Topic: Games you've recently beat

@Arugula I was thinking 'who is this imposter?!' 😂

I don't mind it too much, at least it means any bugs the early birds manage to catch are eaten up.

@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy I’ve honestly heard a lot of mixed things about the Cold Steel games in general, at least from series veterans. I’m on the final chapter of the first Crossbell game so should be onto Cold Steel soon but yeah, pacing’s an issue with basically the whole series. I think a lot of people jumped in with Cold Steel and so that’s all they know, usually supplementing their knowledge of the series through YouTube videos or the Wiki. These people usually tend to love the Cold Steel games but never actually go back and play the older ones. Then there are the original fans who aggressively dislike the Cold Steel games probably mostly because the influx of fans makes them feel insecure, although a lot have issues with the waifu elements of Cold Steel similar to the older Fire Emblem fans. And then there’s me, who’s just playing the games in order and don’t know what to think!

@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy One problem with the series is that it’s incredibly hard to discuss without spoilers 😂

I've reached the end credits of Yakuza 0. The game is so good. It's got a fine story, and the characters are fleshed out. The combat was cool as well, with the different fighting styles providing plenty of variety. Plus I love the stylistic choices in the game, and how over the top everything is. Then there's all the side content and various mini games (the big tough yakuza did spend a lot of time in the arcade playing Out Run in my playthrough).

I'll head back to it and try out some of the content that I missed. However, I probably won't go for 100% completion or try to get the Platinum trophy though.

Just finished off Splinter Cell Blacklist after playing Conviction. @RogerRoger thought I'd give you a shout as we were discussing them in the Trek thread! I don't know if you bothered with these games because Conviction was 360/PC only and Blacklist is Ironside-less but both are pretty good.

Conviction is fun but not very splinter celly whereas Blacklist, once you get over the lack of Ironside, is actually brilliant. It's a really good game and while it has loads of options for gameplay style, I found it much better to play it in the classic splinter cell style rather than the kind of third person shooter style of Conviction. I guess it's a bit like MGSV in that regard, a few ways to approach missions (in the campaign at least).

There are 3 other sets of side missions given by other characters that are playable in solo. Grimsdottir gives you perfect stealth missions (one alarm and it's game over) which are just excellent, Kobin gives you kill all the mercenaries missions which can be done stealthily so these are also good and Charlie gives you wave based horde mode style missions which are a bit rubbish in my opinion.

Charlie's missions and a few Call of Duty-esque parts of the campaign are the few poorly implemented distractions and while I criticise them, they are so few and far between that they really don't detract from the overall game which is really good. It feels like it takes the best bits of the first 4 games and the best bits of Conviction and mashes them up which gives you leeway in terms of how you want to play the game.

I played it on Wii U so I'm not sure how far this stretches to other formats, but the frame rate is a bit choppy on the Paladin (central level select hub) and the loading times are atrocious. Also I was kind of hoping the Wii U version would implement the gamepad in a similar way to how the old games on GameCube could connect to the game boy advance. In the old ones, you'd have the action on the TV but look down at the GBA to check the map and use certain gadgets but both screens were on at the same time. Blacklist on Wii U does shift the view down to the gamepad for gadgets but you lose the image on the TV so I don't really see the point of shifting anything to the gamepad whatsoever.

I'd give Blacklist a solid 8, knocking a point off for lack of Ironside (I think Grim sounds different too but I haven't checked the voice actor) and a point off for slightly poor performance on Wii U. Though luckily the frame rate and load times only really apply to the hub world, the campaign played really well on the Wii U. It's a bit overwhelming at first, and it was both a blessing and a curse that I jumped straight into a Grim side mission before playing the first (non-prologue) mission of the campaign. Took me ages to learn this extra difficult stealth mission which kind of formed the way I played the rest of the game!

@RogerRoger im glad you like blacklist too! Its so weird how it just kind of went under the radar. I and probably so many others probably dismissed it for the Ironside replacement but it was just so good and an appropriate update to the splinter cell formula. I hope they get off their butts and make an 8th (9th if you include the second version of double agent) game in a similar style to it!

Maybe the PS3 installs some of the game to the hard drive which helps with the load times, I think the Wii U just reads everything off the disc because of a lack of reasonable internal storage (I could hear the disc drive going crazy when I was playing it)

Have you not played conviction then? I'm surprised Blacklist made sense but I guess there was enough cursory dialogue to explain the status quo change. Conviction basically explains the resurrection of Sarah Fisher, why Sam hates Grim now and why there's no Third Echelon in Blacklist. I think I've only said what is shown in blacklist without revealing the spoilers of the finer details but I apologise it not!

Anyway, it was nice to finish a game on the Wii U, I have loads of games for it but I've completed relatively few of them. (Mario Kart 8, the 2 HD Zeldas, Star Fox Zero, Breath of the Wild and now Blacklist). Despite that, I've always had the thing set up since it came out, sucking up that stand by electricity because there's no off switch!

Another thing I forgot to mention, I always thought that Ironside was replaced because Ubisoft wanted someone young to do the motion capture (like that's a problem in any other game 🤦🏻‍♂️) but Wikipedia says Ironside couldn't do it because he had cancer but it cites no sources for that info. Very weird!

just completed Starlink on switch. Awful awful, only played it because it's the closest i'll see to a new star fox game again lol

I beat Metro Exodus there. The ending was just incredible, I got the good one as I’d kept the whole crew together. Honestly, the whole game was fantastic, it has some of the best writing I’ve seen in any game. It was a proper adult story from start to finish, without relying on tired tropes. The ambient dialogue, especially in the interludes on the train, is far and away the best I’ve seen. My only problem was the horrific load times and some technical issues with the physics engine. The gameplay changes towards an openish world totally serves the series well but I actually think the more linear levels were better implemented and designed. That being said, I have no complaints about the pacing or gameplay, it was about the best I’ve played in a FPS. I cannot recommend this game, and the series, highly enough. Perhaps it would be better to wait for a PS5 port considering the PC version even has an ‘Extreme’ setting that won’t run well on basically any commercial computer for now, but is more there for future proofing. It does have probably the best looking graphics on PS4 already so I really couldn’t imagine what it looks like on that setting. Of course, my opinion is somewhat skewed for this game in that I’m a massive fan of the original writer’s work, Russian history and the licensed music heard on the radio so if you’re turned off by the setting, you might not get as much of a kick out of it as I did!

@nessisonett Sounds great! There’s no point in playing Exodus without playing the earlier games though, right?

@Th3solution There’s enough new characters and stuff that it’s possible, but I’d recommend playing the first two games. They’re both really quite brilliant as well, more linear than Exodus for sure but they’re supposed to feel claustrophobic anyway so it plays into their strengths. The first two games are on Now and Exodus unfortunately leaves Now at the end of the month.

@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy Oh? I remember you being pretty happy with Cold Steel 1. CS2 wasn't as impressive?

@nessisonett I don’t have Now, but I think I have one of the early games in my PS3 library as a PS Plus game from a couple years ago. I’ve always meant to play the series, but just never got around to it.

@nessisonett Yeah the cannibal level was ace after the trudge of a level before. I was a bit disappointed that they didn't mix it up a bit more, but overall I really enjoyed by time with it. Probably one of the most immersive games I've played in awhile.

@Th3solution I played Exodus after only playing something like 2 hours of the first game. The writing is strong enough that I never felt like I was missing out on anything having not played the previous games.

I have now completed 63 games since the first UK lockdown started in March. I decided to write them all down on paper when I started getting through them rapidly but I've now filled up an A4 page so I thought I'd post it here and over on PX too.

To some people I'm sure this might not seem like a lot but I have been bad at finishing games in the past due to the knackering job I do so I am quite proud of this!

It's been a combination of backlog, game pass, ps plus, the two game clubs, replaying games/series as well as the odd movie or TV tie in to a show or movie series I've been watching!

I think the game I enjoyed most out of all of the new games I've played was the Talos Principle and the two games I spent longest on were MGS Peace Walker and MGS 5 at 90 hours and 130-something hours a piece. I think those two long games balance out the shortest games on this list like Erica and some minigolf games.

If I've finished a game from before lockdown rather than started it from scratch then I've counted two "finished" games as one and put them as one entry.

If you can read my handwriting then do ask me about any of the games if you want, I may have some brief or detailed thoughts on them!

@ralphdibny 😱
That is an amazing list! Nicely done!

I do have a few questions. I’m assuming this wasn’t the first playthrough for many of these. Specifically wondering about the Uncharteds. How many playthroughs does this make for the series? And upon revisiting the series, how did it hold up this time? Which was your favorite of the UC games this time around?

That’s a lot of Metal Gear. 😄 How did you like (or dislike) MG Survive?

Also, I can’t remember if you already commented about it before, but how was your experience with Hellblade? It’s one of my favorites this generation and one that I still ponder months later.

And in general, did any of the games disappoint upon going back and replaying them? Did any hold up even better than you remembered from playing them before?

@Th3solution cheers! I'd only played uncharted 1+2 once before and they were two of my favourite PS3 games. I have the PS3 version of uncharted 3 too but I was always waiting for the 3d TV to be available in the living room so I could play it in 3D and well, it just never happened. So this was my first time with 3, golden abyss, 4 and the lost legacy. Also I played the PS4 remakes of the first 3 this time. Anyway, all brilliant games, I couldn't tell you which one was my favourite because they are all just really fun games with fun stories and characters. I also played golden abyss on a hacked psTV because I wanted to play it on the big screen and the stock PSTV didn't support that particular game, I may go back and play it on the vita if I ever fancy 100%ing all the collectables!

(Edit: I also liked that Lost Legacy finally explained Chloe's accent, I literally thought it was just a bad VO job in uncharted 2, but the kind of worldwide upbringing and mixed heritage made it make a lot more sense and she is one of my favourite characters now (after the local boy Charlie Cutter that is))

Metal Gear survive is actually good enough to be honest. It was the first time I played it and bought it for about a tenner and I'd say it was worth it if you are doing a run through of every metal gear game. Obviously the hype and hate had died down by the time I played it so I had no real expectations on it. Considering stuff like Snakes Revenge, Ghost Babel (just called Metal Gear Solid over here in the UK!) and Metal Gear Acid exists, I really don't mind Metal Gear Survive being in the semi-canon state that those games are in. I only played the single player on survive and it took about 15-20 hours because there's a bit of grinding toward the end of the story. A couple of super hard bosses get unlocked as post game content but I just went and had a look at them but didn't bother grinding to beat them because I don't think they unlock any more story really.

Hellblade was really heavy, for me at least. It was an amazing game but I think knowing what it was about before I played it sort of allowed the intended effect to really sink in, especially as I have gone through long periods of my life with cyclical thinking and self doubt and criticism. Obviously barring all the fantasy elements, from my own experience I feel like the game was quite realistic in how that sort of thing can really bare down on you and feel insurmountable before you can kind of push it all away and attempt to move on.

I don't think any revisited games disappointed me. Playing Peace Walker, GZ and the phantom pain again only allowed me to notice more stuff about those games (as they are a bit of a trilogy). I think that's true of all the main Metal Gear games though, they kind of throw so much at you that only through replaying them and doing extra reading can you fully appreciate them. I didn't expect to replay either Peace Walker or the phantom pain again, especially as they don't offer a new game plus like other MGS games so I actually had to delete my MGSV save data to start again. I am really glad I did though because of the greater insight that it afforded me! (God that sounds pretentious lol)

I'd barely touched the gears of war games in the past, I was a bit disappointed by the first 3 but as KratosMD mentioned to me, I was probably a bit burned out by the time I got to the third one. I just finished the fourth game after a 6 month break from them and really enjoyed it. Not sure if it was the expanded back story in 4, or just the kind of oldies back in the game storyline that I quite like from films like The Expendables or Creed but it did kind of make me want to revisit 1-3 (though I probably won't any time soon still).

Maybe the first splinter cell game wasn't quite as good as I remembered it but I did play the PS3 HD collection version and it has really bad frame rate issues. I'm quite tempted to pick up the Xbox versions at some point to play with backwards compatibility because they look really good/smooth in the YouTube videos I've seen!

Thanks for having a good peruse through my list though, much appreciated! Sorry for writing such an essay to answer your questions!

Edit 2: Spyro was also a very pleasant surprise, I only ever played a bit of it on PS1 and never got into it properly compared to Crash Bandicoot. I found the remake to be really pleasant and an actual 3d platformer whereas Crash is conventionally more of a 2d platformer even if it has an over the shoulder view point. spyro is nowhere near as insane as crash in terms of difficulty too but there are a couple of troubling spots in 1 (namely involving boosting off ramps in one particular level for 100% completion) so it was a nice change of pace in general

@RogerRoger cheers!! I think I understand but can you just clarify that bit....jk! Yeah the story is a bit in the background of the first few games, it doesn't really get very personal until the death of Sarah which kind of makes up the crux of double agent, essentials and conviction

What you've said definitely makes more sense than how I've interpreted it (which is naturally cynically). I thought after giving Ironside the boot, Ubisoft tried some revisionist history to make themselves not look like the bad guys from giving him the boot! But I'll go with your version, sounds more likely than an intern at Ubisoft editing Wikipedia pages about ten year old video games lol

@ralphdibny That’s really fascinating. I really enjoyed reading your thoughts.

I can completely understand where you’re coming from with Hellblade. It skirts a line there that is dark, indeed. I guess I really appreciated the validation the whole project lended to the topic of mental health and I really like it when art can tastefully attack heavy issues and come out on the other end satisfactorily. But I definitely see that it wouldn’t be for everyone. But I’ve always argued that humankind’s hardest and most significant battles are fought within one’s mind and soul.

The Uncharted games are among my favorite series, and yet I’ve never re-played them. I’ve said before that I’m not one to replay games typically, but I keep thinking that I need to do this series. Maybe someday.

Anyways, great work there and I think your handwriting is not near as bad as mine! 😅

@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy I wish KratosMD was around to react to your hot take on ToCS2! 😄 He really championed that series and so it is a little surprising to see a contrary opinion of it. I admit that reading your lukewarm outcome to the second game saps a little bit of my motivation to finish the first one.

@crimsontadpoles I'm pleased to hear you enjoyed Yakuza Zero

I have got nowhere near 100% completion or the platinum in any game of the series so far because they require two runs (no thanks) and also learning how to play MahJong. Someone on another forum I use did learn how to play MahJong for the game and has got the platinum for Zero and the two Kiwami games.

I hope you plan to continue with the series. The Kiwami games play brilliantly as they use the Zero engine and are a bit more limited but still great fun.

@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy Certainly! If you remember then @ me if you write up all your thoughts. I realize that it will be difficult to do so without spoiler tagging a bunch of content, but I don’t ever check my email for notifications, I just use the site, so I won’t see anything that’s spoiler tagged.