What games are you playing currently?

[kirk55555]

Dorter Trade City is a common stumbling block for many new players, but the battle is quite fair. It's the first wake-up battle in the game -- a test to see if you've properly learned the gameplay mechanics. The first battle that will get you slaughtered if you try to brute force your way through it. Tell me your party and what you're having trouble with and I might be able to help.

The whole battle seemed to be designed to be unbeatable. A whole bunch of long range enemies, combined with putting every one of them in an advantageous spot. Also, mages are beyond broken. I thought that their spells could miss you if you get out of their range before they manage to cast them, but that is definitely not the case. You also only get about 4 people and 2 guests for the battle, which was complete BS, especially since the guest AI is idiotic. I had my main guy (Ramza, a squire), a black mage, another squire and a chemist, along with the two guests (Delita the knight and the other guy whose name I can't remember, who I think was still a squire).

We were massacred, every enemy hit was basically a 2 hit KO, and my chemist couldn't heal everyone. Since the enemy could hit me from about half a screen away, and only Ramza had a decent amount of movement, it was probably the most one sided battle in any game I've played recently. Even when I hit them they had about 80 max HP, while my guys had about 35-50 HP, so they were always going to beat my guys in basically every category.

I've decided to just move on. I have a bunch of games on PS3 I can play, I'm not going to waste time on something designed for frustration over good gameplay. I really like the idea of the gameplay, but FF Tactics was designed by sadists.

 

[BillJ]

Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze. I forgot how much I suck at 2D platform games.

 

[Akiraprise]

I'm playing delete the SPAM threads. Gracias to all who have sent notifies. We're getting them sorted.

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

Ace Combat 6. It's a shame this series stalled and did a nosedive into Assault Horizon and Infinity.

 

[SPCTRE]

Ace Combat 6. It's a shame this series stalled and did a nosedive into Assault Horizon and Infinity.

The original Ace Combat (or Air Combat, depending on where you're from) was pretty dope on PSX.

I also like the fourth game on PS2 quite a bit.

Currently back to Forza Horizon 2 on XBONE. Such a relaxing game, gives me those great summertime vacation in Italy feels.

 

[Bob The Skutter]

I'm playing through God Of War Ascension and Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishment. The second case in Sherlock Holmes is really bugging me and GoW is GoW, very repetitive at this point.

 

[SPCTRE]

I'm playing through God Of War Ascension and Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishment. The second case in Sherlock Holmes is really bugging me and GoW is GoW, very repetitive at this point.

Ascension is the Gears of War: Judgement of the God of War franchise.

One game too many on last gen, essentially.

 

[Bob The Skutter]

I'm playing through God Of War Ascension and Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishment. The second case in Sherlock Holmes is really bugging me and GoW is GoW, very repetitive at this point.

Ascension is the Gears of War: Judgement of the God of War franchise.

One game too many on last gen, essentially.

That's why I've never bothered with it until this point. I basically played GoW 1, 2 and 3 back to back with Dante's Inferno in the middle there somewhere and it killed my interest in the genre for a good long time.

 

[SPCTRE]

I just can't get into that franchise. Simply can't. The Character Action genre in general just doesn't do it for me. Same with DMC, Bayonetta, etc.

Well, Bayo at least has its brand of Japanese-ness about it, but I never enjoyed these games enough for their gameplay as some sort of "end in itself".

God of War games look pretty as hell, they always have, and I love Greek mythology, but there's no hook that would make me keep playing.

Edit: A good counter-example of a game that does great combat very, very right but combines it with hooks that I can get into would be Dragon's Dogma. I'm just a sucker for RPGs I guess.

 

[Bob The Skutter]

I just can't get into that franchise. Simply can't. The Character Action genre in general just doesn't do it for me. Same with DMC, Bayonetta, etc.

Well, Bayo at least has its brand of Japanese-ness about it, but I never enjoyed these games enough for their gameplay as some sort of "end in itself".

God of War games look pretty as hell, they always have, and I love Greek mythology, but there's no hook that would make me keep playing.

Edit: A good counter-example of a game that does great combat very, very right but combines it with hooks that I can get into would be Dragon's Dogma. I'm just a sucker for RPGs I guess.

I'd generally agree with you. It basically amounts to hit button, hit button more. The only interesting thing about GoW is the Greek mythology inflections and the artwork.

 

[Reverend]

Just loaded up Mass Effect 3 for the first time in almost a year and pleasantly surprised that 1) the multiplayer is still quite active and 2) Valkyrie is still enormously fun.

 

[Servo]

Bloodborne.

Punishing game if you don't learn from your mistakes quickly. The first hour on it was a nightmare. Got to grips with it a lot more now, so it's a lot more fun to play.

 

[SPCTRE]

Bloodborne.

Punishing game if you don't learn from your mistakes quickly. The first hour on it was a nightmare. Got to grips with it a lot more now, so it's a lot more fun to play.

Is BB your first Souls / From Software game? Good to hear you're sticking with it, these games are very rewarding that way.

 

[RoJoHen]

Bloodborne.

Punishing game if you don't learn from your mistakes quickly. The first hour on it was a nightmare. Got to grips with it a lot more now, so it's a lot more fun to play.

I just attempted to start this game tonight, played for about a half hour and gave up. I felt like it really lacked direction. I don't need everything laid out for me, but a little exposition would be nice just so I know what the heck the point of the game is.

 

[SPCTRE]

a little exposition would be nice just so I know what the heck the point of the game is.

If you have to ask that, you've come to the wrong game.

 

[RoJoHen]

That much is obvious.

I just can't play a game where I'm dropped in the middle of a world with no sense of what I'm supposed to be doing. I don't require a lot of instruction, but some amount of guidance would be nice.

 

[Servo]

Bloodborne.

Punishing game if you don't learn from your mistakes quickly. The first hour on it was a nightmare. Got to grips with it a lot more now, so it's a lot more fun to play.

Is BB your first Souls / From Software game? Good to hear you're sticking with it, these games are very rewarding that way.

Aye, it is my first foray into the series, so I was a little unsure what to expect. I think I was under the impression before playing that it was going to be mostly a hack n' slash, with RPG elements and more in-depth combat mechanics. The first 30 minutes on the game dispelled that assumption.

I do agree, to a certain extent, with what RoJoHen is saying. There is a surprising lack of up-front information for new players. It's kind of like the game is expecting you to have played the previous Souls games, so I can see why that may put some new players off.

One example is the need for at least one point of Insight before you can level up. The game didn't tell me that, I had to look it up online after spending 10 minutes frustratingly trying to find out in-game how I level up my character. There are a number of things like this that may not be obvious to new players, and I do think the game could do with making a bit more effort to welcome players who haven't ventured into this series of games before.

Another thing is the lock-on target mechanism. It's a bit too flimsy. I can lock-on to a boss and dodge around him, but as soon as I try and adjust the camera to get a better view of my surroundings, that lock is gone. That can be a bit frustrating when trying to dodge, attack, and remain mindful of nearby obstacles and buildings you may be in danger of getting pinned against.

I cot caught out by the boss sections a couple of times too, as I wasn't really expecting them, and encountered them through exploring areas. Annoyed me a bit last night while farming Blood Echoes. I had over 4000, and was exploring a new area, and ended up in a boss fight with Father Gascoine that I didn't see coming. Naturally he killed me before I could get more than a quarter of his health down, and bye bye Blood Echoes.

Once I'd learned a few harsh lessons though, and geared my brain up to deal with enemies more tactically, the game became more fun and rewarding to play. I just think it revels in watching you try and fail a bit too much in some cases, and unfortunately I think the game may lose a lot of new players early on because of that.

It is worth sticking with though. Like the online noob guides say; once you accept the fact that you will die (probably a lot), and that every encounter is a learning curve, the game becomes easier to swallow.

 

[SPCTRE]

I do agree, to a certain extent, with what RoJoHen is saying. There is a surprising lack of up-front information for new players. It's kind of like the game is expecting you to have played the previous Souls games, so I can see why that may put some new players off.

They don't actually, they've been like that since the first game. It's just the way they're designed. They're intentionally obtuse and don't surface a lot of information up front, you're definitely right about that.

It makes the early period of playing these games fun for a certain demographic of enthusiasts, when everyone is trying to find out the way certain stats or other mechanics work etc. - definitely not for everyone, but I find it refreshing because larger games these days go overboard with the hand-holding regularly.

 

[RoJoHen]

It makes the early period of playing these games fun for a certain demographic of enthusiasts, when everyone is trying to find out the way certain stats or other mechanics work etc. - definitely not for everyone, but I find it refreshing because larger games these days go overboard with the hand-holding regularly.

That's all well and good, and I enjoy figuring out certain things for myself, but it's frustrating when you're constantly dying and waiting for the game to reload from your last checkpoint.

I died 3 times within the first 10 minutes of gameplay without really understanding what I was doing wrong. Add to that the fact that I found the controls very awkward, and it just made for a less-than-fun experience.

I'll go back and try again at some point in the next few days, but it didn't exactly get me excited to continue.

 

[mimic]

I played both Souls games (not Demon Souls, though) and yeah, there wasn't any direction there either. I spent a good long time in Undead Burg, not realizing I was using a broken weapon and trying to figure out how to kindle a bonfire. But once you get the hang of it, it's pretty unparalleled in gaming. I easily died 100 times trying to beat Gwyn and his stupid black knights.

Bloodbourne and The Last Of Us are the two exclusive games that I really want to try, and they are pretty much the only reason that when I do go next gen it's likely going to be on PS4.