Topic: Games you've recently beat

@LtSarge The game would be much fresher in your mind than mine of course since I haven't played it since release, but didn't Dina basically threaten to leave if she went after Abby again? I could be wrong, but I do know Dina made it quite clear she didn't want Ellie to go after her again.

@FuriousMachine I think quite a bit of the story wasn't executed the way it could have been, but for me it will always go back to the point I said before where I bought the game to play as Ellie. It's a video game, so in spite of her actions, I would have still wanted to play as Ellie and wouldn't want her as a villain. I knew you would play as Abby at some point in the game because of intentionally spoiling myself, but like we've both said already, her portion of the game dragged on and on. If it was meant to sympathize with her at all, that was already out the window the moment she clubbed Joel in the head. Would I have condoned Ellie's actions in real life? No, but again, it's a video game.
It was still a great game in many ways, but the story was so flawed imo that there's no way I could consider it the classic many do. Changing how Part 1's ending went in the flashback scene was mighty convenient too. It's a shame too as it improves the gameplay of the original in many ways. Combine the story of Part 1 with everything else of Part 2 and you'd probably have the best game ever made.

Rolled the credits on Gran Turismo 7 there this morning. Probably the best racing game I've played since the original Gran Turismo. I know there's a lot of post-game content and you can never really finish it but I think I'm done with it for now. I need that 130GB of space it takes up for other games. It's onto Dragons Dogma 2 and Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown for me now. I'm also contemplating reinstalling Diablo 4 to finish the campaign, I feel like that would be a good game for the Portal.

X-Men Legends. I’d played Ultimate Alliance 1 before but this one is really great for the very first entry in the series. Felt a bit boring that my team was mainly Jean Grey, Wolverine, Cyclops and Storm though! There are loads of good characters but I stuck to them.

Armored Core: Project Phantasma

Essentially a DLC for the first game just y’know, on a whole ass disc cause it was PS1. I transferred my mech from the first game though so enjoyed the continuity. The missions were quite small and not the best but the arena’s a brilliant addition!

Just finished Life is Strange: Before the Storm on Series X. So right off the bat I just have to say that either my taste in games have changed or the story in this game was just really good because I was actually very invested in the plot. I remember not caring that much about the story in the first Life is Strange, but I absolutely loved Before the Storm. It's the same thing with The Last of Us: I didn't like the first game but I loved the second one. I think my taste has changed as I've gotten older, which is great!

What I liked about Before the Storm was the characters. I loved Chloe and Rachel and their relationship with each other. They were so much more interesting than Max. In fact, I just want to forget that the first game exists because I just read and recalled what happens in it and it upsets me a great deal. I'd rather just believe that the story ended in Before the Storm and nothing happened afterwards because of how wholesome it was.

Anyway, fantastic game and I'm definitely picking up Life is Strange 2.

@LtSarge I actually liked Before the Storm a lot more than the masses too. I can't compare it to the first one really as it's been probably close to a decade since I've played it (it was one of my early PS4 games). Some don't like Chloe, but I had minimal issues with her in the first game and this one. I don't agree with you in regards to The Last of Us, but at least I do here to an extent.

I beat Miles Morales the other day. Genuinely awesome experience and that ending was superb.

@KilloWertz Ah that's nice to hear! The thing is that even if I don't remember what happens in games I've played a long time ago, I still remember what I felt about the game. And I remember thinking the first LiS wasn't anything special.

On a side note, I miss this type of episodic story-driven games. I feel like they aren't as popular as back in the day. Life is Strange was huge back when the first game came out and then we have the Telltale games. Playing through Before the Storm makes me want to play other Telltale titles I haven't played yet, such as the Batman games, the final season of The Walking Dead and The Expanse.

I beat Gnosia @Ralizah

In fact I even got it's platinum not ten minutes ago I was that engrossed with it.

Got quite grindy in the end as you said in your review and the gameplay loop is so basic and the night time parts really could've used some more events.

But goddamn it was such a breath of fresh air. Beautiful art style. I adored the cast, and they're so well realised and written.

Chippie kinda freaked me out with the whole cat neck thing though

@LtSarge I don't remember well enough to know exactly which one of the two I like better, but I do know I definitely enjoyed the first one more than you did. I know I wouldn't have kept playing the series and more games like it if I didn't. It was the first of it's kind that I played other than Heavy Rain back on the PS3.

Yeah, most of those types of games (even Life is Strange) have gone the more normal route where they release it all at once. I don't really miss it as I always waited for the whole thing to come out first, but I get missing something good from back then.

Beat Super Mario RPG. It was... okay.

Writing was funny in spots. You can really see how it provided a model for future Mario RPGs to emulate and improve on.

That said, it feels like the skeleton of a Mario RPG. The game is constantly urging you on and never giving you time to really immerse yourself in your environments or developing its various scenarios. I suppose this also means you don't have time to get bored, and I know modern JRPGs can be a little long-winded, but damn, I was done with this in 11 hours! And that's after also replaying minigames to collect rare equipment, farm money, etc. I didn't rush through this game, there just wasn't a lot to it.

But even searching out more money, equipment, etc. feels pointless when the game is this easy. And I played on the highest difficulty available to me. This is practically easier than a Pokemon game, and there's an even easier difficulty!

The game pads out its lack of content with a bunch of pointless minigames dotted throughout the adventure. I suppose a few lead to rewards, but there's not a lot of call for them, and many of the minigames are just flatly pretty pointless.

Also, the OST, while beautifully re-done, is still pretty limited. I don't understand the acclaim for this soundtrack. Then again, I feel that way about a lot of games scored by Yoko Shimomura. Not a fan, even if she seems to enjoy significant acclaim.

That being said, it wasn't a bad game. The gameplay is fine, it's fun seeing the character dynamics between Mario, Peach, and Bowser as they fight alongside one-another to defend their world from extra-dimensional invaders (it's always refreshing how Peach is allowed to have a personality in the RPGs), and good lord, the presentation is phenomenal! Everything runs at a smooth 720p60 when undocked (didn't play this on the TV even once, so can't speak to that), and the cutscenes are probably the smoothest, prettiest CGI work I've seen in anything.

I'm glad I got the opportunity to play this, but now that I have, I see it as yet another acclaimed SNES game that I'll never get the love for.

@HallowMoonshadow Wow, you really ate that game alive lmao

Nice work. There's a platinum? Ugh, I might have to repurchase at some point.

Yeah, I feel like the nighttime parts would've benefitted from additional writing or mechanics or something.

That's pretty much how I felt. Despite its numerous flaws, it's just... such a unique, interesting, beautiful game. Zero Escape vibes, but also some significant cosmic horror tones, mixed with interesting transhumanist concepts... yeah, I'm all over it, and I hope this indie developer makes at least one more super interesting sci-fi game in their career.

lol I used to have a black cat that I was really close with, and I'd walk around the house with him wrapped around my neck, holding onto his front and back feet to keep him steady. It kind of brought back memories of that. Except, you know... not horrifying.

I also felt like the game could've done more with Gina. Although apparently there are male gender-exclusive events with her, so maybe that's why she felt underdeveloped in my playthrough.

Not surprised about your thoughts regarding Super Mario RPG @Ralizah.

I've tried to look at various videos of the SNES version over the years and there's just something about it that did not hold my interest or make it look even that fun to play honestly.

Never really listened to the soundtrack before so I can't comment on that but I've enjoyed Yoko Shimomura's work from Kingdom Hearts, Parasite Eve and the like.

The updated version of SMRPG does look really nice though. I'm surprised to hear it was that short though. You even beat the superboss or is that not in the new version?

As for Gnosia I was only going to give it an hour or so on Tuesday but ended up playing it for 4 hours straight that night and then every night after I went for at least two hours when I was only going to do 2 loops max

I haven't been this hooked on a game that badly for quite a while.

Though funnily enough the last game that really got me was the Satellaview Chrono Cross Visual novel. Radical Dreamers - Le Trésor Interdit. (I've yet to play Chrono Cross properly but it's one of the games I actually want to get to this year at some point).

But back to Gnosia I was actually gonna profess my love for Gina in the previous post cus I was a big fan of her too and was kinda bummed I couldn't get a special event for her

I did find the one where SQ ends up betraying everyone when you're a Gnosia to be weirdly wholesome?

Plus the true end with Setsu was fricking adorable too!

@HallowMoonshadow It's about as fun as any JRPG from that era, but lacking in the scope that made games like FFVI and Chrono Trigger stand out.

I actually had no idea there was a superboss, but apparently there is, and they've even made him tougher in this version? Guess I'll try it out. Maybe it'll rid my mouth of the taste of the final boss, who is a total pansy.

SQ was an interesting character. I loved how every character had their own often thoroughly bizarre circumstances. If I remember correctly, SQ was a cloned body that her mother would use to transfer her consciousness into?

Also hypersexual with even a non-binary character. Can't imagine what being a male must be like in this game lol

@WaveBoy You definitely can. It's not like there weren't better JRPGs from the same company out at that time, you know? You want to make allowances for the passage of time, of course, but amazing games are timeless. There are games from the 80s I think still kick today, even.

At the time, it was notable for being something unique: an RPG set in the Mario universe. But we have a dozen of those now, and most of them are better than Super Mario RPG.

Well, regardless, I'm not technically judging the SNES release, but the Nintendo Switch-exclusive remake, which, regardless of how faithful it is to the original release, IS a modern console JRPG.

I think the art-style is great here. The cutscenes are visually resplendent, and the game itself manages to be a fun mix of modern visuals while also retaining the look of the SNES original. And it's all so sharp and colorful on the Switch OLED screen. It's probably the one area where I don't have any complaints tbh.

@LtSarge I'm a huge fan of both Life is Strange and Before the Storm. Both games really drew me in with their characters and I remember feeling quite touched in both cases. I've been a fan of Telltale for quite a while and have played most of them. I remember enjoying both the Batman games and the Walking Dead games and it was such a joy revisiting the Expanse universe and Camina Drummer (once again played excellently by Cara Gee), so if you're fan of the show (and/or the books) it is definitely worth a go

Finished off The Sexy Brutale, with a platinum to go with it, tonight. A real gem of a puzzle game that felt a bit different from everything else. While I'm sure other games have used similar concepts (you need to figure out how to prevent several murders by being in the right place at the right time and you may restart the day, Groundhog Day style, at any time to revisit scenes with new information), this felt truly special. Excellent little game and I enjoyed it a lot

Seeing as I'm just finishing off the last book in the Witcher series, I believe my next game will be The Witcher III

Kirby's Return to Dream Land Deluxe. Original campaign is extremely solid 2D Kirby, and the new Magolor side-game is pretty substantial as well. Have 95% on my file, because I collected all the trinkets from the levels, but didn't bother mastering the mini-games available at the base. 100%ed the side game, though, including the secret unlockable level.

Probably my third favorite Kirby game after Forgotten Land and Planet Robobot.

Beat the Mortal Kombat Deception konquest mode. Shujinko is the most laughably dumb character I’ve ever seen in a game. Like an absolute grade A doofus. The game just sort of ends as well. A bizarre mode that isn’t exactly good but the characters do stand on their own so seeing them in a cinematic style mode does work. Now to beat arcade with everyone before going onto Armageddon.

@nessisonett shaolin monks

@nomither6 I keep hearing that’s good but I always get it confused with the rubbish Special Ops and Sub-Zero games.