What are you playing right now?

All right.

What do you think about Dawn of Dreams?

I thought it was more on the rpg side that I would like to care. Strong presentation values, though. At the time I wasn't ready for next generation and I welcomed it as a sort of last call for the system. I was glad that they tried to give it all a new spin, yet I'm somewhat morose now with level ups and +100h in games. For I think you can find that as a standard and a purer action breed becomes sparse at present.

I think Dawn of Dreams started out amazing, but slowed down too much near the end. It is the type of game that I think would make a lot more waves today in an online landscape ala Nioh. It also shows something that I feel a lot of designers are missing: the dare to switch it up.

Personally I love Action RPGs, but only when done right, which is extremely rare. In most cases builds and stats only mean the difference in how long it takes to kill a boss, now how you actually play. I remember getting a shuckle out of Issen being a stat.

Glad to see you have your old avatar again!

Royta/Raeng wrote: I remember getting a shuckle out of Issen being a stat.

This.

It feels strange to think about it now, but maybe I come around to regard the whole of the game as a precursor for things to come. Now absorbed. Story-driven, stats, and the kind of f-service I roll my eyes at.

Having the Capcom-induced fever then, it's close to comical how I chose to disregard Shadows of Rome on release.
I corrected that a way back and early enough to make the frame where it makes an impression. Yeah, I'd say that's my jam. Brutal, score-based, relentless action. I bring it up 'cause I see a strong connection to Dawn. Somehow.

DMC2. I'm practicing the NGR. I'm really glad that I can hit Trismagia!

You'd have a good discussion partner in @Birdman, he's a big fan of Shadows of Rome as well.

DMC1. I'm playing on hard mode. I'm on the stairway to Nelo Angelo and when the battle music was playing, it was rather distorted. As in it was missing a few notes and it felt like it was speeding up.

Which version are you playing and on what system?

The regular black case on the PS2.

Onimusha 2. I'm really surprised that there isn't a topic about any of the Onimusha games.

I believe we've discussed it in other topics.

I really like Oni 2. Took about 4 playthrough to get 100%.

I'm playing Monster Hunter Tri. It's my first MH but I'm loving it.

Max Payne 3. I'm trying to get all the GG parts and clues. I found a glitch in chapter 9.

Darksiders 1. And Tales of Berseria.

Darksider's combat is reasonably okay, nothing too special, but I kind of wish moves were cheaper. Also, guard cancelling is pretty busted.

Tales of Berseria's combat apparently gets better, and I sure as hell hope so, because so far it's been nothing but stun-spam, and then just use whatever after they're stunned.

Darksiders cancelling is definitely busted, but it allows you to do so much that most normal players would never realise. It allows you to make up your own combos far outside of the preset combos the devs intended. DS 1 is truly a hidden gem of action games. I would take a game with busted mechanics that have a lot of room for experimentation any day over most of the rigid combat in most western action games.

I loved how Berseria controlled a lot, but like you said, stun spam, super move, rinse repeat. I dropped off of that game somewhere in the caves. Was just bored to tears. Ys 8 looks much more my speed, just waiting on a decent sale.

What's fun about Darksiders 1 is how janky it is, it kind of reminds me of Marvel vs Capcom in a way. Just throw mechanics in and see what happens. Don't give a crap about balance or consistency, just let that guard be a 1.frame cancel, let people have fun. I can really respect that honestly!



Also lots of moves in there that remind me of later DmC moves, but that could just be me.

Looking back, definitely the best Darksiders game thanks to guard canceling.

Finished Devil's Third for the first time. After ignoring my save game for some 2 years.
There was some cheap stuff in Mission 8, I think. Snow, a long corridor with invisible gals. When they're cleared out come the black juggernaut units. Still feels lame. Final boss was nice. But I think they wasted a lot of recources on that thing they call "story". Motivation is alright, but I don't play action for the tale. Will check out higher diff.

Good to hear you gave it a shot, criminally underrated title. Shame that Score Attack lost its leaderboards.

I now exactly which part you're referencing and that isn't the easiest section in the game for sure, would go as far as to call it the hardest part in the game. Really wish the game would get a port at one point with a fixed frame-rate and controls.

Higher difficulty is just 'more damage' basically. Score Mode is where the meat of the game is at imo. Really fun going for high scores!

I checked back and it's in Mission 7, not 8.

Ayuh, I don't mind an underdog. I rather play something shunned than popular. I dunno but popularity gives me the creeps. Like Bionic Commando 3D. Could it be better? Yes. Would I be missing something if it had never been released? Oh, yeah.

It's The Evil Within atm. Nightmare. Some bottlenecks, but I'm about to clear the city and Ch13.
In for some stealth.
Was that game popular? My feel says it's marvelous, so I'd guess not.

Evil Within was hyped into the sky as a return to form for Survival Horror, especially with Shinji Mikami's name slapped on all the advertisements. The launch was a disaster though. High difficulty (for casual players), instant deaths, weird story, those blackbars that couldn't be removed and a delightfuly choppy 20-25 fps on launch wasn't great, especially with the shared PS3/PS4/X360/X1 launch it had to suffer through.

As a result it sold really good, but saw lots of returns and negative fan-reviews. The sequel, as a result, sold less than 1/8th of the original.

Fun fact: Devil's Third is the reason this site exists. Without it, no Stinger.

Just shows me what hype truly is: unfounded enthusiasm. Sure enough, some read the EVIL  in the title and expect, no, demand, the second comming since their very impressionable first experience. And the rest, as they say, is PR.

Anyhow, I'm having a hoot. I just past it over at release and relishing it now. A little stand off does it for me.
The anti-hype: when a game draws you in, at any time, by it's craftsmanship.

So I gave Darksiders 2 a run, and dropped it pretty quickly.

Animations are just as satisfying as ever, and it seems that there are still a good number of moves, but all that RPG stuff man, and all these other things, like no dodge offset and inconsistent telegraphs just weighed it down. It's kind of a shame, because if there's one thing that Darksiders consistently excels at, it's attack animations. Super clear that the devs put a lot of work into making every hit feel super crunchy, and weighty.

Dishonoured is super fun. Just warping around the area, stabbing people from behind, and throwing down traps as guards run after you when you inevitably get caught at some point is so damn exhilarating.

Got back into RE6. The game has a lot of dumb walky-talky stuff and QTE sections but the mechanics are great. Really good movement options, the addition of stamina and a fleshed put melee system is great and mercenaries is a lot of fun. Ton of enemy variety as well. It’s a shame the guns aren’t as interesting as the last couple games.

Doing another Extreme run on ZoE2. Watched a playthrough and didn’t realize some of the bosses could be looped so easily. Classic Kojima boss design.

I traded in bloodstained because it wasn’t really my thing, got the Mega Man X collection for PS4, going to be playing the first four games for a while.

Virtua Fighter 5: Final Showdown

Nice. I used to play VF but quit due to no competition.

Recently playing the PSN version of Haunting Ground. Just finished and need to check the PS2 version for comparison.

Still have to get into RE6 at one point, despite my love for the series and Vanquish, I never got into that game. Currently just finished Dante's Inferno and moving on to Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory. What a godly game that is.

Chaos Theory is Indeed godly, I can’t believe I don’t own it anymore. Is the HD trilogy on PS3 any good? I actually don’t own any of these games anymore aside from Blacklist and Conviction(I know...).

Contra in Contra Anniversary Collection. I just found out how to do the Konami Code.

Is the code usable for all games?

Speaking of Contra, has anyone played Blazing Chrome? I’ve given it a few playthroughs and it’s a decent but very uninspired Contra/Metal Slug throwback. I honestly feel ripped off at $17.

Not for every game sadly. For example, I tried to do it on the Arcade Version but it keeps exiting out. Super Contra has a 10 lives code I think.

>Blazing Chrome
Never played it. What makes it an uninspiring rip-off?

Magatama.

Since I've got the old Xbox set up, I might churn through the few titles I have that I need to finish.

Next up will be Dead to Rights 1, Panzer Dragon Orta,  and Crazy Taxi 3 High Roller.

Only played each of these a little. They're all Japanese but don't seem too hard to navigate.

I'll start with DtR, then Crazy Taxi 3. This game, from what little I've played is absolutely, well, crazy. The name says it all. It's like...an action game where you play as a taxi, almost. I can't believe there hasn't been a new release.

I also have Crimson Sea which I found really interesting but it's too hard to figure out what to do in Japanese. Might give it another go or just wait and buy the English version someday.

What are your thoughts on Darksiders 3? I thought it was overall pretty good, but I do wish that weapons had larger movesets.

Done with Magatama. Gave Dead to Rights another try and hated it. Awful shooting and melee. Never intended to buy this, just got it in a box of Japanese games I bought off Ebay years ago and it isn't worth anything so I can't sell it. It being in Japanese doesn't help.

Since I went to the effort of setting up this brick of a console, might as well make it count. I have a few games I need to finish. Next up is Crazy Taxi 3, followed by Panzer Dragoon Orta, Otogi 1&2, and Dino Crisis 3.

Crazy Taxi 3 is super fun but rough on the fingers. The car controls nicely and I had no issue driving around full speed. High scores are the object here. Definitely keeping this.

Otogi feels so weird after not playing for so long. I've found I don't really like the first game that much, mainly because I can't be bothered repairing weapons. They don't break but you lose damage.

Otogi 2 feels much better. They've removed weapon repair, but combat feels largely the same. The dash is very weird because the characters vanish during it.

There are 5 characters, but I've only played as 3. Mechanics between them are similar but they have some big differences. One of the ones I played can jump infinitely. Not in row, but if you double jump then dash, your double jump will be back so you can stay in the air forever. The others can stay afloat pretty much forever too but it's harder because you have to keep using the dash attack which is like a launcher that also boosts you higher.

I'm not sure what the focus of this game is though. The flying enemies I've seen are always pretty close to the ground, and the majority of others I've encountered so far are grounded. There's a huge emphasis on knockbacks. Most of your attacks send enemies across the screen, and you can slam them into walls or other objects, or into other enemies. When you smash stuff in the environment, the debris can hit enemies too, and you can position yourself to direct where it'll go. Feels like zero reason to have so much air mobility.

I might have to get an English version because I'm not sure what some of the menus say.

Shadow Warrior 2. Finished the first one.

Edit: First level in and it feels weird.

Superhot. It is such a fun game.

Nice! So you would recommend Shadow Warrior 2?

I am playing NG3RE and NG2 on X1X, as well as some Warframe and Dead or Alive 6.

Yeah I would recommend it! The core gameplay from the first one is there but there are some differences. Mainly it is a looter shooter RPG game.

Just finished Lords of Shadow on Normal, not too pleased with the title to be honest. I knew some people that really liked it, but this was my second attempt at it and I just can't get into it and its mechanics. Anyone else gave it a shot?

Not me. I only have SOTN.

Deciding on either Superhot or DMC Collection. Just stopped playing Shadow Warrior 2. While I do like it, I prefer the first one.

Been playing a lot of Tales games lately: Berseria, Xillia, and Abyss.

I'm pretty sad that Berseria's combat is so dull. Because the cast and story are just fucking fantastic. I think I'm just gonna drop the game down to easy, and just focus on the story.

Abyss is definitely a bit dated, but the combat is better than Berseria's. Story is slower, but I hear it really kicks into high gear a bit later.

Xillia's the one I've been having the most fun with so far. Combat actually impressed me, and the story and characters are pretty solid, but not quite as good as Berseria's. Not sure how we went from a weird, but solid combat system like this one, to the convoluted clusterfuck known as Berseria's combat. I'm gonna take a stab at it, and assume that Bandai Namco got too obsessed with the idea of making combat "customizable" or "freeform", even though Xillia was completely fine in that regard, among others.

I got Vesperia but haven't touched it. Saw Berseria cheap not long ago.

What exactly is the deal with Berseria's combat?

making combat "customizable" or "freeform"
In what way?

At the moment, it's way too complicated for me to explain, sorry.

No problem. Eventually I'll get to Vesperia and maybe some of the others.

Doing The Battle at Chi Bi in Dynasty Warriors 3. Almost done with it. I had to restart Zhao Yun 's story so he can get stronger. Currently have the K.O. count of 3365. I also hope that everybody had a good day.

Classic. I played this to death in my 20s. Still have an old save.

I remember this stage. You could help Zhuge Liang (if you were on his side) to call the wind which would cause the fires to spread over the entire fleet, and wipe out a majority of Wei's army. For a challenge, I'd sometimes let the plan fail. Didn't actually end up much of a challenge with a maxed out character though.

Do you have the expansion?

Unfortunately no. It seems to be hard to find from where I go to.

I remember when I first got the expansion. It was the Japanese version in a package with the base game. At the time I couldn't play it because I used Swap Magic and you can't open the disc tray because it resets the program. Later I got a Japanese PS2 and played it a bit, though this was years after the actual release date.

Played a lot of World of Warcraft: Classic yesterday, good stuff. Looking forward to Astral Chain this week too!