@Lord_Malice Cold Steel 2 and RE2R are some of my favorites, so maybe we have some similar tastes. How are you liking Hades? It's been on my Amazon games list for years, I just haven't ever pulled the trigger.
Stellar Blade is so good, but I'm really bad at it. I just reached the Wasteland, and I can't beat either of the bosses I've come across.
I won't have too much time to play this weekend, so I'll play a bit more of Stellar Blade. If I get frustrated, I'll switch back to Scarlet Nexus. Gaming time is hard to come by lately, so I think I'm done buying for 2024.
@wildcat_kickz We'll have to agree to disagree - for me, it has some of the worst dialogue since Resident Evil '96 ("My face is tired.") The characters don't act in ways that make any kind of sense ("Oh hey son/daughter, let's swap using the mask every 60 seconds or so and hurry back to the ship" would have been the logical thing to do for highly trained space farers), and the plot holes need a mass relay to traverse (translators work for races on first contact? Both ways? And they translate idioms no problem? Come on). Those are just examples that come to mind; there was a lot more than that. This is one game where the great combat gameplay wasn't enough to overcome the rest for me.
@ApostateMage Agreed. Andromeda had the best combat in the series, but I can't bring myself to care enough about it to finish it. The writing, character design, disrespect of the lore, and shallow character development just nuked the whole experience. What made Mass Effect successful wasn't the combat - the first game certainly wasn't the belle of the ball in that regard - but the narrative. Mass Effect 2 had an excellent balance of the two, while ME3 leaned more heavily in to the combat while sacrificing narrative in its sloppy wrap of the story.
No clue how Veilguard is going to turn out, but the trailer + EA + recent history doesn't give me warm fuzzies.
Expedition 33 is my most anticipated announced game. I'm chomping at the bit for more. Metaphor is #2, but they'll both be supplanted by a Code: Veronica remake.
I still don't get the big deal about Astro Bot. I really wish I could get excited about Outlaws, but I just can't summon the interest for it.
I could only really pick two - Expedition 33 is what I've been wanting for years. A dark, gritty RPG that's turn-based with a non-anime art style. I like an anime art style, but it gets repetitive. That's shaping up to be a day 1 buy for me. Metaphor is looking better and better too. Nothing else caught my interest, and a few were actively repulsive. Dragon Age in particular looks like an outright parody of itself.
I went ahead and bought Stellar Blade earlier in the week. I started it last night and am enjoying it for the most part. I'm not a fan of Souls-like games, so the combat is definitely an adjustment. I don't find it to be as difficult as the other games I've tried, so that's encouraging. It looks like it will be a busy weekend, so I may not have a whole lot of time to play. If I do and get frustrated, I can pivot back to Scarlet Nexus.
@WhensDinner There's a ROM hack that fixes the slowdown and a couple other bugs with the game. After ~300 hours with the PS1 version from my childhood and ~200 hours on the PSP with the physical UMD spinning away in the little drive, playing the ROM hack through PPSSPP on a PC hooked up to my TV has been the definitive way to play. A few little graphics tweaks and internal resolution scaling, and it looks way better than it has any business looking. The new release would have to be a full on HD-2D refresh like Star Ocean 2 to move the needle versus what's available now.
Everything I want is remakes in remasters. I guess I don't have any faith in new stuff except for Metaphor, but we have more than enough content out for that game.
Resident Evil Code: Veronica remake, Lost Odyssey remaster, Xenogears HD-2D. That's my wishlist of announcements.
@ChrisDeku You didn't take in to account the drastically lower cost of living in Osaka (where Capcom is based) versus a place like London. Expatistan indicates that it could be 55% lower. That's huge. I live in rural America, and it's famously cheap to live here - Osaka is much, much cheaper than that even. Based on what it costs to live, I'd say their compensation is fine. Their starting salaries are above the median for the area. You can't say that about fast food jobs in the UK.
I must be out of the loop. Why all of the hype for Astro Bot? I know the character was used in some tech demos and things of that nature, but it just looks like a generic action platformer to me. What am I missing?
"Girlboss leader who talks down to men because she's the smartest and most capable in the room at all times" was an interesting character trope 20 years ago. Now it's just so bland and over-used in media, just like everything else we've seen from this game up to this point. If you're doing something that's so heavily clichéd, there either needs to be a market for it (hello isekai anime) or it has to be exceptionally well done. It looks like it's going to be just another Counterstrike clone with stale humor and derivative characters. How exciting.
My first Dynasty Warriors experience was on a PlayStation 2 demo disc I got a few months after the console came out. It had a demo for Dynasty Warriors 2. My friends and I put so much time in to that demo - it was incredible. I went on to buy a bunch of DW games that generation and have a whole lot of fun with them, but it started to get stale after several releases made very small, very incremental changes. I hope this one makes me feel 14 again. Really looking forward to seeing more.
@AccessibleDaydream Cold Steel is a bit, but I don't expect that this one will be. The battle system in Cold Steel is much more involved. There's the school atmosphere, alternating between excursion and down time to bond with classmates. If that's what you like, Cold Steel I&II will scratch the itch - it did for me anyway.
If you like action games with downtime and squad mate bonding, Scarlett Nexus is one I think you might enjoy. Same engine as Tales of Arise, really underrated.
@Zeroo The tropes are there because a lot of people like them. The storytelling peaked in the Crossbell duology unfortunately. Those are worth playing if you want the best of Trails. I bought Reverie day 1 last year, but I've only spent about 10 hours with it. The exposition dumps are tolerable when there's one track to follow, but three is a bit much.
So I guess peeking at Amazon a couple times a day to see if the price has dropped on Stellar Blade is going to be fruitless for a little while. Great news, really.
Finished Final Fantasy VIII during the week. What a trip down memory lane.
So far, 20 minutes here and there of RE4R, third run I think. My backlog is enormous. I'll sample a few of what I have, maybe check out Scarlett Nexus, Yakuza 0, and Like a Dragon. Might try to dive back in to Reverie or DQXI. We'll see how it shakes out.
I liked 13 Sentinels a lot. Unicorn Overlord looked cool, but the demo felt like a missed opportunity - the combat just...plays itself? Not a fan of that mechanic.
I thought 2018 was just ok. I have no desire to play Ragnarok given the stuttering flow between gameplay and cut scene. The original two are some of my favorites of the PS2 generation, up there with Okami, Tekken 5, and Final Fantasy X.
@zekepliskin Sadly, you're right. The other option is of course emulation. The 95nm RSX in the launch PS3s is so fundamentally flawed that a system expected to last more than a few years after repair should have the 'Frankenstein' RSX repair done to it.
Unfortunately the service is about $500 for the reputable places I've seen offer it - and that's if you already have the broken console. For that price, you can get an off lease SFF PC with a competent i7 CPU, a low profile GPU, a solid state drive, and an 8-Bitdo adapter for seamless DS4 functionality. You'd have yourself an excellent emulation PC, especially neat if you added an optical drive. Not hard to set it up so that you can just pop in your discs and launch them.
I've wanted this game since the announcement of the very first one. I just don't trust current year Ubisoft. I fully expect a historical fiction "made for modern audiences," a map packed with all sorts of redundant things to do, a season pass for sale in huge letters on the title screen, and ads for OTHER GREAT UBISOFT PRODUCTS! in the pause screen. Please prove me wrong, Ubisoft!
Still enjoying a nostalgic replay of Final Fantasy VIII. It's only my second time through, the first being in 1999/2000, so a lot of it might as well be new. I just got Ragnarok, so I'm starting some of the optional side quests and the grind for ultimate weapon materials. Not sure what I'll be in the mood for when I'm finished with it. I may need an RPG break.
Busy weekend. Made it a long one to celebrate my and my wife's anniversary. I thought I'd beat the weather and get the yard taken care of Friday night, but my equipment all had other plans. In the end, it took cleaning up some fouled plugs on the riding mower, a complete carb disassembly and cleaning for the push mower, and fixing a kinked fuel line on the trimmer. I managed to get everything done and cleaned up just as the first drops fell late Saturday morning.
Having knocked out everything by Sunday, I spent majority of the day on the PS4 remaster of Final Fantasy VIII. I haven't played it all the way through in over 20 years, so it's great rediscovering all of the twists and turns that I had completely forgotten.
Maybe I'm just getting too old for this hobby - my selection would have been, "None of them have been great for several years." I may end up purchasing Stellar Blade when the price dips because I enjoy the combat in the demo, difficult as it may be. I will reserve judgement for now on whether the whole experience is great.
Rebirth is a train wreck - Final Fantasy died with XIII, and this whole Re-X trilogy for Final Fantasy VII is strengthening my opinion. I am absolutely stunned that so many find the combat mechanics fun or even usable. Final Fantasy XVI was a pretty ok action game with far too many cut scenes, but it has gone so far off the rails of what Final Fantasy was that I wish they would just change the name.
For first party titles, Open World Game: Post Apocalypse Robots, Open World Game: Super Hero, and Open World Game: Samurai had some entertainment value, but there's so much fluff in all of them. You really need to love that kind of game to keep playing them. They just feel like re-skins of one another: go to spot on map, follow/fight something. Pull up map. Go to next spot. Repeat. The experience is edging closer and closer to passive entertainment.
The Korean creative industry is resonating with the west in a big way, and it's been gaining steam for years. Their shows, movies, and games are doing things that western audiences love in storytelling and gameplay. The studios focus on delivering a good experience to everybody, not a message via a vanity project with bloated cost. I certainly hope we see more - the games industry needs a shake-up like this.
I'm in a bit of a gaming rut. I've tried spinning up Trails into Reverie, Star Ocean 4, Shining Resonance: Refrain, Yakuza: Like a Dragon, and Soul Hackers 2. None of them are grabbing me. I lost interest in Dragon Quest XI after about 12 hours. Maybe it's the music. I swear the game only has like 4 tracks. The idea of picking up a game controller right now is not appealing at all.
I'm thinking a gaming break is due this weekend. My small engines are all due for oil changes, so I'll probably do that. My mower was running rough last weekend, so I'll chase that too. If the weather calms down, maybe I'll go trout fishing and take care of the brush pile that needs to be burned.
@Zenos I don't know how you'd do an action RPG if it was based on the source material. It's not super action-heavy, but I suppose that there are good spots in the middle of Season 1 and beginning of Season 2.
If someone wanted to do something in-universe, a back story game following Paul and Ghislaine would be pretty cool.
So much Atlus this year. Between this, a second run of P3R with Episode Aigis, and Metaphor, I may every well be taken care of for the rest of the year with my backlog the way it is - just started dabbling with Digital Devil Saga and Soul Hackers 2, trying to decide which one to commit to first.
@MrBook They really don't. I can't believe it's been nearly 15 years. I remember getting off work at midnight, hitting the Taco Bell drive-thru (spending only $3 in the process), and playing that game at my bachelor pad until 3 or 4am for weeks. This was around the same time I started dating my wife. Just like you mentioned, the mineral mini game and reading all of the descriptions of the planets was such a cool experience. Lots of extrasolar captures, hot Jupiters, and bits of lore about ancient battles that took place.
@Blaze215 Different strokes, I suppose. I played the demo of Rebirth and thought it was clunky. The player attacks have no weight, and I got real tired of being attacked from off screen. FFXVI wasn't great or anything (shame when Nier: Automata offers an amazing blueprint of how an action RPG can play), but it was at least competent.
Is the lesson here that we should wait a full year before diving in to a Square Enix title? This is a game-altering collection of changes.
Seeing this, I'm even MORE hesitant to pick up Rebirth. FFXVI has so much better combat than the FF7 RE-x titles, and seeing that they've continued to refine XVI this long after release makes me want to wait to buy Rebirth until it gets a similar treatment. Just being able to remap controls would be huge.
In between household chores and getting ready for the week ahead, dipping my toes in to several games to see what grabs my interest for a play through. After finishing Persona 3 Reload and finishing a run of Persona 5 Royal that I started a year ago, I'm left with the question, "What do I play next?"
Trails in to Reverie - I loved Cold Steel and the Crossbell duology. For some reason, I can't get in to this one. Maybe it's Falcom fatigue.
Octopath Traveler II and Soul Hackers II - both are sitting on the shelf on plastic. I enjoyed the Octopath Traveler II demo, and I've been on a MegaTen kick. Either is viable.
Dragon Quest XI - this one is also sitting on the shelf, but I haven't broken the plastic just yet. I'm playing through the demo now and am really enjoying it. This may be the one.
Evil Within 1 and 2 - landed both very cheaply. I live survival horror, but just haven't played these too yet.
I also have some extended backlog ... I've been meaning to replay Final Fantasy 8, which I haven't beaten in over 20 years. Xenogears and Breath of Fire IV are others that I've been meaning to get around to since they came out.
I'm glad I'm not the only one underwhelmed by the demo. Movement felt nice, and the game was a pleasure to look at - the game just isn't for me. I can tell that a lot of care went in to it though, so I hope fans of the IP enjoy it.
I only played the demo so didn't give it a ranking. I was underwhelmed by the gameplay, or really lack thereof. There was a lot of potential for the battles to play out like a turn-based RPG. I was unimpressed that the game ends up just playing itself. I'll either skip it entirely or revisit on a deep, deep sale.
@koffing Great memories there! Getting home from school to see the new PlayStation Magazine in the mailbox was a great feeling. It was extra motivation to blitz through homework, chores, and violin practice so that I could dig in to the demo disc - the magazine I saved for the bus ride to school. Demo discs that came with games were awesome too - would anyone have purchased Zone of the Enders without the Metal Gear Solid 2 demo?
I see it all over, but the only justification that I've seen is, "It'll encourage bad game design!" Will it? Maybe. If it does, go after THOSE games. If the game is balanced around these items not being in it, then the game design is fine.
"It's a waste of money!"
What kind of pretentious, self-righteous git do you have to be to tell me what a waste of my money is? I'm in my late 30's, make great money, am married with a kid, and don't want to spend a ton of time on the game. This is a good option for me. I and the many like me are the target audience.
That's exactly what these are - options. When it gets to the point where games pop up the store to buy revival every time you die or force you to watch an ad, then we have an issue. When it's there in the background if you want it and completely separate from the game experience, this is blind outrage.
I'm going to stick with the standard. Looking at my library of PS5 games, there is a grand total of 2 games I could not have bought on PS4. I honestly regret buying it in the first place. PS5 will likely be my last Sony console before I make the full switch to PC if they really do decide to lean in on this all-digital future.
I guess I'm in the minority here - I think this is just fine. They're actually releasing the content as an expansion rather than as part of a deluxe edition you're forced to buy just to get the new content. The base game as it was released is a complete experience as far as I'm concerned. I paid $65 for it and played for about 75 hours so far. Less than $1 an hour for the experience is worth it to me, especially since I'll be starting another run in August to get ready for the new content and expect to put in another 90 hours or so to run the game again, finish the platinum (which I almost NEVER do), and play Episode Aigis. This was never billed as a remake of FES or Portable. It's a remake of the base game. Getting the ability to purchase Episode Aigis is just frosting on the cake as far as I'm concerned. I believe the devs deserve to be paid for extra work, so I'm happy to buy it.
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Re: Talking Point: What Are You Playing This Weekend? - Issue 534
@ear_wig Thank you! I managed to beat the bosses in Wasteland today. I'm being stubborn and refuse to put it on easy mode.
Re: Talking Point: What Are You Playing This Weekend? - Issue 534
@Lord_Malice Cold Steel 2 and RE2R are some of my favorites, so maybe we have some similar tastes. How are you liking Hades? It's been on my Amazon games list for years, I just haven't ever pulled the trigger.
Re: Talking Point: What Are You Playing This Weekend? - Issue 534
Stellar Blade is so good, but I'm really bad at it. I just reached the Wasteland, and I can't beat either of the bosses I've come across.
I won't have too much time to play this weekend, so I'll play a bit more of Stellar Blade. If I get frustrated, I'll switch back to Scarlet Nexus. Gaming time is hard to come by lately, so I think I'm done buying for 2024.
Re: Dragon Age: The Veilguard Assures Its RPG Roots with Massive Skill Trees for Each Class
@wildcat_kickz We'll have to agree to disagree - for me, it has some of the worst dialogue since Resident Evil '96 ("My face is tired.") The characters don't act in ways that make any kind of sense ("Oh hey son/daughter, let's swap using the mask every 60 seconds or so and hurry back to the ship" would have been the logical thing to do for highly trained space farers), and the plot holes need a mass relay to traverse (translators work for races on first contact? Both ways? And they translate idioms no problem? Come on). Those are just examples that come to mind; there was a lot more than that. This is one game where the great combat gameplay wasn't enough to overcome the rest for me.
Re: Dragon Age: The Veilguard Assures Its RPG Roots with Massive Skill Trees for Each Class
@ApostateMage Agreed. Andromeda had the best combat in the series, but I can't bring myself to care enough about it to finish it. The writing, character design, disrespect of the lore, and shallow character development just nuked the whole experience. What made Mass Effect successful wasn't the combat - the first game certainly wasn't the belle of the ball in that regard - but the narrative. Mass Effect 2 had an excellent balance of the two, while ME3 leaned more heavily in to the combat while sacrificing narrative in its sloppy wrap of the story.
No clue how Veilguard is going to turn out, but the trailer + EA + recent history doesn't give me warm fuzzies.
Re: Feature: Top 10 Best PS5 Games of 2024's Summer Showcases
Expedition 33 is my most anticipated announced game. I'm chomping at the bit for more. Metaphor is #2, but they'll both be supplanted by a Code: Veronica remake.
I still don't get the big deal about Astro Bot. I really wish I could get excited about Outlaws, but I just can't summon the interest for it.
Re: Valorant Is Another Free PS5 FPS with a Rubbish Trophy List
I never understood the appeal of trophies/achievements in the first place. They could disappear today, and I really wouldn't care.
Re: Talking Point: What PS5 Game Had the Best Showing Across All the Summer Gaming Events?
I could only really pick two - Expedition 33 is what I've been wanting for years. A dark, gritty RPG that's turn-based with a non-anime art style. I like an anime art style, but it gets repetitive. That's shaping up to be a day 1 buy for me. Metaphor is looking better and better too. Nothing else caught my interest, and a few were actively repulsive. Dragon Age in particular looks like an outright parody of itself.
Re: Talking Point: What Are You Playing This Weekend? - Issue 533
I went ahead and bought Stellar Blade earlier in the week. I started it last night and am enjoying it for the most part. I'm not a fan of Souls-like games, so the combat is definitely an adjustment. I don't find it to be as difficult as the other games I've tried, so that's encouraging. It looks like it will be a busy weekend, so I may not have a whole lot of time to play. If I do and get frustrated, I can pivot back to Scarlet Nexus.
Re: Final Fantasy Tactics Remaster Is Reportedly 'Real and Happening'
@WhensDinner There's a ROM hack that fixes the slowdown and a couple other bugs with the game. After ~300 hours with the PS1 version from my childhood and ~200 hours on the PSP with the physical UMD spinning away in the little drive, playing the ROM hack through PPSSPP on a PC hooked up to my TV has been the definitive way to play. A few little graphics tweaks and internal resolution scaling, and it looks way better than it has any business looking. The new release would have to be a full on HD-2D refresh like Star Ocean 2 to move the needle versus what's available now.
Re: Tons More Massive PS5, PS4 Games with Huge Discounts
@Fyz306903 Just curious, what needed to be patched with Signalis? I played it through about 6 months ago and adored it.
Re: Dragon Age: The Veilguard Finally Ventures to PS5 Later This Year, Trailer Gives First Look
All this did was make me really sad for the future of Mass Effect.
Re: Talking Point: What Are Your PS5 Predictions for Summer Game Fest 2024?
Everything I want is remakes in remasters. I guess I don't have any faith in new stuff except for Metaphor, but we have more than enough content out for that game.
Resident Evil Code: Veronica remake, Lost Odyssey remaster, Xenogears HD-2D. That's my wishlist of announcements.
Re: Multiple Square Enix Rumours Spread Like Wildfire Ahead of Summer Game Fest
@ChrisDeku You didn't take in to account the drastically lower cost of living in Osaka (where Capcom is based) versus a place like London. Expatistan indicates that it could be 55% lower. That's huge. I live in rural America, and it's famously cheap to live here - Osaka is much, much cheaper than that even. Based on what it costs to live, I'd say their compensation is fine. Their starting salaries are above the median for the area. You can't say that about fast food jobs in the UK.
Re: Poll: What Was Your Favourite Game from State of Play?
I must be out of the loop. Why all of the hype for Astro Bot? I know the character was used in some tech demos and things of that nature, but it just looks like a generic action platformer to me. What am I missing?
Re: Big New PS5, PC Shooter Concord Has an Uphill Battle Ahead of It
"Girlboss leader who talks down to men because she's the smartest and most capable in the room at all times" was an interesting character trope 20 years ago. Now it's just so bland and over-used in media, just like everything else we've seen from this game up to this point. If you're doing something that's so heavily clichéd, there either needs to be a market for it (hello isekai anime) or it has to be exceptionally well done. It looks like it's going to be just another Counterstrike clone with stale humor and derivative characters. How exciting.
Re: Dynasty Warriors Origins Could Be the Comeback Fans Have Been Waiting For on PS5
My first Dynasty Warriors experience was on a PlayStation 2 demo disc I got a few months after the console came out. It had a demo for Dynasty Warriors 2. My friends and I put so much time in to that demo - it was incredible. I went on to buy a bunch of DW games that generation and have a whole lot of fun with them, but it started to get stale after several releases made very small, very incremental changes. I hope this one makes me feel 14 again. Really looking forward to seeing more.
Re: Big Trails through Daybreak Demo Drops a Month Before Release, Progress Carries Over
@AccessibleDaydream Cold Steel is a bit, but I don't expect that this one will be. The battle system in Cold Steel is much more involved. There's the school atmosphere, alternating between excursion and down time to bond with classmates. If that's what you like, Cold Steel I&II will scratch the itch - it did for me anyway.
If you like action games with downtime and squad mate bonding, Scarlett Nexus is one I think you might enjoy. Same engine as Tales of Arise, really underrated.
Re: Big Trails through Daybreak Demo Drops a Month Before Release, Progress Carries Over
@Zeroo The tropes are there because a lot of people like them. The storytelling peaked in the Crossbell duology unfortunately. Those are worth playing if you want the best of Trails. I bought Reverie day 1 last year, but I've only spent about 10 hours with it. The exposition dumps are tolerable when there's one track to follow, but three is a bit much.
Re: Apr 2024 USA Sales: Stellar Blade Slashes Straight to Number 1, Helldivers 2 Is Still Insane
So I guess peeking at Amazon a couple times a day to see if the price has dropped on Stellar Blade is going to be fruitless for a little while. Great news, really.
Re: Conscript Musters Retro WW1 Survival Horror for PS5, PS4
Oh yeah, this looks like a day 1 for me.
Re: Talking Point: What Are You Playing This Weekend? - Issue 530
Finished Final Fantasy VIII during the week. What a trip down memory lane.
So far, 20 minutes here and there of RE4R, third run I think. My backlog is enormous. I'll sample a few of what I have, maybe check out Scarlett Nexus, Yakuza 0, and Like a Dragon. Might try to dive back in to Reverie or DQXI. We'll see how it shakes out.
Re: The Next Naughty Dog Game Its 'Most Thrilling Yet', Says Neil Druckmann
That kind of talk almost certainly means it's going to flop.
Re: Metaphor: ReFantazio Bringing New Details to Summer Game Fest
I don't do $70 games. I'll probably cave and make an exception here though.
Re: Rejoice! Vanillaware Is Recruiting for a New Fantasy RPG
I liked 13 Sentinels a lot. Unicorn Overlord looked cool, but the demo felt like a missed opportunity - the combat just...plays itself? Not a fan of that mechanic.
Re: Microsoft Leadership Reportedly Want No 'Red Line' Stopping Xbox Games Coming to PS5
Lost Odyssey and a Gears of War trilogy upscaled with multiplayer - please!!
Re: Best God of War Games
I thought 2018 was just ok. I have no desire to play Ragnarok given the stuttering flow between gameplay and cut scene. The original two are some of my favorites of the PS2 generation, up there with Okami, Tekken 5, and Final Fantasy X.
Re: New PS2 Emulator Appears to Be Imminent on PS5, PS4
@zekepliskin Sadly, you're right. The other option is of course emulation. The 95nm RSX in the launch PS3s is so fundamentally flawed that a system expected to last more than a few years after repair should have the 'Frankenstein' RSX repair done to it.
Unfortunately the service is about $500 for the reputable places I've seen offer it - and that's if you already have the broken console. For that price, you can get an off lease SFF PC with a competent i7 CPU, a low profile GPU, a solid state drive, and an 8-Bitdo adapter for seamless DS4 functionality. You'd have yourself an excellent emulation PC, especially neat if you added an optical drive. Not hard to set it up so that you can just pop in your discs and launch them.
Re: New PS2 Emulator Appears to Be Imminent on PS5, PS4
Dandy. Sony needs to do two things with this:
1.) All those PS1/PS2 classics we bought digitally on PS3 need to be restored to us and playable on PS4/PS5.
2.) Let me buy the emulator on PSN so that I can use my PS1 and PS2 discs that I already bought.
These two things are far too consumer-friendly, so I seriously doubt they happen.
Re: Assassin's Creed Shadows the Actual Name of AC Red, Reveal This Week
I've wanted this game since the announcement of the very first one. I just don't trust current year Ubisoft. I fully expect a historical fiction "made for modern audiences," a map packed with all sorts of redundant things to do, a season pass for sale in huge letters on the title screen, and ads for OTHER GREAT UBISOFT PRODUCTS! in the pause screen. Please prove me wrong, Ubisoft!
Re: Talking Point: What Are You Playing This Weekend? - Issue 528
Still enjoying a nostalgic replay of Final Fantasy VIII. It's only my second time through, the first being in 1999/2000, so a lot of it might as well be new. I just got Ragnarok, so I'm starting some of the optional side quests and the grind for ultimate weapon materials. Not sure what I'll be in the mood for when I'm finished with it. I may need an RPG break.
Re: Enticing Action RPG REYNATIS Hits PS5, PS4 in September
I'm hoping there's a demo. I'm very intrigued.
Re: Talking Point: What Are You Playing This Weekend? - Issue 527
Busy weekend. Made it a long one to celebrate my and my wife's anniversary. I thought I'd beat the weather and get the yard taken care of Friday night, but my equipment all had other plans. In the end, it took cleaning up some fouled plugs on the riding mower, a complete carb disassembly and cleaning for the push mower, and fixing a kinked fuel line on the trimmer. I managed to get everything done and cleaned up just as the first drops fell late Saturday morning.
Having knocked out everything by Sunday, I spent majority of the day on the PS4 remaster of Final Fantasy VIII. I haven't played it all the way through in over 20 years, so it's great rediscovering all of the twists and turns that I had completely forgotten.
Re: Talking Point: Have Sony's Third-Party PS5 Deals Made Up for Its Lack of First-Party Games?
Maybe I'm just getting too old for this hobby - my selection would have been, "None of them have been great for several years." I may end up purchasing Stellar Blade when the price dips because I enjoy the combat in the demo, difficult as it may be. I will reserve judgement for now on whether the whole experience is great.
Rebirth is a train wreck - Final Fantasy died with XIII, and this whole Re-X trilogy for Final Fantasy VII is strengthening my opinion. I am absolutely stunned that so many find the combat mechanics fun or even usable. Final Fantasy XVI was a pretty ok action game with far too many cut scenes, but it has gone so far off the rails of what Final Fantasy was that I wish they would just change the name.
For first party titles, Open World Game: Post Apocalypse Robots, Open World Game: Super Hero, and Open World Game: Samurai had some entertainment value, but there's so much fluff in all of them. You really need to love that kind of game to keep playing them. They just feel like re-skins of one another: go to spot on map, follow/fight something. Pull up map. Go to next spot. Repeat. The experience is edging closer and closer to passive entertainment.
Re: Korea Announces Bold Plan to Buff Nation's Nascent Console Market
The Korean creative industry is resonating with the west in a big way, and it's been gaining steam for years. Their shows, movies, and games are doing things that western audiences love in storytelling and gameplay. The studios focus on delivering a good experience to everybody, not a message via a vanity project with bloated cost. I certainly hope we see more - the games industry needs a shake-up like this.
Re: Talking Point: What Are You Playing This Weekend? - Issue 526
I'm in a bit of a gaming rut. I've tried spinning up Trails into Reverie, Star Ocean 4, Shining Resonance: Refrain, Yakuza: Like a Dragon, and Soul Hackers 2. None of them are grabbing me. I lost interest in Dragon Quest XI after about 12 hours. Maybe it's the music. I swear the game only has like 4 tracks. The idea of picking up a game controller right now is not appealing at all.
I'm thinking a gaming break is due this weekend. My small engines are all due for oil changes, so I'll probably do that. My mower was running rough last weekend, so I'll chase that too. If the weather calms down, maybe I'll go trout fishing and take care of the brush pile that needs to be burned.
Re: That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime Is Coming to PS5, PS4 as an Action RPG
@Zenos I don't know how you'd do an action RPG if it was based on the source material. It's not super action-heavy, but I suppose that there are good spots in the middle of Season 1 and beginning of Season 2.
If someone wanted to do something in-universe, a back story game following Paul and Ghislaine would be pretty cool.
Re: SMT 5: Vengeance Offers '75 More Hours of Gameplay', Says Atlus
So much Atlus this year. Between this, a second run of P3R with Episode Aigis, and Metaphor, I may every well be taken care of for the rest of the year with my backlog the way it is - just started dabbling with Digital Devil Saga and Soul Hackers 2, trying to decide which one to commit to first.
Re: Ex-Psygnosis, WipEout, Skate Devs Announce New Studio Starlight Games
Awesome, looking forward to their next space fighting game: War of Colonies.
Re: Talking Point: What Are You Playing This Weekend? - Issue 525
@MrBook They really don't. I can't believe it's been nearly 15 years. I remember getting off work at midnight, hitting the Taco Bell drive-thru (spending only $3 in the process), and playing that game at my bachelor pad until 3 or 4am for weeks. This was around the same time I started dating my wife. Just like you mentioned, the mineral mini game and reading all of the descriptions of the planets was such a cool experience. Lots of extrasolar captures, hot Jupiters, and bits of lore about ancient battles that took place.
Re: Final Fantasy 16 Patch 1.31 Brings Big Damage Buffs for Clive, Better Side Quests, and Much More
@Blaze215 Different strokes, I suppose. I played the demo of Rebirth and thought it was clunky. The player attacks have no weight, and I got real tired of being attacked from off screen. FFXVI wasn't great or anything (shame when Nier: Automata offers an amazing blueprint of how an action RPG can play), but it was at least competent.
Re: Final Fantasy 16 Patch 1.31 Brings Big Damage Buffs for Clive, Better Side Quests, and Much More
Is the lesson here that we should wait a full year before diving in to a Square Enix title? This is a game-altering collection of changes.
Seeing this, I'm even MORE hesitant to pick up Rebirth. FFXVI has so much better combat than the FF7 RE-x titles, and seeing that they've continued to refine XVI this long after release makes me want to wait to buy Rebirth until it gets a similar treatment. Just being able to remap controls would be huge.
Re: Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth's Rage-Inducing Retry Wording Has Been Quietly Re-Worked
On behalf of all cheapskates, I offer my thanks to the early adopters for finishing SE's job of play-testing this game.
Re: Talking Point: What Are You Playing This Weekend? - Issue 524
In between household chores and getting ready for the week ahead, dipping my toes in to several games to see what grabs my interest for a play through. After finishing Persona 3 Reload and finishing a run of Persona 5 Royal that I started a year ago, I'm left with the question, "What do I play next?"
Trails in to Reverie - I loved Cold Steel and the Crossbell duology. For some reason, I can't get in to this one. Maybe it's Falcom fatigue.
Octopath Traveler II and Soul Hackers II - both are sitting on the shelf on plastic. I enjoyed the Octopath Traveler II demo, and I've been on a MegaTen kick. Either is viable.
Dragon Quest XI - this one is also sitting on the shelf, but I haven't broken the plastic just yet. I'm playing through the demo now and am really enjoying it. This may be the one.
Evil Within 1 and 2 - landed both very cheaply. I live survival horror, but just haven't played these too yet.
I also have some extended backlog ... I've been meaning to replay Final Fantasy 8, which I haven't beaten in over 20 years. Xenogears and Breath of Fire IV are others that I've been meaning to get around to since they came out.
Decisions decisions.
Re: Preview: Sand Land Could Be a Surprise PS5 Hit, But the Grind Has to Be Good
I'm glad I'm not the only one underwhelmed by the demo. Movement felt nice, and the game was a pleasure to look at - the game just isn't for me. I can tell that a lot of care went in to it though, so I hope fans of the IP enjoy it.
Re: Poll: What Review Score Would You Give Unicorn Overlord?
I only played the demo so didn't give it a ranking. I was underwhelmed by the gameplay, or really lack thereof. There was a lot of potential for the battles to play out like a turn-based RPG. I was unimpressed that the game ends up just playing itself. I'll either skip it entirely or revisit on a deep, deep sale.
Re: Stellar Blade PS5 Demo Drops This Week, Progress Carries to the Full Game
@koffing Great memories there! Getting home from school to see the new PlayStation Magazine in the mailbox was a great feeling. It was extra motivation to blitz through homework, chores, and violin practice so that I could dig in to the demo disc - the magazine I saved for the bus ride to school. Demo discs that came with games were awesome too - would anyone have purchased Zone of the Enders without the Metal Gear Solid 2 demo?
Re: Dragon's Dogma 2 Slated for Adding Sinister PS5 Microtransactions at Launch
Some of these responses are silly. Childish even.
"It's a bad practice!"
I see it all over, but the only justification that I've seen is, "It'll encourage bad game design!" Will it? Maybe. If it does, go after THOSE games. If the game is balanced around these items not being in it, then the game design is fine.
"It's a waste of money!"
What kind of pretentious, self-righteous git do you have to be to tell me what a waste of my money is? I'm in my late 30's, make great money, am married with a kid, and don't want to spend a ton of time on the game. This is a good option for me. I and the many like me are the target audience.
That's exactly what these are - options. When it gets to the point where games pop up the store to buy revival every time you die or force you to watch an ad, then we have an issue. When it's there in the background if you want it and completely separate from the game experience, this is blind outrage.
Re: Rumour: PS5 Pro Is Up to Three Times Faster Than PS5 as Specs Surface
I'm going to stick with the standard. Looking at my library of PS5 games, there is a grand total of 2 games I could not have bought on PS4. I honestly regret buying it in the first place. PS5 will likely be my last Sony console before I make the full switch to PC if they really do decide to lean in on this all-digital future.
Re: Full Price Remake Persona 3 Reload Will Be 'Complete' with Episode Aigis DLC, Says Producer
I guess I'm in the minority here - I think this is just fine. They're actually releasing the content as an expansion rather than as part of a deluxe edition you're forced to buy just to get the new content. The base game as it was released is a complete experience as far as I'm concerned. I paid $65 for it and played for about 75 hours so far. Less than $1 an hour for the experience is worth it to me, especially since I'll be starting another run in August to get ready for the new content and expect to put in another 90 hours or so to run the game again, finish the platinum (which I almost NEVER do), and play Episode Aigis. This was never billed as a remake of FES or Portable. It's a remake of the base game. Getting the ability to purchase Episode Aigis is just frosting on the cake as far as I'm concerned. I believe the devs deserve to be paid for extra work, so I'm happy to buy it.