[djtiesto]

Well, I beat Mother 1! And yeah, Itoi even said that they never bothered to balance the final area (Mt. Itoi) due to trying to make deadlines... that whole area was ridiculous, but a bit of grinding, a lot of running, and crossing my fingers seemed to work.

So now it's on to a replay in FF Type-0 HD, which opens up new missions, and continue with Suikoden Tierkreis.

[Dr Lancer-X]

djtiesto, on 18 August 2015 - 12:32 PM, said:

Well, I beat Mother 1! And yeah, Itoi even said that they never bothered to balance the final area (Mt. Itoi) due to trying to make deadlines... that whole area was ridiculous, but a bit of grinding, a lot of running, and crossing my fingers seemed to work.

I had no idea at the time that the final boss was essentially a non-boss*, so I did waste a fair bit of time grinding that wasn't necessary - since I assumed the enemies were balanced to prepare you for the final fight (and I also wanted to get the highest level PSI moves). In retrospect I probably would have been better off just running away / using super bombs for the battles you don't have EVE for.

Oh well, it's still a fantastic game.

*not like Mother 2's, where you still had a fairly challenging leadup- in Mother you just start singing immediately (after raising defense and putting up shields) while using healing items / PSI, so the minimum level necessary is far lower than that of the surrounding area.

[Exophase]

CJA, on 16 July 2015 - 12:00 PM, said:

LISA: MEH I bought this out of a nostalgia crave and it's been pretty disappointing so far.

I was debating this one and kind of had to work up the willpower to tackle it but I'm pretty thoroughly enjoying it now.

It's one of those games that I go into knowing I'll be looking at a walkthrough after beating it (and in this case, possibly playing through again). Not that I'm naive enough to think things can get much saner.

[T-Bone]

I've been playing Heroes of Might and Magic 3. I'm so incredibly addicted. End up dealing with insomnia due to it. I just did my first ever stream while playing it. I'll be doing more stream on Youtube.

[zzo38]

I have Linux computer now, so I played many of the same GameBoyAdvance homebrew games (looploop, Tetanus on Drugs, Puzzle Dungeon, GEMini, etc) but also in the package manager I have found others such as Amoebax, Biniax2, Emilia Pinball. I like to play the Amoebax game with both player's controls set to the same keys (by editing the configuration file directly; the UI doesn't seem to allow that), and then try to earn as many points as I can before either side is unable to continue (the sequence is the same for both sides but ghost-block appear at different position at random on each side). But I also like Taisen Tsume Shogi (a commercial GameBoy game) by Athena.

This post has been edited by zzo38: 30 August 2015 - 04:54 PM

[Goshi]

Shadowrun Hong Kong, great stuff.

T-Bone, on 27 August 2015 - 07:32 PM, said:

I've been playing Heroes of Might and Magic 3. I'm so incredibly addicted. End up dealing with insomnia due to it. I just did my first ever stream while playing it. I'll be doing more stream on Youtube.

That game is a classic!

[djtiesto]

Just about finished with my Type-0 HD replay. The alternate missions were kinda cool, the expert trials were annoying and repetitive. The replay didn't really offer much in the way of new story, but at least I managed to get a Platinum out of the deal.

Also started MGS5 (PS4). It seems really cool so far but overwhelming with the whole base building stuff, and I'm still getting used to the open-world nature of it. Since I'm such a sucker for Kojima's ridiculous storylines, I kinda wish it was more of a tightly-paced heavily-cinematic game but considering how that type of game has been done to death last gen (with Uncharted, Gears of War, etc) I understand why Kojima went with something different.

And I beat Quackshot Starring Donald Duck (Genesis). Great game with some cool level design. Music wasn't that good, though... then again, not all Disney themed games could have as awesome music as DuckTales 1.

[Baby Bonnie Hood]

I played Undertale.

Okay, not actually. I watched my cousin play it, and then we decided to watch a video playthrough of it. Best RPG of this year hands down. Must play.

Argh, why do I still have no computer? Could've played it myself :x

[Exophase]

Baby Bonnie Hood, on 12 October 2015 - 10:08 AM, said:

I played Undertale.

Okay, not actually. I watched my cousin play it, and then we decided to watch a video playthrough of it. Best RPG of this year hands down. Must play.

Argh, why do I still have no computer? Could've played it myself :x

Like with some other games, stuck waiting to see if a Linux version ever happens.

Pretty much abandoned any notion of gaming on my Windows laptop/TV anymore. Only after taking the plunge to run Steam on my Linux desktop have I started semi-regularly playing games, for the first time in several years.

But it's in this uncomfortable state where enough stuff supports it to have a decent selection but enough stuff doesn't to be really frustrating. I know not even 1% of users report using it in the surveys but I do wonder what the breakdown is for actual spending.

[Dr Lancer-X]

Exophase, on 13 October 2015 - 11:17 AM, said:

But it's in this uncomfortable state where enough stuff supports it to have a decent selection but enough stuff doesn't to be really frustrating. I know not even 1% of users report using it in the surveys but I do wonder what the breakdown is for actual spending.

And it's a little sad considering everyone's using things like Unity and Unreal Engine nowadays that can publish for Linux-- it's just that in most cases people just don't bother.

[Hoof]

I was so happy to pick up Mother 1 and finally get a chance to play it. I put it off for so long. It's pretty great stuff so far; it's something I wish I would have had as a kid, because it would have blown my mind. I'm also playing Metroid Fusion and considering starting Ys 3 or Ys 4... never beat 3 as a kid and never played 4.

[djtiesto]

Ys 4 comes in 3 different versions, each is different enough to warrant a play:

Memories of Celceta - the newest game in the franchise, on Vita. This is also Falcom's only "official" version, since the SNES and PCE games were made by TonkinHouse and Hudson, respectively. It's a pretty decent game but a little slow-moving compared to the other games in the series. Ever since Ys 7, it seems that Falcom is borrowing from their Kiseki series and making the games much wordier... which works on the more slow-paced, story-driven Kiseki games, but in Ys I just wanna get out there, kick ass, and listen to buttrock. Also there's very light resource gathering/crafting in here, which further bogs the pacing down a bit... Why does every RPG need god damn crafting nowadays, it was novel when the Star Ocean games did it back in the day, but now it's been done to death

Mask of the Sun - the weakest of the Ys 4 titles, but it's also the shortest. Has the "dash into enemies" combat style, but it feels a bit off compared to the PCE titles. Doesn't feel as 'developed' (for lack of a better term) as the PCE game.

Dawn of Ys - my favorite of the Ys 4 games. Amazing music, great boss fights, a large variety in areas to travel to, and without a lot of the extraneous fluff that Memories of Celceta has.

Mask of the Sun and Dawn of Ys got unofficial fan translations, while Memories of Celceta ended up with an official release thanks to X-SEED.

For Ys 3, I'd recommend both the PCE version (for that astounding soundtrack) and Oath in Felghana, which many people consider the best game in the franchise.

This post has been edited by djtiesto: 13 October 2015 - 03:42 AM

[Dr Lancer-X]

Ys IV: Dawn of Ys is pretty great and the one I recommend, but I'm a Ys "purist" who doesn't really like to see the gameplay change at all. I skipped Ys III because I have a fairly fixed idea of what a Ys game is. Ys IV feels like it follows on from Ys II story-wise despite being by a different company, so it felt pretty natural to go Ys I, Ys II, Ys IV.

[Exophase]

Lancer-X, on 12 October 2015 - 09:57 PM, said:

And it's a little sad considering everyone's using things like Unity and Unreal Engine nowadays that can publish for Linux-- it's just that in most cases people just don't bother.

In this case it's GameMaker but there's supposed to be some export module thing you can use to get that on Linux.

[Dr Lancer-X]

Sakura no Uta

This eroge is I guess notable because it was originally intended to be released in 2004, but a few funny things happened and it was finally released yesterday. The scenario writer is insanely good, though, so I'm very confident that I'll end up enjoying this thoroughly. There's been other eroges that have been stuck in development hell for longer, but none of those have actually come out, so...

[Hoof]

So I haven't yet finished Mother, but I'm loving the humor and atmosphere. Nor did I start Ys 3 or Ys 4 (Mask of the Sun), but I did play though Alcahest and was really into it. It felt like a fast paced Soul Blazer and I really dig that. It's also got a sweet soundtrack.

I'm also playing Megaman X2, but goddamn am I rusty! That game is wayyy harder than I remember.. I feel like Megaman X was more balanced, but I might be nostalgia-struck. That one's next.

[Lachesis]

i finally caved and decided to play ocarina of time

it's atrocious, even by 1998 standards. why does anyone like it

[Dr Lancer-X]

Lachesis, on 24 October 2015 - 06:39 PM, said:

i finally caved and decided to play ocarina of time

it's atrocious, even by 1998 standards. why does anyone like it

Never finished it myself, but I am in total agreement. The draw of Zelda games was stuff like tight + responsive controls and non-linear progression. Not that Ocarina of Time was bad compared to other early 3D action adventure games, but I'm still not sure why it has the acclaim it continues to enjoy today.

[CJA]

ocarina of time had rad music, the number one key to snagging people by their nostalgia scruffs. I can't enjoy playing it nowadays, but I can listen to Song of Storms for an hour on repeat.

I'm playing Big Pharma which is really cool! It's a puzzle/strategy game that seems at first to be a Zachtronics type programming puzzler, but really you use more long-term economic strategy rather than algorithm design prowess. Expect a writeup soon. It's by the team that made the Democracy games, but I think that this title redeems them at least a little. It's a very nice, easy, slow game and I really love that it allows you to take your time and have fun mixing drugs together.

Speaking of music being a big thing: THE MUSIC. The actual soundtrack of Big Pharma I'd give a solid A because it's fun but very repetitive. But it CHANGES and ADDS LAYERS based on what view you're in. While you're laying belts and machines, the game lets the high frequencies of the soundtrack through; while you're examining discovered cures it cuts the highs and mids and replaces them with a soothing pad section, and while you're investigating ingredients you get a nice djembe (or psuedo djembe) beat. I love it when games play with music like that.

I hope it goes in a good indie bundle soon, I'd pay around ten bucks for it but not the 25 that Steam wants for it.

[Lachesis]

Lancer-X, on 24 October 2015 - 05:16 AM, said:

Never finished it myself, but I am in total agreement. The draw of Zelda games was stuff like tight + responsive controls and non-linear progression. Not that Ocarina of Time was bad compared to other early 3D action adventure games, but I'm still not sure why it has the acclaim it continues to enjoy today.

Me either; I'm at the final boss of the Shadow Temple (meaning it's just the desert and then the final dungeon left). The best I can say about this game is that the dungeons are fine, the music is fine—sorry CJA but that is how i feel, some tracks are good, but the goron city music for example just makes me cringe—the controls are okay for most of what they try to accomplish. As an exercise, compare Metroid Prime's targeting with Ocarina of Time's; it's a four year difference, but it's interesting in retrospect how Metroid Prime got everything right that Ocarina of Time got so, so wrong.

What infuriates me so much about this game is how much it seems to actively enjoy wasting the player's time. Hyrule field. King Zora moving. Bats that are nigh impossible to target that freeze you for seconds at a time. NPCs tricking you into repeating long text boxes where you have to watch the text scroll on one letter at a time (they intentionally turn off the skipping feature for "important" scenes). It takes several seconds to open a chest, because I guess it is "moar epic", or something. I haven't even bothered trying to collect all of the heart pieces, because it's futile. Exploring for items isn't fun like it was in A Link to the Past and the other games that preceded OoT. It's just a slog.

Speaking of A Link to the Past, the plot is the exact same, except it has about ten times as much self-important filler, the world switching gimmick takes much longer to execute and involves long, tedious cutscenes, and the world switching gimmick isn't used nearly to its full potential. You aren't exploring with it, you're just committing yourself to long backtracking segments because, for instance, you forgot to go back earlier and bomb the rock near the castle to get the macguffin that lets you enter a dungeon much later in the game. I can't blame them for trying to play the formula as safe as possible, but if that was their approach they should have spent some of the time in the 4-5 years it took to make this game to tighten everything up more, maybe. I mean, a lot of what it was trying to do was new-ish, I guess, but still

On the positive side, I now have a mental list of about 100 things I shouldn't do in the game I'm currently working on because of this game.

tl;dr this game Truley is danald and Mickey the Rondent

[Baby Bonnie Hood]

Undertale's music is also pretty great. Memorable, fits most situations, and just pleasant to listen to.

[Dr Lancer-X]

I'm playing Moraff's Dungeons of the Unforgiven. Nearly finished it, too; the game that always eluded me in my youth is about to be conquered.



Sakura no Uta is pretty great so far; fantastic music as always for this developer.

[Lachesis]

Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia. i started it a while back but never got around to finishing it. looking forward to hard mode.

[Old-Sckool]

As a self-proclaimed grand master of Ocarina of Time, I haven't played the game normally recently to remember why the game is good. What I really like about the game is being able to dig into it's quirks and glitches, since it becomes really complex that way.

Lachesis, on 25 October 2015 - 11:54 PM, said:

Me either; I'm at the final boss of the Shadow Temple (meaning it's just the desert and then the final dungeon left). The best I can say about this game is that the dungeons are fine, the music is fine—sorry CJA but that is how i feel, some tracks are good, but the goron city music for example just makes me cringe—the controls are okay for most of what they try to accomplish. As an exercise, compare Metroid Prime's targeting with Ocarina of Time's; it's a four year difference, but it's interesting in retrospect how Metroid Prime got everything right that Ocarina of Time got so, so wrong.

Seems a little unfair to compare Prime to Ocarina's Z-Targeting engine, since Prime is in first person and you don't have to figure out what to do with the camera at all. I don't know what you think doesn't work specifically with Ocarina's Z-Targeting system, but from off the top of my head targeting Keese and Guays (bats and crows) doesn't work well. Z-Targeting appears to be designed to work best with targeting things around the same level as Link, and Keese/Guays tend to hang out a lot higher than that, and can attack you from behind or at bad angles. Z-Targeting also has a pretty short range which makes it harder to look at them with C-Up and target that way, and Keese/Guays are able to escape the target range fairly easily.

I guess another stab against Ocarina's Z-Targeting is that it's just much easier to not use it at all to fight certain enemies. When locked on you lose track of your immediate surroundings, which can get you in trouble sometimes. Then you have Poes which are deliberately designed to disappear and become invulnerable the moment you target on to them.

Quote

What infuriates me so much about this game is how much it seems to actively enjoy wasting the player's time. Hyrule field. King Zora moving. Bats that are nigh impossible to target that freeze you for seconds at a time. NPCs tricking you into repeating long text boxes where you have to watch the text scroll on one letter at a time (they intentionally turn off the skipping feature for "important" scenes). It takes several seconds to open a chest, because I guess it is "moar epic", or something. I haven't even bothered trying to collect all of the heart pieces, because it's futile. Exploring for items isn't fun like it was in A Link to the Past and the other games that preceded OoT. It's just a slog.

Keese/Guays are 100 times less potent if you toss a Deku Nut when they come near you, and you can button mash out of being frozen, but the catch is that if you're being frozen by a Freezard or trap chest you can usually mash so fast that it ends up re-freezing you. The slow text speed was fixed in the 3DS remake, and is likely a product of only thoroughly testing the Japanese build. In a casual run, you probably spend a good 20-30 minutes extra on text in the English version vs. the Japanese. Egoraptor mentioned the chest thing in his Sequelitis video and I never really found it to be that big of an issue. The only chests that have the long animation have either key items in them or have the dungeon map/compass/boss key.

I can say that I've never collected every item in a lot of Zeldas, Ocarina of Time included. There are far too many Gold Skulltulas for me to care, and there is no way to keep track of what Heart Pieces you've obtained, and collecting all of either isn't particularly rewarding. At the very least, they're interesting to have around for the speedrunning community because we have Bingo races which provide opportunities for collecting them. In the modern era of Zelda, I feel that Majora's Mask is the best at rewarding players for picking up collectibles because the masks are pretty neat and you usually get a little extra back story in the process, but even then I never bothered getting every heart piece.

Quote

Speaking of A Link to the Past, the plot is the exact same, except it has about ten times as much self-important filler, the world switching gimmick takes much longer to execute and involves long, tedious cutscenes, and the world switching gimmick isn't used nearly to its full potential. You aren't exploring with it, you're just committing yourself to long backtracking segments because, for instance, you forgot to go back earlier and bomb the rock near the castle to get the macguffin that lets you enter a dungeon much later in the game. I can't blame them for trying to play the formula as safe as possible, but if that was their approach they should have spent some of the time in the 4-5 years it took to make this game to tighten everything up more, maybe. I mean, a lot of what it was trying to do was new-ish, I guess, but still

Fun fact about that macguffin, it was originally located at the top of Death Mountain Trail, while the Spin Attack was located at Zelda's Castle, and before that it was actually one of the items the sages give you. Go figure.

This post has been edited by Old-Sckool: 01 November 2015 - 09:01 AM

[Lachesis]

Quote

Fun fact about that macguffin, it was originally located at the top of Death Mountain Trail, while the Spin Attack was located at Zelda's Castle, and before that it was actually one of the items the sages give you. Go figure.

You know, that actually makes sense, and I've managed to do anything useful with the Spin Attack... zero times.

I stopped killing skulltulas once I hit 50 because I don't really need more money... more about the heart pieces, though, I did a little math a while back and realized there would be as many heart pieces hidden as in ALttP and Link's Awakening combined (two games where I have found everything), and that a lot of them were hidden in mini-games I wasn't interested in playing, or just more well-hidden in general than in the two aforementioned 2D games. That's pretty much when I decided to not bother finding them all

I watched Cosmo's 18:10 run of this game when I started to play it and it was really impressive. I've never managed to glitch it playing casually, but its glitches seem to have a lot of depth

Thank you for making a serious and thoughtful reply to my condescending vent post

[Old-Sckool]

Yea the spin attack isn't that great. It always deals the same damage as a normal stab unless you charge it red (I always thought it did double damage regardless), and there aren't any situations where you end up being mobbed by tons of enemies that you need to kill. It actually does have one odd purpose: in the water temple (f1 south path) there's a skulltula and a crystal switch locked behind a gate. You can only reach the switch with a blue or better spin attack because it's placed far enough from the gate that a bomb explosion can't reach it.

[djtiesto]

Finally beat Metal Gear Solid 5 (105 hours!) and Suikoden Tierkreis (DS), so I've been playing Hatsune Miku: Project Mirai (3DS) and Wild Arms 5 (PS2). And a whole lotta shmups on my friend's X68000

[Dr Lancer-X]

Life is Strange

The time travel mechanic is total inexcusable irredeemable bullshit but I'm enjoying it so far (finished the first 3 episodes)

[Exophase]

Finally beat Undertale on the Genocide run (if any of you saw I made a post here a while ago thinking the game was broken at the end of the Pacifist run but it was me just not getting the game's meta-ness at first, so I deleted it). The last boss took an awful lot of attempts.

[Baby Bonnie Hood]

Sounds like you had a bad time

Lancer-X, on 07 November 2015 - 11:39 AM, said:

The time travel mechanic is total inexcusable irredeemable bullshit but I'm enjoying it so far (finished the first 3 episodes)

I heard that you might not like how it ultimately ends.