Earthbound and Dune 24.06.15

I was the winner of a haul of N64 titles of an auction site, so I wasted some time playing a strange bunch of titles for the console. 

First the good, The New Tetris is a more than adequate version of the puzzle classic, it could be the first example of the piece storing being added to Tetris, I might be wrong on that, but its refreshing to find them being more reserved with adding elements than with a lot of games on the N64. The music is a decent remix of the tune too. Castlevania 64 is better than I was expecting from what I’d read before, the button config is a little weird (they seem to be against mapping the A & B buttons) combat is pretty good for the time, the fogging which seemed to blight most games on this platform seems in place with the atmosphere and the day night time transitions are pretty neat. Pokemon Snap, could well be the best Pokemon game i’ve played, an on rails shooter, which forgoes the obvious choice of a gun for a more serine camera. You snap away at various Pokemon and then are rated for the pictures by some old dude when you get back, he wasn’t a fan of the arty framing of my shots of a Meowth. Its got some Metriody elements in that you see things on levels which can’t be achieved until you get upgrades and on the whole is very charming. Mace: The Dark Age is okay, easy enough to button mash your way through the early rounds of the tournament mode and a nice variety of characters. 

Now the bad, or not so much bad, just that time has been rather unkind to them (a problem a lot of N64 titles seem to have) Mischief Makers was a title I was interested in playing for a long time, a 2D platformer on a console that had few and it always reviewed well at a time when the genre wasn’t popular. I really struggled with it though, perhaps its the lack of manual or tutorial, but it seemed overly complicated, with an emphasis on grabbing bits of the environment to get through the game or beat enemies. I didn’t give it much time and I might return to it at some point. Rogue Squadron was the one game I’d played on its release, and was interested in how it had held up, it still looks and sounds good (at least expansion pack enhanced) it was just dreadfully slow, and fogging blighted the levels I played so ships appeared from nowhere and I could just hear the screams for help from my team but had little chance of tracking them down in a maze of fog. Turok 2: Seeds of Evil was far an away the worst of the bunch, the standard controls unplayable, it looked terrible and has way too much platforming for slow first person shooter. I gave up after a couple of minutes, didn’t even see a dinosaur. 

My working week has been night shifts, so I unwisely decided this was a time to get to the end of The Last of Us (PS4), only unwise as the game throws a hell of a lot of emotional turmoil at you. Its not a game which relies on jump scares overly, its more the world it renders which is going to stay with you. The actions of the humans in the game are far worse than the actions of the infected (and the infection itself is a novel take on the zombie genre). Morality in the game is grey, even a character who is associated with rape and cannibalism isn’t presented as overtly evil (at least when introduced) and this is helped by fantastic voice acting. I find it really interesting that a film of this game has been talked about, not because I don’t think it would make a strong film, just that it is as strong an game in narrative that i’ve ever played. The ending is really powerful, and doesn’t go with any obvious choices, the last piece of gun combat in the game feels especially brutal. its not a good video game story. Its a good story, and I hope when if and when the film comes out that the game is recognised as a book would be when translated to film. The only slight blemishes on it are when its a video game, guns are hard to aim (but in the context this works) swimming can be frustrating and on occasion puzzles repeat a few too many times, Anyway away from my rambling about what might happen, a few quick points about the game I loved, the inclusion of animals as a thing of wonder, collectables which help to build the world, the best hunting sequence I’ve ever played and crafting that feels rewarding rather than irritating.

I also tried a bit of the DLC released for Smash Bros 4, Ryu feels like a really unique addition, and its a great choice to have his original moveset from Streetfigher 2 usable. Bit odd they added moves from later iterations of Streetfighter though (although perhaps its referencing the 3DS version of 4?).

Earthbound and Dune 17.06.15

Wasn't blown away by the PS+ releases this month, but a couple of games stood out (apart from the amazing Ground Zeroes which I'd purchased a while back) Futuridium EP Deluxe isn't the mast catchy title, but its a simple, addictive arcady shooter. Your spaceship flies forward whilst constantly draining power and you have to clear a simple stage of targets before your power runs out (and each target you hit will knock your power back up) there is a leniency given by being able to reverse your direction in a click of a button, which is handy but also a creates a few seconds of confusion as you realign yourself with the world. Hit anything and your ship blows up and is respawned a distance from the level, so it ramps up in difficulty pretty quickly. Only a few levels in, its a fun game, certainly wouldn't want to play it for any more than half hour chunks but it also looks nice and has a dated but catchy soundtrack.

Super Exploding Zoo has a much catchier name, but with the more simple premise comes a more complex game, the aim being to protect an egg from alien invaders with a range of different exploding animals, penguins are basic, monkeys can climb stuff, crocodiles act as a bridge etc. The aliens are nicely designed but I found the look of the animals I've encountered so far to be a little generic, and the game became tricky pretty quickly as you have to seek out a range of different animals to complete your task. It may well be that this game is more suited to a touch screen device, or certainly a handheld. Both the titles i've played this month from PS+ are available for the Vita as well, and that may be the better place to experience them.

I found a copy of Shadow Warrior (PS4) cheap this week and played quite a bit of it. An old fashioned FPS (and a reboot of an old PC game apparently), Doom like with the attitude of Duke Nukem 3D mixed with a little bit of No More Heroes. So far i've found it a pretty unique first person shooter in that shooting is the least effective way to clear a room, instead it seems a better option to go with the sword chopping up waves of enemies (which is immensely satisfying). Each section you complete gives you a rating out of 5 for how you did which helps it feel arcady and unlike a lot of modern shooters. Enemies don't range that much in terms of appearance, something the game makes reference too in the dialogue, but it does mix up humans and demons to make you think a bit more during combat. Everything in the world seems overly explosive (especially when hit with a sword) which led to a couple of comical deaths in an arcade, but checkpoints are spaced evenly so you're quickly back to where you were even when dying in a stupid way. It looks nice, especially the temple opening with tunnels of Tori gates showing you where to go, these act as a better path than later in the opening level where you have to navigate mazes of bamboo, which can be easy to get trapped in, with no direction from the game, this is the only issue I had with the game on the whole, it seems easy to loose track of your objective and how to get there, I wasted time trying to jump through thick bamboo or onto a toppled lamppost only to find there was a simpler path the game wanted me to take, this isn't the games fault, more that objective markers and pointers have become so common in this genre given the freedom to roam I act like an idiot! Further into the game it gets much harder, even on the normal setting, I'm keen to see this game through to the end so will keep plugging away at it.


 

Earthbound and Dune 09.06.15

I’d played and completed Super Mario 3D World (Wii U) long before playing Super Mario 3D Land (3DS) and that was rather unfortunate, 3D Land is a fantastic game, its taken me a couple of weeks to get through the first loop of gameplay, the levels are far tighter than the Wii U sequel and with that comes more exact platforming which makes it a harder game, certainly not too hard though. The best levels are the ones which play with height and it’s here that it really shines, I’ve not got much more to say on the game apart from the final showdown with Bowser is a great entry to the many fights I’ve had with him over the past 20 or so years.

Most of my time over the past few weeks though has been on a couple of new releases, first offThe Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (PS4) a game which seems universally loved, and it was this praise that tipped me over the edge to buying it. Personally though so far i’ve found the game too deep an RPG with too much to do, I simply don’t have the time to get into it, which is a shame because in places its hard not to be blown away by the scope of the game both in look and storytelling. I made the mistake of trying to blast through the central storyline first of all (without reading the scores of text which do highlight what level you should be before attempting them) and quickly found myself stuck in a cave fighting an enemy I had no chance of beating, so I made the bleak choice of reverting back to a much earlier save. So now i’ve exclusively taken on lesser quests, searching for carts and ghosts by wells. I can see so much in it which is fantastic, at the moment though the scope of the game is just to vast for what I’m looking for now. I’ll certainly give it more time at some point though. 

The Witcher may have been a victim of the other new release which i’ve got into though Splatoon (Wii U) which is the perfect game to play in short bursts. Balancing the actual matches perfectly in terms of duration so the back and forth nature of it doesn’t become tedious. The balancing of the weapons is another area where this game shines, I can see the benefit of the paint brushes and rollers but cant get to grips with them so its pleasing to see they aren’t overpowered, my tactic is to go in with one of the heavier guns as far into enemy territory, then on my inevitable death and return focus on making sure my own area stays inked in my own colour, its a tactic that seems to work more often than not. It’s so pleasing to play a game (online too) where I don’t feel underpowered or i’m getting a tirade of abuse from other players, I might be a minority but I love the absence of voice chat, in a game so tied to visual communication its not important. On top of all this it has a pretty robust single player campaign which introduces (so far at least) neat mechanics not employed in the multiplayer. Multiplayer is where this game will hopefully continue to develop though, and Nintendo have been pretty good at releasing a few treats early on to beef up the slim content with its release, an interesting approach at keeping the user base returning at interested in the game. Long may people keep coming back too as I really like this game. 

Introduction

Hi there,

So for the past year and a bit myself and Dom have been writing semi regular dairies on our gaming life. We try to keep things positive and relatively spoiler free and talk about both current and older games. 

Hopefully you'll keep reading and we'll keep writing!

Pip & Dom