've played. It's scarier than both Alan Wake, American Nightmare and QB which weren't really scary. I think I can just be more scared of the weirdness of this game. The muffled voices, the static and distortion that gets louder, the blinding lights and the lack of light etc. It all creates a very uncomfortable atmosphere which can be quite frightening.

I like the general style of the story. It's somewhere between X-Files, Fringe and Twin Peaks. I guess the uncomfortable jilted conversations could be unintentional but I am leaning towards them being intentional because of the Twin Peaks vibe that it gives it and how that gels with the rest of the story.

But yeah, generally just weird and it's very successful in accomplishing that! Good game so far!

@ralphdibny I found it took a little bit of time for me to really find it a great game as it feels pretty limited when you start out with the base gun and no abilities, plus it's quite a confusing story that takes a while for you to get your head round. That said, the story thing makes sense as Jesse has no idea of what's going on either.

Jesse's acting can feel a little wooden at times but, again, I thought this actually suited her character the more you learn about her and it's actually quite nice to have a bit more of an understated performance.

@Thrillho oh for sure! Both things you mentioned, the acting (or indeed the direction and editing of the acting) and the being thrown into the deep end of the story really add to the Twin Peaks feel of it. It's almost like it's so bad that it's genius. Like it's brilliant performances that are juxtaposed in this kind of idiosyncratic way that makes it look odd and awkward. But it's one of the things that made Twin Peaks so fascinating to watch.

Im sure I'm not going to understand everything in this game anyway! I understood the broad strokes of Quantum Break but even the timey wimey stuff made my brain melt a bit. I just don't have the head space and physical time to look into every detail closely at the moment but I'm sure I'll enjoy it just as much as the previous 3 Remedy games I've played!

@ralphdibny The story starts to make sense and I don't remember many big reveals but there are just lots of little moments where things suddenly make sense. Plus, there's plenty of stuff that never gets explained but that also works in the context of the fact that they're researching stuff they have no clue about.

I seem to have blitzed through this game this time round. I’m sure it took me a lot longer on my first play through but I guess where I have a pretty good idea what’s going to happen I’m ready for the action.

I just love the characters and the world created by Remedy and even though it’s all happening in the same building it does feel limited in scope. One of my favourite characters is Langston. He’s totally non phased by everything and just seems like a regular guy who’s turned up for work at the office.

@ralphdibny I played this on base PS4 first time round and I’m finding the experience on PS5 a lot better. I’m using performance mode so having 60fps is great. I quite like the look of it though, they’ve hit that brutalist look bang on. Just wait until you get some more abilities and but the ashtray maze. You are going to love it 😁

@ralphdibny I'm completely with you on the twin peaks meets xfiles vibe! I played Alan wake on the 360 a couple of years ago and for me, it had serious twin peaks vibes. Clearly the folks at remedy are fans. Theres definitely an Wrea of this game that gives me Alan Wake vibes. I still wouldn't say this game is full on scary, but there have definitely been moments where like you, I've felt uncomfortable about going into an area because of the chanting/static. I've been playing on ps5 and you get the haptic pulse with footsteps that somehow make that tension even worse! I tried Ray tracing at 30 fps and performance at 60 fps and while the reflections are really nice, performance is the way to go.

From a gameplay perspective, I would agree with Thrillho that once you start to unlock some abilities and different weapon forms along with mods you can start to be a bit more creative. I'm actually going to take a break from the main story to do a few more side missions so I can change my playstyle from using hanging back, dashing and sniping to using shields/shotgun and see if I like that. I've mostly found the difficulty pretty fair, though one boss kicked my ass a few times before I figured out what was going on Salvador, when I threw a rocket at him after I broke his shield . The mechanic of losing some shards on death gives you some meaning to encounters but it's not so punishing to discourage you from experimenting in encounters.

I haven't done lots of side missions yet (5) but they have on the whole been very rewarding with new abilities and one with a fantastic boss fight. Definitely worth digging into a bit more.

@Thrillho I feel like I'm quite far in the story and while I have a grasp of what's going in the game, there's definitely a fair bit of mystery still! I just finished the Finnish Tango mission and have no clue what's going on with the janitor yet. . I've been making a really concerted effort to collect all the collectibles I can as they really help add flavour to what's going on. They seem pretty numerous though, I popped a gold trophy for collecting 120 items a couple of missions ago and still seem to be finding plenty.

Lastly, I think I found one of the quests that trigger the dlc. From people who have played the dlc, is that best left to the end of the main game?

@render haha I like him too, "I did a steady 40 hrs a week for 10 years and here I am" should be something I have on a coffee mug for work 😂

@R1spam Ha ha yeah I’m getting that if there’s ever one available. The DLC is actually harder than the main missions and I’ve found that this time round as well. I did go off on the AWE branch for a while, which is the one about Bright Falls and Alan Wake but I got my ass handed to me on the final bit so ditched that to go back to it later.

I’ve just rolled the credits on the main story so definitely flown through it this time but flippin loved every minute of it. Going to carry on and polish off the DLC etc because well why the hell not 😆

@R1spam Yeah, I’m my opinion the DLC (especially their respective bosses) are amongst the hardest in the game. I would recommend saving the AWE until late game (like maybe in the latter half or just before the final stretch) and save The Foundation until post-game. Narratively The Foundation works better at the end anyways. The downside to waiting is that the new weapons and abilities you get from the DLC won’t get to be used until just end, but honestly although I like the variety they added to the gameplay, I didn’t think they were any better than the standard weapons and skills you are given in the base game.

@R1spam I played the AWE DLC as it unlocked (not realising that’s what it was) and did fine on it. I can’t remember the boss being that difficult to be honest.

But you do get a brilliant ability during the early part which makes combat in the main game much easier and the grenade launcher weapon was one of my most used ones in the rest of the game too.

The Foundation DLC is only accessible post game as it carries on the story from there.

@Th3solution @Thrilho cheers for the tips! Will veer off and do the AWE stuff as I think I'm pretty far on just got the cassette player to help get through the ashtray maze . I loved the atmosphere in Alan Wake, I'm hoping Barry makes an appearance!

@render nice one, I'll look forward to it!

I'll also look forward to meeting this Langston you speak of. So far I've only met the main character and a blonde woman. Oh yeah and a cleaner. And the original director I suppose.

@R1spam oh sweet, that haptic pulse sounds awesome!!

I had to add Fringe to my crossover of styles because while it is just more of a bonkers X files, the variety of things they investigate in Fringe match Control a bit better. Whereas X files is like aliens aliens aliens, native American myth, aliens aliens aliens, chupacabra, aliens aliens aliens, fluke man, aliens aliens aliens lol. (I say that lovingly toward X files as I do actually love the show!)

I am looking forward to the Alan Wake DLC I guess though! It will cap off this playthrough of Remedy games that I've been doing over the last 6 months or so quite nicely I think.