Topic: Games you've recently beat

@mookysam Allow me to add my praise for your Spider-Man review. Just remember, Spidey doesn't kill the thugs he's thrown from atop a skyscraper; the fall does!

welcome to a Legend of Zelda game

@FullbringIchigo How they've managed to build a franchise out of this kinda thing, I'll never know. Each to their own and all that, but even I was having difficulty uttering the sentence "I can see where you're coming from" when discussing it with my partner afterwards.

Speaking of games I wanted to abandon / have abandoned... @crimsontadpoles Apologies, I missed your review of Half-Life up there; great write-up! I tried playing the PS2 port once; made it about forty minutes in before I traded it back to the store. Were you playing on PC, perchance? Because I know the game is kinda one of those "big deal" games and should therefore give it another chance at some point.

@RogerRoger part of the fun is figuring it all out for your self, nothing feels better than getting through a dungeon by your own skills

the back and forth can be kind annoying though

... Scathing or what @RogerRoger ?

I've only played two Legend Of Zelda games myself. Twilight Princess on Wii and Phantom Hourglass on DS. I found them both pretty enjoyable. Phantom H less so then Twilight P.

I do quite like dungeon crawlers myself but it seems that the simplicity of this title originally being a gameboy game and the remake adding only a few quality of life improvements seem to hinder it.

I'll admit I've thought the artstyle of Link's Awkening is a bit ugly to me to be honest. The plastic asthetic makes it look... cheap almost and just off. 😅

I enjoyed reading your write up and glad your partner enjoyed it... shame you didn't though!

And @crimsontadpoles nice to hear about Half-Life. I've only ever heard how HL 2 is god's gift to gaming so even if it's about the first one instead it's nice to hear a more grounded review of it!

Glad you enjoyed Danganronpa as well!

@RogerRoger Yeah, I was playing the PC version of Half-Life. I'm not sure how it compares to the PS2 port though. The game does gets better later on when the fights get more intense, but if you weren't keen on the PS2 version then possibly the game just isn't for you.

Those reasons are why I'm not too keen on the 2D Zelda games. They're alright, but I don't find them to be as amazing as they're made out to be. On the other hand, I love the 3D Zelda games. Those complaints are still valid to the 3D games to some degree, but not as much.

@crimsontadpoles Half Life 2 is amazing. I was fairly new to the genre when I played it as part of The Orange Box (BioShock was the only post-N64 shooter I'd played at that point) and absolutely loved it. The level design is spot on, the weapons handle brilliantly and then there's the gravity gun. Hope you get to it and the episodes one day.

@RogerRoger Thanks and I'll remember that next time I'm on a rooftop. 😂 Definitely not a Zelda person then? They're all things I enjoy about the games and I guess are core ingredients of what makes "Zelda" Zelda. Your scathing assessment did make me chuckle. Glad your partner's enjoyment made it worth it though.

@RogerRoger It's funny that you call the menu and item management "cumbersome" in the remake, because I think the OG Game Boy version would have killed you. They removed probably 90% of the tedious pausing and item switching crap that was in the original game, where you only had two buttons to work with.

@RogerRoger Enjoyed your review. I liked this reimagining of the LA and I had little attachment to the original as never actually owned it, just borrowed it. I would agree though that I found the final 2 dungeons far less enjoyable than what had come before. Of course, that is probably more to do with the original design and limitations. I would be interested in your view of other Zelda games, maybe 3D ones.

@FullbringIchigo Given the strength of the franchise, there's no doubt that many find it enjoyable (including @mookysam I see). I guess it just isn't for me. I didn't feel satisfied when I beat a dungeon... more relief that it was over and I could save my progress.

@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy I've seen both Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks in action on my Mum's Nintendo DS and I guess they're the closest to Link's Awakening that I'd ever seen before. I never played them myself, but my Mum seemed to think they were okay. She asked me for help once and I just pointed her towards an IGN guide, so I obviously have this in-built, reflex hatred of dungeon-crawlers!

@crimsontadpoles Ah, fair enough. Thanks for the honest appraisal of Half-Life, then!

And yeah, I didn't mind Breath of the Wild when I played it, probably because it felt like a lot of other 3D open-world sandbox action / adventure games that I've got in my own library. There were still moments of frustration, but none that felt cheap or unfair (although I also recall it having a cumbersome inventory system).

Speaking of which...

@Ralizah My partner was describing the inventory system from the GameBoy original whilst I played. He said that he appreciated that the new version retained that mechanic, to which I responded with a quote from Air Force One, when the President's daughter says "I'm twelve years old, Dad! In the cave man days, I'd be having children of my own by now!" and he replies "That's what we call progress, young lady."

There were two trigger buttons and a D-Pad going completely wasted on my Pro controller. I get that the JoyCons don't have those extra triggers, so okay, but at least give the option for a more modern control scheme with what's on the face; maybe have jump permanently mapped to a button once you unlock it (seriously, unlocking a jump... have you ever heard of anything so ridiculous?!) and then, on the other three, you've got interact, attack (with the option to scroll through available weapons side-to-side on the D-Pad) and use item (again, scrolling up and down on the D-Pad to select what you use). I just came up with that, off the top of my head. How hard was it, Nintendo?!

Obviously, I still have a lot of anger.

@Rudy_Manchego The final dungeon I didn't mind so much, the one with the little ground-laying machines you used to traverse lava? It was the tower-based one, where you often fell back to a lower level, and the one before it. Those just had far, far too much back-and-forth and far too much punishment; far too many rooms crowded with un-killable hazards that attacked the instant you blindly walked through a door. Just because I've got a dozen hearts, a fairy trapped in a jar and a kiss from a prostitute that'll revive me upon death doesn't mean that it's fun to get repeatedly wailed upon, just because I can take it.

I'll ask my partner about any 3D installments he may have. We played Breath of the Wild together, although stopped short of finishing it because I could never master the needlessly-fiddly parry manoeuvre. He might have some of the GameCube or Wii ones.

@RogerRoger

??

The Joycon controllers should have just as many buttons as the Pro controller - triggers included.

Anyway, just the fact that you don't have to pause and equip the power bracelet every time you want to move a rock or a pot would probably make me enjoy this remake significantly more. Also, the game not popping up sllloooooooowwwwww text boxes any time you get near a rock without that stupid bracelet equipped. Based on what I've seen, I think the amount of menu fiddling in this remake would be fine for me, considering you can have more than one thing at a time equipped.

RE: unlocking jumps... you have to keep in mind that pre-BotW Link, despite his adeptness at sword combat, is physically unable to jump. He can kind of roll-hurl himself off of ledges toward other surfaces, but, when it comes to directly defying gravity in an upward direction, he requires the aid of mystical tools to unlock the ability to do so.

@Ralizah Do they? I thought they only had one shoulder button, because they don't look chunky enough for two. My mistake; having only ever used a Pro controller, I'll defer to your expertise!

Might be getting the Switch confused with the PS Vita a little there, too. It's easily done.

And thank you for the brief history lesson on Link's ability (or rather, inability) to jump. I think that helpfully illustrates a couple of my points, about the Zelda franchise and Nintendo in general, so I shall leave it there and continue to enjoy my own catalogue of upwardly-mobile games!

@RogerRoger Whoa whoa whoa - wait a second, that woman was a prostitute? I just thought she was an instagram star. Mind blown...

I’ve just completed Horizon chase turbos Summer Vibes DLC. It took me less than an hour to get all the super trophies. Which given that it took me a month and a half to get the platinum on the base game is really short. The difficulty is also lower than the final few master tournament. It ads one new car with a number of skins and 12 races only one of which is on a new track.

@Ryall Is it fun?

Yes 😀. @Kidfried

I completed the Modern Warfare Remastered campaign yesterday. Speaking as someone who never played it first time around, I can say it still holds up. The levels are well-designed, the characters slightly more well-rounded than your average grunts and the shooting is absolutely rock solid. I know 'Call of Duty game features good shooting mechanics' isn't the type of bang-up-to-date news people visit this site for, but there you go.

I think it was just the sort of game I needed to get me back into the groove, after a bit of a post-Sekiro lull.

@Frigate A remake of MoH Frontline would be amazing. Me and my mate played that game non-stop, I think it was summer 2002. Probably my favourite FPS. Call of Duty World at War went some way to recapturing the feel of Frontline for me.

@Frigate @Gremio108 If either of you have access to a PS3, there's a halfway-decent remastered version of Frontline available for download on that console. It's got a semi-attainable trophy list and implements a modern control scheme alongside the option for "classic" controls.

Celeste

WHAT IS IT?
A precision platformer with controls and gameplay reminiscent of earlier titles such as Super Meat Boy and Slime-San where you play as a depressed young woman named Madeline who is determined to climb to the summit of Mount Celeste, which is filled with mysteries and danger. She meets a variety of eclectic characters on her journey and is forced to confront a dark reflection of herself that manifests as a physical entity on the mountain.

PLATFORM
Nintendo Switch

LEVEL OF COMPLETION
Completed the normal levels for Chapters 1 - 8 and collected all the strawberries. Also unlocked and completed the B-side levels for Chapters 1 - 7 (Chapter 8's B-Side is locked behind an extra set of collectibles that are especially hidden with each level, and, honestly, after spending 25 hours over 4 days playing this, I'm a bit exhausted). Didn't complete the recently released Chapter 9 DLC, which I hear is the most challenging part of the game, but I'll come back to it someday.

GAMEPLAY

The game is organized into a variety of chapters. Each chapter will generally advance the story, and is composed of a long series of primarily single-screen platforming challenges. While the game only requires the player to do the bare minimum to navigate to the end of the level, there are a host of collectibles, hidden and open, to collect along the way. Strawberries, the most prominent collectibles in the game, are objects that you usually have to go out of your way to collect. Normal strawberries also you to collect them however you like, but they usually require the player to complete the platforming challenge they were obtained during before the player is allowed to collect them. If you die immediately after having grabbed a strawberry, you'll have to go back and try for it again. Alternative strawberries include ones that are formed by collecting a certain number of items throughout a room without touching the ground, and one with wings that will fly away if you use your dash ability trying to get to them, forcing the player to rely on normal jumps and platforming mechanics to reach them. Each chapter will also have a crystal heart, which often requires extremely out-of-the-box thinking to obtain, and a B-side cassette, which unlocks a harder and often much longer version of a given level as an optional challenge.

Celeste's controls seem simple at first, but there is a ton of depth to the platforming in this game. Most of it won't be accessible to normal players, although the good news is that most people should be able to beat the game in its default difficulty with just normal jumps and dashes.

PRO:

• I REALLY like how the game tells you how many strawberries are in each section of a chapter, and lets you jump right into that section to collect what you need. It also seems to autosave after successfully collecting a strawberry, which allows the player to jump in and out of stages at will.
• Immediately restarting players at the start of a room when they die during a challenge is central to encouraging them to keep trying at a challenge.
• The best levels in this game integrate level design/exploration/aesthetics/theme to create one compelling whole. The Mirror Temple near the middle of the game stands out in this regard.
• I really like the way the ending changes depending on how many strawberries you've collected. Very cute.
• I was tempted to create a separate section for this observation, since it could be either a pro or a con, depending on the person. The developers of this game seem to have a deep love for Nintendo games, and you'll find design aspects here that reference the Big N's games constantly. Characters jabber in a soft nonsense language reminiscent of Animal Crossing (thankfully, these sounds lack the ear-shredding quality found in another recent Nintendo-inspired indie adventure, Yooka-Laylee). Many of Madeline's abilities recall gameplay from older Nintendo games, be they the Super Metroid-esque wall jump exploit you can perform to conserve stamina, "wave-dashing," or the obviously Cosmic Mario-inspired sequences where Madeline's shadow mirrors her movements and kills her if she catches up.

CON:

• Crystal Heart locations are often unintuitive. The one in the second or third chapter (I forget) has you dashing upward by phasing back and forth between screen transitions. It's a clever design choice, but the problem is I don't recall the game ever making a point of introducing this aspect of the design in any way, which makes it feel less like a collectible and more like an Easter Egg. Except late game content is hidden until you obtain these collectibles.
• I don't like the level design in the B-sides. It's reminiscent of a lot of Super Mario Maker levels I've played insofar as they rely on repeatedly pulling off a certain series of platforming moves in exactly the same way in a sequence until you clear a room. Like many Mario Maker levels, these platforming moves are forced by covering nearly every inch of the screen that you're not supposed to touch in instakill spikes. It's incredibly uncreative and lazy.
• More broadly, there are too many levels, even in the main part of the game, where there's little to no design openness. More often than not, there's only one correct way to clear a challenge, and it even requires identical timing with the jumps and whatnot.
• This might seem like a weird criticism, but the way platforms are oriented within levels in this game often feel very inorganic and abstract, as if they were designed for a video game and nothing else. Compare to a game like DKC: Tropical Freeze, where every level element feels like it belongs within that environment, and elements work together to create a coherent environmental picture.
• Celeste sometimes teaches game mechanics passively through good level design, but oftentimes it leaves the exact operations of things a complete mystery. The game really doesn't explain its stamina system, for example, and good luck consistently triggering high jumps on springs and bouncy clouds until you figure out the timing that the game gives you no idea about.

STORY/CHARACTERS

Celeste is marginally more engaging than games with similar mechanics and challenges due to how the game structures the levels in such a way that you feel like you're going on an adventure, as opposed to just trying to go from left to right in linear stages. Part of this is due to the light narrative focus. The best stages in this game combine a persistent narrative thread with complex, exploratory level design, which helps to develop the context that Madeline's journey up the mountain is a sort of psycho-spiritual odyssey for her. Not every stage is like this, but these sections help to distinguish Celeste from many of its indie game peers.

Plot-wise, a lot of interesting ideas are hinted at or suggested and then promptly abandoned throughout the game. While this is frustrating in some respects, I do like how the developer keeps the game laser-focused on Madeline's subjective experience throughout. Not every game needs to be an epic, or deeply plumb the mysteries and lore of imagined settings; for better or for worse, whatever bizarre contrivances are hinted at throughout, it's just set design for Madeline's journey of personal growth.

There are a number of colorful characters that Madeline meets on her adventure, and they're fun, but mostly underdeveloped, and are typically characterized by one overriding character trait. As mentioned before, the game is focused on Madeline, so the rest of the characters who aren't Madeline (or her double) end up going fairly undeveloped.

ART/CHARACTER DESIGNS/MUSIC

I'm a bit conflicted here. While the game's environments often make wonderful use of color to offer up vibrant backdrops, the pixel art for the characters is horrible. There's no detail to them at all. I obviously don't expect hyper-detailed WayForward-esque sprites, but this, at least visually, often feels like about a thousand other lazy indie games out there.

The CGs that periodically pop up during chapters and bookend each chapter are frequently adorable and full of personality.

The game is more consistently excellent on the music front. Composer Lena Raine's gorgeous tracks, often piano-dominated, exude a variety of emotions and do a great job of immersing the player throughout. There are some really stellar remixes from other artists during the B-side levels as well. There aren't too many indie games with soundtracks this good, honestly, and it's another element that really elevates Celeste above its peers.

CONCLUSION
Celeste is a fun, challenging, and fairly memorable platformer with a strong central narrative, compelling music, and a lengthy campaign that rewards players who persist and attempt to engage with as much of the game's content as possible. Terrible pixel art for the characters, lacking character and story development (not related to Madeline), and some quibbles with the game design drag it down a bit for me, but I enjoyed my time with it.

VERDICT
8/10