Earthbound and Dune 13.07.16

Streetfighter V (PS4) came back onto my radar when it released its story mode a couple of weeks back. It was a chance to play a game which I had enjoyed the feel of quite a bit, with more purpose. The story itself is fairly silly stuff, giant mechanical moons crashing into the earth and a god demon thing which wants to eat fighters. I'm not too up on my Streetfighter lore and don't know where this all sits in the greater timeline but saying this I found it all satisfying, despite the fact it retains the single round fights of the underwhelming character stories included in the original release. At the start of the 3 hours or so it took me to get through it was simple stuff and while I wasn't having to retry fights until the last three or four in the game the challenge did have a subtile gradient to it. Also by forcing me to play as a variety of fighters throughout some fights were harder purely because I didn't know the characters moveset, any time I controlled M.Bison for example was not a good time. I really liked how it introduced either characters to be released as DLC or named background characters to mix things up a bit. Certainly with the limited roster of 20 characters at the moment it needed this to make the story seem a bit bigger the only complaint about this is that the Dolls soon became like Fire Emblem characters in Smash Bros, there were a few too many of them. It's finale was cool and over the top but for me it needed a hint of a returning character in the league of E Honda or Blanka, again though i'm not too up on the world of these characters and a few of the surprises fell short on me simply because I didn't recognise who was being introduced. All in all it was a fun couple of hours, encouraging me to play a few online matches after it was all over, I really like the new feature of rematches with your opponent which has been added since I last played. Everything added recently has made it seem closer to a full game, its a shame it wasn't there at release!

As well as this I played a bit of Furi (PS4) I say a bit, I played a few hours, but didn't get very far, mostly due to my incompetence at games like this. Guided by a rabbit through a series of boss fights as you sort've break out of jail is the basic premise of the game. The boss fights themselves have played out so far as a combination of duel stick shooting sections followed by hand to hand combat which is more timing based (and theres a handy health refresh for a successful parry) the neat thing, which has kept me playing despite how bad I am at it is that there is a three attempt system to each fight which is refreshed when you knock off a full bar of your opponents health. Meaning that there is ample time for me to get used to the waves of attacks thrown at me. It feels very much like a boss fight from Bloodborne to me, which is an impressive scope to aim for from an indie game. It all looks very stylish and the voice acting is strong so far. I'm certainly enjoying it more than I thought I would initially and despite how terrible I am at it!

Pocket Card Jockey (3DS) continues to sap away most of my time, I've now got a stable of horses with variable success on the track. I bred a horse, Tinopener, who wasn't as good as I was hoping, very quick but then I realised the speed of your horse effects the amount of time you have to play solitaire, so a quick horse isn't necessarily a good thing. I then took another ride, Paul Ross, who wasn't great but I've been working purely on levelling him up, not too bothered about winning the initial races, instead getting the little horseshoes and lightbulbs to make him a high level horse with lots of skills, time will tell. The game is a dark path of simulation and cards which continues to be the most fun I'm having with video games at the moment.

Earthbound and Dune 06.07.16

I bought two racing games on the 3DS this week and the first, Mario Kart 7, was everything I was expecting it to be. I came in from the wrong angle of having played its successor Mario Kart 8 already so a lot of the new features added had been improved upon along with the better tracks from this game being recreated for the WiiU version. That's not to say I was downbeat about my time with the game, its a lot of fun and a couple of the tracks added are great, I especially like the tracks which are split into sections rather than the conventional laps. Flight (or air-gliding) being one of the features added for this iteration is used much better than its successor, I felt that short cuts and speed boosts were a lot of fun to find with this technique. The roster, which has been expanded and chopped and changed so much by this stage, is one of the weaker for my tastes. Obviously this is a minor thing, bearing in mind how most are just skin changes for your racer, I found myself sticking to the predictable Toad and Koopa Trooper throughout. On my loose scale of this series, being a rare thing that I've played and finished every one released, I'd place it somewhere between Super Circuit and Super Mario Kart, I certainly got more out of Mario Kart DS. For the record here's my uninformed Mario Kart Chart.

8. Mario Kart Wii 

7. Mario Kart 64

6. Mario Kart: Super Circuit

5. Mario Kart 7

4. Super Mario Kart

3. Mario Kart 8

2. Mario Kart DS

1. Mario Kart: Double Dash!!

So with that cleared up I played a lot of a game that would probably go straight to the top of my horse racing crossed with solitaire games list. Pocket Card Jockey (3DS) it's as addictive a game as I've played in a long time. Tasked with controlling a resurrected jockey, who's not great at racing horses but enjoys playing cards the game then goes on to explain the at first daunting combination of solitaire and horse racing. It goes something like this; 1) race starts and you play a bit of speed solitaire to determine how quick out of the blocks you are and where you place early on 2) you play a bit of solitaire (for a varying amount of rounds during the race) the better you do at this the more energy your horse has and more injections of pace you get at the end of the race. 3) You physically mark out where your horse goes on the track, areas which will slow down expend more energy are shown, along with areas which will retain energy 4) depending on the distance of the race you then enter the home stretch and here the game seems to weigh up how you've done for how quick your horse is but also placement of the horse and the amount of boosts you have at this point can be really important. On top of all this the game has a levelling system to your horse, which includes certain skills they learn and the temperament of the creature, oh and there's a shop which sells special one time items for races along with puzzle pieces which when complete I think they boost a horse or something? At times, especially early on I found it all rather overwhelming but quickly a seemingly complex random assortment of mechanics became clear and more importantly a lot of fun. There's a massive element of chance, on numerous occasions my ride would be undone by an AI mishap or a bad hand of cards but weirdly I don't find it frustrating. The races are short enough to always have me ready to have one more go and on top of all this its got a lovely aesthetic to the whole experience only made better by some genuinely funny characters and some awesome music. I absolutely adore this game, its everything I want from a handheld game and possibly the best thing I've played on a handheld since Tetris.  

Earthbound and Dune 27.06.16

On name alone Dangerous Golf (PS4) seems like a winner and the sort of game i'd like to play. It looks really nice too the only things I found hold it back are a complete lack of instruction on what to do and some really horrible bugs. The concept is golf in the loosest terms, my target was still a hole but in one of four constrained environments, the attraction though is that each is filled with items to destroy, this destruction fills up a meter which once filled gives me more control of my next shot. Failure to fill the meter tends to mean replaying the hole. All of this is pretty sketchy because from the outset your given a loading screen of the controls and that's it. I played the first few holes quickly and got decent scores but wasn't too sure what I was doing to get these scores. It hit a big bump in the road when it came to a timed hole, I had to get through it quickly, it was only once I'd learn't through trial and error that the time consuming smashbreaker can be stopped in its flow that I worked out how to get past this level. I then got through a few more levels and the game started to hit its stride, nuances with placement of shots and feathering the slow motion destructive controls felt like I was actually using skill to achieve scores. Especially the holes which involve multiple targets in a brief time period. Then a few hard crashes happened, something my Playstation hadn't ever done. It was really disappointing because it was at the point where I was starting to enjoy the game. I've gone back to it a couple of times and chipped away a few more levels and i'm not disliking it, in fact I think with a few patches or updates it could be something as good as its name deserves. 

I had fun with NBA 2K16 (PS4) for all the wrong reasons, hoping for something more like NBA Jam I knew it was way too technical for my slight knowledge of basketball as soon as I play a match as the sizeable full game installed. When it finally installed though I got into a bit of the the Spike Lee directed story mode, starting as a play of sorts, which the directed interrupts a rehearsal and then requested that I enjoy the experience which was coming up. Mine was made more light hearted by my earlier decision to mould a loose interpretation of what I looked like into the character I played. Ginger, bearded, Caucasian, skinny and as short as a basketball video game would allow me. He was then thrust into the streets of Harlem playing basketball with his two African American friends, nothing untoward at all, but then one of the friends announced herself as my sister, for the role of the story I was happy to assume I was adopted, but as it developed she became my twin sister and I met my equally confusing parents. That my character was nicknamed "Freq" by everyone would have seemed an intentional joke but its all told in such a serious tone, I'm sure as the story developed it would have told something interesting but I couldn't get past how silly it seemed by my own accidental design. The story seemed to me to be something I was being told, rather than something I had any influence over. That played into the basketball games themselves, I was announced as the brightest prospect in the sport early on and despite my failings at it initially the path of my character seemed set in stone. I was playing shots from all over the court in no time and I started to realise this wasn't because I was especially good at the game, rather the story dictated that I had to be good at it. I got as far a routine of interviews which saw me decide on which college to play for, problem with these being that they're entwined with games of basketball so by the point where I had to decide who to play for I'd forgotten what every college had said. I'm sure there's a fantastic basketball game in there somewhere but its a bit too simulation for my tastes.

Gone Home (PS4) Had been on my radar for a while, so I was pleased to see it release on PS Plus. Its everything I thought it would be, having read about it in the context of other games I've enjoyed such as Firewatch and Everyones Gone to the Rapture. Its very narrative focused, and short to play through, without saying to much I was really pleased to see how it worked with my assumptions to what was going to happen. I had a strange moment in the game where in a burst of silliness I decided to though items around my sisters room and generally make a mess, I walked out of the room and down the hall and had a pang of guilt, I went back and cleaned up as best I could. I guess that's a testament to the immersion of the game.

 

Earthbound and Dune 22.06.16

I've found Fallout 4: Far Harbour (PS4) both a fantastic and frustrating piece of add on content which while it seems great value goes in some weird directions it didn't need to. The main quest takes place on a big island north of the area which the body of the game has taken place so far, but that's not after a bit on detective work first. I opted to take Nick Valentine along as my companion (the game not so subtly pointed me in that direction straight away) the initial work I needed to do to get to Far Harbour is fairly simple but its a cool angle on the synth subject which is covered a lot in the game. As soon as I got to Far Harbour though it got a lot more difficult, soon introduced to a number of new creatures in a fight not too dissimilar than the early fight against a Deathclaw in the main game. The only difference is I opted to tackle it without power armour so it was a lot more tricky and my ammunition and health restoring resources which I'd squirrelled away for hours were depleting at an alarming rate. I then made the mistake of taking on a new companion and sending Nick back to Sanctuary, this new companions gruff nature and seeming alcoholism was funny at first but the joke wears thin after an hour or so travelling with him. On top of this it seems like there would be a lot more story which would unfold with Nick at my side, especially when you meet up with the synth commune which has a big part to play in the story. The plot has seen me reintroduced to the children of the Atom, who are just as dislikeable as when I met them in the main story. In fact I had to resist the temptation of gunning them down as soon as I met them, the only thing stopping me being the slog through toxic marshes littered with weird angler fish mutants to get there. I'm glad I did though as it went in some interesting places at this point and getting deeper into the weird cult was interesting and well written. Sadly it was soon after that the weakest part of the new content reared its head, a sequence of puzzles involving the construction mechanics which at first was a fresh idea but by the end (it took me over an hour to get through them, I'm not great at puzzles) was just boring and frustrating, I was unsure whether leaving the sequence would erase my progress especially without the option to save while your working through it. Along with this it all involves fiddly placement of items and tricky platforming in first person (which is rarely much fun). I've worked through this now, which is a massive relief and hopefully it will become more of the reasons I play a Fallout game again soon. 

Like I say I've enjoyed a lot of it, the combat steps up a level in challenge on the island. Most of the factions are littered about the habitat and at least one new one, who introduce a fun new nautical themed weapon. I like the way the stories going too especially the reasons for the abundance of radiation on the island, I'm just not too sure once I get through the main content that I'll be as keen to root about for other things to do, which is a shame because it looks like there is plenty on offer.

Played a bit of Downwell (PS4) too as it came out sneakily on the console. I was a bit caught out because I was so used to touch controls, it certainly wasn't as easy as I expected, but after a couple of tumbles down the well I was getting further than I had playing on an iPhone. The other benefit of playing on the PlayStation I found was I was chasing trophies more than I had with other games, and the trophies themselves were cool ways to attempt playing the game. Such as get to the bottom of a stage without firing a shot or killing an enemy or even landing, basically it added a new way to play the game. Its really cheap too, so well worth it!

Earthbound and Dune 26.05.2016

In little over a week I completed the campaign of Doom (PS4) and I had a whale of a time with it. The game is relatively short (maybe 12hours) but it never overstays its welcome but this is a key factor of this fantastic game. Its balanced in such a way that every fight, boss encounter and level is such that just before it became tedious it ended. The plot is close to a retelling of the first Doom, taking control of the ambiguous hero (presumably from Doom & Doom 2) it was mere seconds before I was killing my first demons, unrecognisable from the footsoldiers of old but it was a couple of minutes before I fought the more familiar imps. I then died, a lot. The action is fast enough that death didn't feel so much a penalty, more of a chance to hone my skills in murdering the legions of hell. Early on without much prompting I was taught about the new glory kill system which kills enemies in gory, imaginative ways and how by doing this I got health bonuses which were essential to progressing. As much as this seems like a game with a reverence for its past it adds new features in creative ways. The chainsaw is now reduced to a short fuel supply, but using it helps build up ammunition reserves for other weapons, getting me out of tight spots on a couple of occasions. Certain scenarios do seem like retellings of things that happened in the first game such as the Hell Knight encounter from the end of act one, these nods to the games past don't feel tacked on, instead make the game feel likes its crafted by people who loved the originals and also understood what made them great. For as little plot as there is in the game (humans are using hell for an energy source it goes wrong) it's told in such an earnest tone that its funny without trying too hard. Having a silent protagonist helped me fill in the blanks to what my character was thinking throughout, sometimes when he was punching elevator buttons and smashing tubes it didn't take too much imagination. As I got deeper into the game, old foes continued to appear, pretty much all the demons from the original two games are here (minus two by my count) favourites of mine such as the Pinky Demon and the Cacodemon return with much more "charming" character design than the realism that was attempted in Doom 3 and the game bounces between Hell and Mars toward the end in such a way that the environments always felt fresh and cool to explore. 

The only slight complaint I had with it at all was that by seemingly avoiding the horror tropes of Doom 3 its not frightening at all in its bombastic approach. My memories of playing Doom 2 as a 13 year old was an underlying sense of fear, as comical as it seems now compared to today's games, the lighting and sound work in the game was terrifying at times. This reboot of Doom has decided to go another way and admittedly this way is a lot more fun. I played a bit of the multi-player and enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would too. 

Doom isn't anything new, it has medipacks, yellow keys and zombies but in the week it took me to complete it felt like one of the most original games I've played in a long time, I'll certainly be playing through it again at some point. Finally the ending of the game is left in such a way that I can't wait to play the next game (if it ever comes).

My hours spent in Pokemon Yellow is now over thirty hours. I'd say I don't know how that's happened in such a short space of time but I do, traipsing back and forth fighting bikers, swimmers and young trainers to get my Tauros to an acceptable level and he's still floundering in the low 30s. It's bordered on frustrating at time, especially fighting the multitude of poison attacks at the moment but I'm still way into my Pokemon. What's surprised me the most is that there is much more of a conventional game in there (and an impressive amount for a gameboy cartridge) the plot is deeper, Team Rocket are up to something and it continually adds new things that I wasn't expecting such as bicycles and fast travelling. Still really enjoying it basically. 

Earthbound and Dune 17.05.16

Over the past few weeks I've been falling rapidly down a rabbit hole of capturing/killing (or knocking out according to my translation of the lore of the world) hundreds of Pocket Monsters in Pokemon Yellow (3DS). It's my understanding that playing the game on a 3DS will allow me to transfer my team of comically named creatures into future games via a Pokemon bank (whatever that is) and if its smooth that's a big selling point, I couldn't bare the thought of wading through tall grass to fight Pidgeys to level up my Squirtle even if the graphics are improved. 

I'm surprised about how much I'm enjoying the game, I think this has a lot to do with my tastes and habits both inside and outside of video games. It feels a bit like the elements of Fallout games I really enjoy, the hoarding, the grinding out fights to earn XP and the tantalising concept that something really valuable or powerful could be right around the corner. It also seems to have taken influence from Earthbound (and other JRPGs I've not played I'm sure) and while it's not got the sharp whit constantly it can be genuinely funny at times, normally before fighting another trainer on my travels. I wouldn't say it's particularly subtitle but the characters I've met so far from the seasick captain of a boat and the two gamblers close by who announce in quick succession "I never loose" and "I never win" have a charm to them. Speaking of charm some of the Pokemons designs haven't aged well but the majority are lovely to look at, it helps with the most addictive part of the game I've found so far, the bond made with my party of 6, for the record I've gone with Nidoking, Spearow, Pikachu, Squirtle, Graveler and Weepinbell. All the forums I've embarrassingly visited seem to suggest this isn't the best combination but I've grown attached to Spearow through training him up from level 3 and most of the others I'd longingly looked at whilst I turned my nose up at actually playing the game. I've got my eye on a couple of additions, I'd be very happy if a wild Poliwhirl or Krabby popped up. With my little team though I've worked out viable tactic of combining my plant with my rock with my electric and in these early steps it seems to work, I say early I'm pushing 15 hours of gameplay. In the narrative of the game I've encountered team rocket a number of times, collected 4 badges and can chop down trees.

Basically it's all nonsense, but the right kind of nonsense for a commute or a half hour here or there, at times scratching that animal crossing itch while at the same time giving you a little more reward for your endless grinding. The game is over 20years old and I've been aware of it for all that time both in gaming and popular culture but I don't feel like I've come to it late, I wouldn't have had the patience for it when it came out or more importantly the access to the Internet which has both helped and amused me so far exploring this world.

The rest of my video gaming related actions this week were, reading FAQs and message boards about Pokemon, playing Smash Bros 4 exclusively on Pokemon stages with Pokemon characters and finally watching the Pokemon Sun Moon trailer a couple of times. I'm one step away from producing Pokemon fan art and that's not as frightening as it was a month ago.

Earthbound and Dune 09.05.16

I finished Starfox Zeros (WiiU) brief story this week, there where points when everything came together, especially the penultimate battle against Star Wolf and his companions. Here dogfighting worked, felt good and I even used the gamepad to target at points. Changing the Arwing into the chicken walker during the fight felt like the the best transformers game there never was and compact level it took place on was small enough so action was always close. The sad thing about the game though is the few good levels are majorly outweighed by boring or annoying levels. When the game has around 10 levels in to total to complete, factor in 3-4 of them I found no fun at all, therein lies the problem I had with it. If it had been an "attraction" at the much maligned Nintendoland game the value proposition for this game wouldn't be an issue. On its own though it just felt too threadbare and I plain didn't enjoy a lot of my short amount of time with it.

I got nowhere in Party Hard (PS4) and was happy enough to do that. A stealth game with a comical premise, your irritated at the noise/commotion a party is causing to the point of wanting to murder all the people attending. The levels are small enough to occupy a single screen and it's got a stylish 16bit look to it, complete with the chip tune soundtrack that does start to get annoying as I slowly worked my way through the couple of party's I ended. I've always assumed I'd be awful at a hitman game and this game confirms this, a number of times I'd get to killing the last few people and the police would catch me right at the end because of my over eagerness to finish the level. Despite my failing I am having a great time with the game, seemingly random events from aliens to robbers happen on the levels and will increase the death count, traps and places to hide also litter the levels and add a more methodical strategy to playing. Hiding places and escape routes are barricaded up with overuse which stopped me from cheating the levels much to my dismay at discovering this. The levels are compact enough that the really fun levels, such as the party on the ranch are really good fun and kept interesting by moving around items to help your murdering on attempts. Some levels aren't as much fun due to a more constricted environment but it's all snappy enough that it's not become irritating yet. Looking forward to carrying on with it.