Could always get the PS1 original @RogerRoger on PS3 for £3.99. No horrible tactics there and nearly ten times less then what I paid for the disc version at launch lol
Again it's a shame because otherwise I'd wholeheartedly recommend Crash Team Racing: Nitro Fueled to everyone. It's a really good racer mired by awful practises
After being away for much of July, I finally finished Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night. Prior to release I was quite concerned this could turn out to be another Mighty No. 9. Thankfully , it isn't. In completing this I explored 100% of the castle and also defeated all the bosses. To me, hitting that statistic and collecting all upgrades is one of the most satisfying aspects of a game in the genre.
Ignore the Bloodstained part of the title, for all intents and purposes Ritual of the Night is a Castlevania game. It looks like one, the menus and UI are organised like one, the combat is gloriously the same and it even sounds like one. This should come as no surprise given it is helmed by Koji Igariashi, the man responsible for the majority of post-Symphony of the Night Castlevania games. He's a master of the genre and Bloodstained is absolutely expertly crafted. I'd agree with @Ralizah that it sticks to a formula that in some ways seems quaint by the modern standards of the genre (it has been a decade since Order of Ecclesia), but to me this is no criticism. It's comfy, like a well fitted woolly mitten, and I love the gameplay loop. Therefore, it doesn't miss the puzzles or complex platforming of more recent Metroidvania games. For this reason it would also make a good entry point for gamers wishing to get into the genre.
Bloodstained's basic gameplay loop sees you explore a massive sprawling castle, gradually unlocking more abilities which in turn allows you to explore even further. There are also RPG elements; it's stat based, there're various weapons armour and accessories to equip (all with a range of effects), and you level up through defeating enemies and gaining experience.
The game sees you play as Miriam, a plucky "shardbinder" who, as the name would aptly suggest, binds with shards. What are these shards you ask? Why, they're the essence of demonic power, and thus by collecting these Miriam gets more and more powerful with access to a greater range of abilities. There are several different categories of shard depending on what they do, ranging from those that throw weapons at enemies, to ones that augment stats, to summons and so on. In turn, the more of a shard you obtain the more powerful its effect becomes. The augment shards are quite interesting because once fully "ranked up" at the friendly neighbourhood shop (yes, it required all kinds of monster loot), they become permanent skills, whether equipped or not.
The story does what it needs to in order to advance the game. Voice acting is pretty bad, with some interesting English accents. This isn't a negative - it's all part of the charm.
Positives!
The game sounds incredible, courtesy of Michiru Yamane's brilliant score. Her work is always impeccable and doesn't disappoint here. Bloodstained also looks rather attractive, with nicely varied locations. Whatever was done during the production delay clearly paid off.
Combat is tight and Miriam controls exceedingly well. This is crucial in this type of game, so yay there.
Strong level design and (for the most part, see below) progression. Exploring more and more of the sprawling castle is satisfying.
I found it great fun to upgrade Miriam through permanent food bonuses and levelling up "Shards". This is the most effective way to increase Miriam's stats. By the end of the game my Miriam was überpowerful and that is awesome.
The difficulty is quite nicely pitched with a good upward curve. Early boss battles can be brutal and require the player to take their time, but it's certainly considerably easier than Order of Ecclesia.
A perfect length, Ritual of the Night doesn't outstay its welcome.
Negatives!
Underwater movement and swimming is horrible. Thankfully swimming is quite quickly done away with, and you later gain access to optional movement shards that offset the sluggishness somewhat.
One downside of the game's traditional design is that progression through the castle and even moving past a key boss fight is at times rather opaque. For example, at one point you must equip a piece of armour that allow you to progress through an area, but the armour is located in a chest in a long-since explored portion of the map - with no real hints. It's a pretty old-school "go to spots of the map you haven't before!" design.
At times buggy and there are severe frame rate drops in two very specific locations.
Pretty dull side-quests. A gluttonous old hag named Susie will try your patience, trust me.
In all, Ritual of the Night has been one of my favourite gaming experiences this year. It's not quite as sublime as last year's 8-bit style Curse of the Moon, but nevertheless it's a well-made and expertly crafted game that anyone with a passing interest in the genre should play. So go play it people!
Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc on PC. It's the first game of the series. It's a visual novel involving a bunch of students trapped inside a school, who are told that they will have to kill each other if they want to escape. Overall, it's an excellent game and I really enjoyed my time with it. The characters along with the story is what makes the game so good.
Completion status: Reached the end credits. There's plenty of achievements I've missed, mainly to do with building friendships with everyone. It could be fun to listen to those friendship dialogues, but could also be time-consuming to get, so I'll wait a few days then decide whether or not to bother with them.
Pros:
Characters: There's a large number of characters introduced at the start of the game, and they're mostly all rather interesting and well developed. Each of the characters feels distinct and unique, ranging from the goofballs to the more serious people. The only one I didn't like was Hifumi, the irritating guy who was always going on about how 2D girls are better even when more important things were happening.
Monokuma, the weird looking bear that keeps the game of life and death running smoothly. Its silly nature helps take the edge off of what would otherwise be very dark moments. The banter with Monokuma helps liven up the situation, and the Momokuma Theatre clips are quite amusing to watch.
Story: Without going into too much detail, it's well written and remains interesting all throughout. There's plenty of twists and turns while trying to figure out the mysteries of the game.
Class trials: Feels like playing a much chaotic and intense version of Ace Attorney. Trying to figure out the contradictions in the statements is easily the best part of the class trials, but there's also other minigames to help mix things up.
Cons:
Lack of story choices: There's not many choices in the game that affects what happens. More decisions that could potentially affect who lives and who dies would have made the game even better. However, I will accept that a focus on one excellent story is better than them doing multiple merely good stories.
Class trial hints: After cycling through what people have to say, the playable character's thoughts at the end generally make it far too obvious what the hidden contradiction is (playing on medium difficulty).
As for the ending, I'm not sure what to think of it. I was expecting the reason for the killing game taking place was something inexplicably related to stopping a mysterious tragedy, but instead there was a much simpler explanation involving a despair fetish. Still can't decide whether I love that reasoning or dislike it. That bit at the very end of the last trial involving shooting Hope Truth Bullets was also a lovely moment. I'm also curious about whether or not anything actually did happen to the outside world, but that mystery will wait until whenever I get around to playing Danganronpa 2.
Overall, it was a most enjoyable game, and I'll be sure to eventually get round to playing Danganronpa 2.
@crimsontadpoles The sequels are better. DR2's cast is the best in the series, it does a fantastic job with the world-building that the first game lacked, and the trials are far more clever and intricate than pretty much anything in the original. Ultra Despair Girls is something entirely different, but it's a welcome addition to the series lore-wise, and it does a great job of fleshing out Toko's character (wasn't as big a fan of her in the first game). V3 is controversial, but I definitely feel like it has some of the best trials in the entire series, and the writing is brilliant.
@RogerRoger Great write up on inFamous. It's always been one of my favorite PS exclusives, moreso than some of the actual best titles in the lineup.
For me, it's one of those games where the gameplay supercedes everything else. I have a huge blast of a time that it's easy to forget about the niggles it has. It's story isn't groundbreaking, but it's a perfect superhero origin. The graphics and animation aren't the best either, and the game itself can get pretty tough at times. But playing with Cole's powers is just too fun to drag it down for me. It certainly helped that at the time of it's release, the only other superhero game of high quality was Batman Arkham Asylum, so it also added more to a genre that needed quality.
Hopefully you enjoy inFAMOUS 2 when you get around to it. It improved quite a bit on the original.
"We don't get to choose how we start in this life. Real 'greatness' is what you do with the hand you're dealt." -Victor Sullivan "Building the future and keeping the past alive are one and the same thing." -Solid Snake
@Ralizah fantastic post, you articulate so well what I think about the game. I think the cauldrons in the game (bar one) were brilliant, the best dungeons in any game I've played. If human combat had been better (let's queue up to wander over to this murder bush), melee had more heft/diversity and the illusion of choice that sits over decisions about whether you deal things emotionally etc replaced with impact in the sequel then it could be AMAZING!!
@RogerRoger Great post, and a well thought out and interesting commentary! I waited until the end of my work day when I would have time to really read the fullness of your impressions and they didn’t disappoint. And how did I know you’d play the hero role 😄?
I can agree with all of your views on the game, I think. The narrative is good, but not particularly tight (as you point out - the dissonance of moral choices, lack of logic behind NPC character actions, etc) The presentation is fun with the comic style, but a little disjointed. And the same could be said of some of the gameplay mechanics. But the game is just plain enjoyable. It’s one of those “greater than a sum of its parts” type of game experience.
Infamous 2 will improve on this with a better world and gameplay is a little more refined, as I recall (hopefully less of your accidental slaying of innocents for example) and then even better in the Second Son games. But yes, more of the same however. I think if you enjoyed this one, you’ll still enjoy the others. Likely even more so.
The question is, will you dare try an Evil Cole playthrough? 😛
I think I know the answer to that.
School Girl Zombie Hunter (PS4) - A mission based TPS that sees a group of 5 high school girls fighting for their survival once zombies overrun their high school.
Pros:
While a bit janky (it's a budget title), the gameplay is generally fun, with the guns being fun to shoot, especially since you can dismember the zombies.
Ally AI is actually pretty good considering the budget. They generally stay near you, so no wandering off by themselves to get killed, and shoot anything that moves. The only downside to this are base defense missions with a collectable off the beaten path, as they will follow you away from the base leaving it defenseless when you go for the collectable. This only happens once or twice though.
There are a decent amount of unlockables, such as outfits that can be hidden in a level, or Charons (bird zombies) strewn about that unlock hair & underwear colors, and the most powerful rocket launchers, if you kill enough of them. Then there are the numerous varieties of the six weapon types regularly dropped by enemies (though I tended to pick options I liked relatively early on and didn't mix it up).
I really mostly really enjoyed the schlocly B-Movie vibe it had going on (including the cheesy rock theme song), even if it could have used some more environmental variety.
Neutral:
Although the weapons all feel good to use, ultimately things tend to get so busy that I tended to only use shotguns, and ocassionally a rocket launcher to get me out of a pinch (other than the sniping specific sub-missions).
Each of the 5 girls has a special ability, and while Akiha's (who can indefinitely revive fallen allies, at half health, using no items) and Mayaya's (who reveals the locations of all a level's key & hidden items) are really useful, the various combat buffs the other girls' abilities involve aren't nearly as useful, IMO.
Being a budget title, the characters are a bit wooden, but generally all have a character arc that shows how they've grown.
It's a fanservice game, so take that how you will. It's not as over the top as something like Senran Kagura (especially in terms of design), but you can dress the girls up in outfits like swimsuits & nurse uniforms, clothes take damage as you get hit, and as a last resort move you can strip down to your underwear to temporarily distract the zombies.
Negative:
Difficulty is all over the place. Sub-missions not withstanding, there is a huge difficulty spike around the end of chapter two/the start of chapter three (missions are suddenly filled with very aggressive, infinitely spawning zombies that make routine point A-B missions and card key missions highly annoying, especially considering you're on the clock & they spawn as fast, if not faster, than you can kill them), it was almost enough to make me quit the game outright, however that huge spike is gone as fast as it came, and later missions become much more manageable once again (the only time infinitely spawning enemies appear in the main story again are in survival & base defense missions, which are much more manageable since you can stand your ground & fight). Not only this, but boss missions (first introduced in Chapter 3), with the exception of the final boss, are much EASIER than anything else in the game.
It does drop frames ocassionally, I think once or twice into single digits. Not often or long enough to hugely impact the game, but it is a noticeable mar.
From a story perspective there's no "how", or even "who" or "why". Relatively early on it's revealed that an intelligent zombie named Ren is causing the infestation using a science facility below the school, but other than stopping him, the story doesn't go any deeper (no explaination as to who Ren is for example). A deep story is probably not the biggest equation that goes into a game about high school girls fighting zombies, but a weak link it is.
Overall a pretty average experience, but there's just something that draws me to these B grade experiences from time to time.
@Ralizah, sorry for aping your write-up format. It just seems so useful.
Currently Playing:
Switch - Blade Strangers
PS4 - Kingdom Hearts III, Tetris Effect (VR)
Two games this time, since I don't have too much to say about either of them.
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Mutant Mudds
Platform: Nintendo Switch
Completion Status: 100%. All levels completed normally, including the moon and ghost levels. All hidden retro levels completed, both of the normal variety and the more hidden ones only reachable with the overpowered "Grannie" character. All hidden character skins found. Only took a little over five hours to do all of this.
Description: A comet falls from the sky and mud monsters take over... or something. Aside from a cutscene near the beginning that's less than 30 seconds long, there's no story here. You play a kid with a hoverpack and a gun that shoots bullets of water. Otherwise, it plays like a normal platformer: you shoot enemies, navigate across the stages, collect gems or something and try to get to the goal at the end of the level. Hidden levels are themed after older systems such as the Game Boy and Virtual Boy, which render levels in grey or red and black, respectively.
This was originally released in 2012 on the 3DS, where I originally played it, but it was soon ported to every other imaginable platform. Now that includes the Switch.
Likes:
Simple, mildly challenging gameplay that's reflexively enjoyable for me.
Vibrant color scheme.
Controls are tight.
Pretty much the definition of a "pick up and play" experience. You can mix and match sessions of this with almost anything else without getting your cognitive wires crossed (kind of the opposite of playing two complex RPGs at once, I would say).
I like the twist on traditional gameplay in the ghost levels. Unlike normal, you can't just kill enemies and then progress through stages in a carefree manner. Enemies are immune to your attacks and, with only a few exceptions, you never get the right ammunition to kill them, so you're attempting to platform while also avoiding enemies. When you do get ammo that can hurt them, it'd often only enough to kill baddies that are unavoidable in certain sections and, even then, they respawn a few seconds after killing them.
Dislikes:
It's the video game equivalent of junk food. You gobble it down, often too fast, and enjoy the activity enough while you're in the midst of it, but, afterward, there's little to remember. It's hard to even remember anything about this game. There's no real story, the music is forgettable, everything is just sort of designed to be mildly pleasant and passable and absolutely nothing more.
There's very little variation in-between different worlds or characters.
The game was originally released on Nintendo 3DS, and you can tell, because a lot of the levels have you navigating between various layers of the screen. On the 3DS, each layer had its own visual depth, allowing you to tell which enemies were on which layer of the screen even when they overlapped, but here, without the aid of the stereoscopic 3D effect, screens often become cluttered and confused and it's difficult to tell which layer of the level enemies are operating on.
Conclusion: Decent, but mostly forgettable little game. It does very little wrong, but, at the same time, its lack of ambition or ingenuity makes it difficult to recommend to people unless there's a deep sale (which is actually the reason I repurchased this).
Verdict 6/10
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BoxBoy!
Platform: Nintendo 3DS
Completion Status: Finished the main story levels and most of the optional score attack and timed levels. Didn't quite complete all of the optional post-game worlds, though. Spent 11 hours playing it.
Description: You're a boy who is also a box. You're eventually followed by other silent box people. You complete levels by manipulating the main character's abilities to spawn more boxes out of his body.
Likes:
Despite the limited number of mechanics and simplistic controls, there's a surprising amount of stuff you can actually do with them. When the game eventually becomes challenging in the post-game, it can be interesting to experiment and see just how wild your solutions need to be to complete a level while collecting all of the crowns (the currency in this game).
You can use the optional crowns you collect in each level unlock outfits, music tracks, and optional challenge levels, which is nice, I guess.
There seems to be a decent amount of content in the game. Despite the levels themselves being short, they eventually feel longer just because of the sheer brainwork that goes into figuring out what to do in them.
Mixed:
Most of the game feels like an extended tutorial, because each of the story worlds introduces you to a new mechanic (or a new twist on a previously introduced mechanic), and, as such, the level design primarily revolves around learning to manipulate these mechanics.
Dislikes:
I have no issue with visual minimalism, but this game is... too basic. The game's color scheme is monochrome. There's no texturing or detail to any of the characters or levels. It's pretty much just a step above ASCII art. While it's very clean looking, it's also pretty bland.
No stereoscopic 3D. I hate this. It's not like the developers needed to disable the 3D because the game needed to use as much of the system's resources as possible.
The minimalism extends to the use of sound and music as well. I can't even remember any of the aural components of this game. They're apparently purely functional and nothing else.
There's no story, or context for anything that happens, which makes it difficult to care about completing the game.
The game gives you nothing for completing optional challenges, which makes them feel kind of pointless.
There's a mechanic where you can extend boxes away from yourself and then contract your character to the point where your line of boxes extends. There's also a mechanic where you can 'break away' your extended box body and use the shape it makes to help you when you're platforming. But, oftentimes, it would break off instead of allowing me to contract, and I feel like the game never clearly explained the rules governing this behavior.
Conclusion: The puzzle aspect of this puzzle game is solid, I guess, but everything around it is so plain that it's hard to maintain interest.
Interesting games you've reviewed @Ralizah . I've heard a lot of people praise the Boxboy! game series. Isn't it by one of the nintendo companies? S'not Game Freak or Monolith... Ummm Hal laboratories or whatever they're called?
Never heard of Mutant Mudds before though!
Shame both of them are dissapointingly...
I'd actually scrolled down to the bottom of the page waiting for it to load and when it eventually did I saw the 5.5 score and I thought it was what you'd given DDS at first! 😅
@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy Yeah, the BoxBoy! games are developed by HAL Laboratories. And... I can see why someone would like them. They might find the incredibly simple presentation to be charming. I didn't, really. The puzzles aren't bad, but, at the same time, I can't really say I had fun with it in the same way I enjoy the puzzles in games like Professor Layton and the Curious Village, The Witness, Picross, etc. There's no story, almost no music, no incentive to complete side content. If this was made by an indie, it would already be forgotten.
No worries. While my feelings on DDS are mixed, it's certainly better than BoxBoy! I just beat the second form of Beezlebub, by the way. That was an incredibly tough fight.
Mutant Mudds is an example of a game that I like, but I also can't pretend is great. It's not. It's average, and it was better on 3DS, where the layering effect looked pretty good in action.
Considering I've fought the superboss I know your pain @Ralizah... plus even more! 😂
I think i've actually seen the character Max from Mutant Mudds upon giving it a look. But I have no idea where I've actually seen them before either.
And I can see what you mean about Boxboy!. I suppose the simplicity in the design is to make it rather easily accessible to anyone... but... There could be a bit of colour at least. Shame about no catchy music either or the lack of rewards from challenges other then the satisfaction of beating them.
Least beating the aforementioned bonus boss got me an OP ring I never used.
One try being about forty minutes before a cheap hit knocked me out. He's so OP. 😂
The super boss in DDS2 ( Satan ) is apparently just as fun!
It's really neat though that the random encounter music from Nocturne plays during the fight, like he doesn't even acknowledge you as a challenege. You're just some random fight that occurs as if he's just grinding for exp or something
Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3: the Black Order (Switch).
Pros:
The core beat 'em up gameplay is easy to pick up and grasp, but it can be satisfyingly challenging at points. Even against groups of regular enemies there are more powerful variants than can pack a punch if you're not careful so you can't just mindlessly punch around, and the numerous boss fights demand your attention & on more than one occasion I had to abandon the story for a bit to grind up in the Infinity Trials when I was stuck on a boss.
Between fights with large groups of enemies, platforming/chase segments, light puzzle elements, and the numerous boss encounters (many of which have a special gimmick, such as an early encounter where you have to solidify Sandman with rounds from a turret before you can hurt him), objectives are varied enough to keep the action from getting stale.
From levelling up individual characters, as well as their abilities, the party wide skill tree, and ISO-8 equipping (stat altering stones), there are lots of ways to power up your heroes. These elements are introduced one at a time though, so they're easy to take in. Good thing too, as you'll need to be conscious of all of them in the later game.
If there were any performance issues, I didn't notice them. Seemed to run great from my perspective.
I haven't explored these too deeply, but you have the quickfire challenge based missions of the Infinity Trials if you're really up for a challenge. They're usually remixed boss fights, though there are missions where you have to fight through waves of enemies with special rules in place as well.
It has an extensive concept art gallery, and I love features like that.
Neutral:
There are tons of characters to play as (and many do have their own feel), however you're essentially stuck with a core group during a single playthrough as it's impossible to stay reasonably levelled otherwise.
I like the story well enough, and it has a neat twist at the end, but there are so many characters on offer that not many get much to say. There are even some (like lets say Ghost Rider) that I don't think get any airtime after the mission they're introduced in.
While I do like the cell shaded style that I think works well with the source material & think it has a good amount of environmental variety, it's definitely not one of Switch's prettier titles. I'd even say that Hyrule Warriors: DE & Fire Emblem Warriors (all developed by the same company, with lots of enemies on screen) look better.
It probably would be better playing it with others. I didn't have a particularly tough time playing it solo & enjoyed it (and I played on Mighty, so I didn't go the easiest route), but the ally AI tended to bum rush all the bosses, even the ones with a gimmick for you to exploit, which isn't ideal.
Negative:
For whatever reason, whenever you're moving towards the camera your character stops running and only walks. Naturally, this is a bit unavoidable as you're often trying to run around combat arenas, so it's a bit annoying. Luckily you still jump, swing, and fly at full speed when moving towards the camera, so it quickly becomes second nature to do so if you need to move quickly in that direction.
The only alternate costumes to unlock are pallet swaps, and even then I think it's just one per character. Of course, I'm not expecting it to be on par with the bounty of options available in PS4's Spider-Man (which only has to focus on one character), but it would have been nice to have at least one or two real options per character.
Overall it's a pretty solid effort. It's not going to win any awards, and it's noticeably not even one of Nintendo's top tier efforts on the system, but if you enjoy beat 'em ups or the Marvel universe it's definitely worth a look.
Currently Playing:
Switch - Blade Strangers
PS4 - Kingdom Hearts III, Tetris Effect (VR)
@RR529 Does it connect with the previous UA games story wise? I know by name and game play it does but unless it connects story wise with the first 2 I probably will pass it up. I know UA and UA2 the story's connected with what happened at the end of the first one being the reason for 2. This one however I can't really tell.
RetiredPush Square Moderator and all around retro gamer.
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