Topic: What are you playing?

[Gingerbeer]

I really enjoyed the Steamworld Dig games and Heist! I have Quest but haven't played yet.

For me, right now I'm playing Divinity Original Sin 2. I picked it up on Steam a while back (you know the buy the game because it's on sale thinking you want to play it one day). Played it for a few hours and it seemed like it could be something I would like and so many excellent critical reviews and fans singing its praises, so then I bought it on Switch for cross-platform saves. It's definitely much prettier on PC but having it on Switch will help me sink in much more time which will help immensely for a game like this.

It's quite different from my normal gaming tastes and I haven't played D&D since the 1990s. So I'm definitely feeling a bit overwhelmed by all the systems and options - reading a few different guides and hints/tips sites but don't want to ruin the experience exploring and experimenting. I'm still very early on in the game and it hasn't truly captivated me but I'll definitely stick with it for a while longer yet - but at this stage I really can't tell whether I'll stick with it all the way through.

Is there anyone else here who's played it on Switch or elsewhere?

[Adrock]

Indivisible (Switch)

I didn't realize I would receive both a digital and physical copy of the game. I downloaded the game thinking I wouldn't get the physical copy until July or August. I got it in the beginning of June.

Finally booted this up. It's pretty good so far. I'm not good at combos, and there wasn't really a training section. A lot of battles require combos such as breaking an enemies shield. It isn't especially forgiving as you can waste whole turns dealing like a single point of damage. There's a quick tutorial in the beginning with Ajna's father showing her how to block attacks, but he doesn't offer to do the training again. You would have to restart from the last checkpoint. I thought that was little weird.

The battle system appears pretty deep so there definitely should have been more guidance. Indivisible's battle system is like a souped up version of Valkyrie Profile's (unless I forgot the complexities of the latter). Holding a direction and the attack button does a different move for every party member. I just reached the third area, and I've only recruited six other characters. Having to remember every party member's moves has proven to be pretty difficult especially since thus far, you can't farm experience. You fight the enemies that show up. I'm not getting a lot of practice unless you count all the times I've died.

The graphics are fine; I like how colorful the world is. The backgrounds are noticeably simple with the art direction doing the heavy lifting. The music is great so far. The voice acting is uneven. The cutscenes are odd. Indivisible has a really gorgeous animated opening. With the crowdfunded budget the game had, there was no way Lab Zero Games could animate every cutscene. That said, some scenes have splash images with some minor animation while others are merely dialog on the gameplay screen with character portraits appearing with dialog boxes. It's really inconsistent because some are fully voice and others aren't. I understand not voicing every NPC. However, not every playable characters is voiced in their introductory cutscene which was weird. Not a huge deal, but I would have liked more consistency.

[ejamer]

So I've been bumming around playing Hexyz Force (PSP). This Atlus-published RPG was developed by Sting Entertainment, and sounded promising enough... but it's been a bit of a slog. The story and characters are (frankly) pretty bad, and the localization hasn't done it any favors in my opinion. That isn't to say the game is bad - it's not - but it's been almost entirely unremarkable. Perhaps it's a case of misplaced expectations, or the way I'm playing isn't the way it should be played, but the overall experience so far has been mediocre at best and a let down over all.


Which brings me to some happier news: I've started digging into Xenoblade Chronicles 3D (3DS) again and am just constantly reminded of how much I love this game. Playing on 3DS isn't the best way to go about it in my opinion - the small screen just doesn't convey the sense of scale and grandeur that you get from a bigger view on the Wii or Switch versions... but being able to play the game on a portable system at all is amazing.

Thanks to Khush for brining it back to mind with recent posts here: http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/forums/index.php?topic=28408.700

["King Gong" Khushrenada]

Which brings me to some happier news: I've started digging into Xenoblade Chronicles 3D (3DS) again and am just constantly reminded of how much I love this game. Playing on 3DS isn't the best way to go about it in my opinion -  but being able to play the game on a portable system at all is amazing.

Thanks to Khush for brining it back to mind with recent posts here: http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/forums/index.php?topic=28408.700

I'm just such a bad influence on these forums. 

I've actually popped in my 3DS copy to see the difference between that and the DE and what the 3D effect is like. I actually learned something new for use in the Switch version I'm playing by doing that. I also can't help but wonder if getting XC to work on the 3DS was another factor in getting Nintendo to the Switch since you had a portable able to run a huge game like that which was still quite current. It just seems like at that point the ability to just make console gaming equivalent to portable was pretty much there for them and now it was a matter of making it work with third parties also.

[Luigi Dude]

Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon 2

Well I'm not sure what to think so far.  Two years ago I praised the first one for being the remake of Castlevania 3 that IGA always wanted to make.  Now this game is a more of the same sequel with some new character added.  The new characters are really fun to control and each is quite different from the last.

So on paper I should be loving it.  The problem is this game fucking hates me and anybody I might have every known as well.  I'm sure it hates whoever is reading this as well.  The difficulty is just insane and not always in a good way.  I finished Episode 1, and those last few stages were just bullshit.  The game is obsessed with literally putting you in situations where you're next to a bottomless bit, with an enemy shooting projectiles at you, and a flying enemy swooping down at the same time.  Some sections literally require you to keep track of enemies coming from both sides and the top, and if you don't have the right character and sub weapon equipped on that character you're fucked.

I have to wonder if because some complained that Casual mode was too easy in the previous game, Inti Create went our of their way to make it way more challenging in this game which as a result turns Veteran mode which I prefer to play into cheap BS mode.  Of course, I have to imagine some of these area's are just as cheap in Casual since some of the level design feels like Inti was trying to create another Mega Man Zero or Gunvolt game, and didn't realize the jumping mechanics of classic Castlevania do not fit that type of level design.

Oh well, I do like a good challenge and maybe after completing the later episodes I might appreciate the game in the end but right now a lot of the challenge feels more on the cheap side then fair, which is kind of disappointing since the original did a great job of being very accessible with it's regular mode while offering a good challenge with stuff like doing a solo Zangetsu run that was hard but still fair.  This game literally punches you in the face and steals your car by the halfway point of what should be the easiest part.  It makes me fear what's in store for me in the later Episodes.

[pokepal148]

Hypnospace Outlaw Played on PC. Also available on MAC and I believe Linux. It doesn't seem demanding at all so pretty much any PC that you have that's in any kind of active use in the year of our lord 2020 should be able to run it.

This game is weird and wonderful. You play as an enforcer who moderates what is essentially a miniature Geocities thing. The game kind of relies on you having some kind of nostalgia for late 90s internet culture but even for someone like me who is way too young to remember any of that, there is plenty of great humor and writing throughout the game help carry the experience.

It's a bizzare experience and I don't want to go too into detail because I feel like doing so would risk spoiling things but the game has some really good logic puzzles, incredible writing, and more than enough charm to make it worth checking out.

What really strikes me about the game is how authentic it feels. The various hypnospace webpages you interact with feel like they were actually written by different people even though they were probably written by the same one or two people, the fake 90s era operating system the game is built around feels like an actual operating system and you can even "download" files and catch fake viruses on it (which in turn requires you to get a fake anti-virus).

[NWR_insanolord]

Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral Town

The original Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town is one of my favorite games, so I've been looking forward to the western release of the remake for a while. This is also the first time I've played a HM/SoS game since playing Stardew Valley, which makes for some interesting comparisons.

While this game includes quite a few quality of life improvements compared to the original, it's still missing a couple things that I'd become used to because of Stardew. The biggest adjustment, even though it seems like a relatively minor thing, is going back to having your sold items picked up at 5 p.m. instead of overnight. Largely, though, it's pretty faithful to the spirit and overall structure of the original, but with some very nice updates in areas that prevented me from enjoying it as much on the Virtual Console, like inventory management and being able to walk over crops.

[Adrock]

Resident Evil 4 (PS4)

Hot take: Resident Evil 4 with traditional controls does not hold up. I haven’t played the game with a traditional controller since like 2005. Now that I’ve tried, woof. It’s difficult going back. I almost want to say the controls are actively bad by 2020 standards. I’m tempted to dust off the ol’ Wii U just to play it with motion controls again. I feel like I started replaying Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition in 2013/2014 and thinking it held up.

There’s a rumor going around that Resident Evil 4 is getting the remake treatment similar to Resident Evil 2 and 3 (ignoring Code Veronica for some reason). I don’t know if a full remake is necessary. However, Capcom could have gotten some extra mileage from Resident Evil 4 if it went out of its way to add at least the Type D controls from Resident Evil 5 (though all control types would have been preferred). That would have made a world of difference.

Resident Evil 5 (PS4)

Still holds up. The better frame rate is *chef’s kiss* It also still kind of sucks playing single player. I won’t dock points from the game as it was built for multiplayer, and I’m too cheap to pay for PlayStation Plus.

[nickmitch]

I don't normally like rogue-likes, but I've really been enjoying Hades (Switch).  I don't have much to say about it that Jonny didn't already say on the RFN live episode.  I picked it up because of the praise and GOTY attention it got, and I don't regret it.  I recently got past the second boss on a run that I didn't think would go the distance, but I had some of my favorite boons and finally worked a strategy for it.  That moment kind of sealed it for me because I honestly went into that run thinking "Guess this'll be to just grind for stuff" but then it turned into "teh urn" for me.  I'm still a ways off from escaping, but I really like the loop of progressively getting stronger or unlocking random stuff/seeing dialogue with each attempt.