What VIDEO GAME(s) have you been playing?

Been stuck at level 20 of Monster Train for weeks it seems. While I still really enjoy the game, it seems much harder lately. Is it just me?

Rliyen wrote: With my recent raise and bonus, I ended up buying a cooling/charging station for my PS4 and Fist of the North Star - Lost Paradise.

OH MAN, every time I play, I go back 30 years when I first saw the movie, then the series, in college. Cliff Notes: Bruce Lee with godlike martial arts meets the Road Warrior.

I still have the import for my PS1 and I still play it from time to time, simply because it has the original voice actors from the series.

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Oh, which one? I loved the final fight type release but there was a Banpresto graphic adventure one that, I swear, no one has ever beaten. The last fight was impossible.
Correction: someone did best it... thanks youtube. Apparently I wasn't smart enough to figure out you needed to use every acquired power at least once in the last boss.

BillyBobThwarton wrote: Been stuck at level 20 of Monster Train for weeks it seems. While I still really enjoy the game, it seems much harder lately. Is it just me?

It's so frustrating to get stuck in a game. When I play a game, I want to play the whole game and not get stuck at some bottleneck where the difficulty level is greater than normal for the game.

Last time I posted in this thread, I was stuck at a particular point in Vampire: Bloodlines.

I'm apparently a slow learner, because I must have died at two dozen times before I figured all that out.

Played a lot of Destiny this weekend, but I also played a lot of HOLLOW KNIGHT thanks to PS +. Normally, I'm not a Metroidvania fan, but this one with its art style, humorous Simlish (my wife fell in love with the miner's humming), and atmospheric music had me playing for hours. My H/E coordination is no where near what it was, but it felt nice to play a game that was simple to learn, but a challenge for me to get better at.

I also got the other offering, ME: Shadow of War, but since I haven't finished Shadow of Mordor, It'll have to wait.

Some games have a real gatekeeper factor. If they are smart, the devs build-in some multi-player, AI, or story end-around to get through it eventually. Each Soulsbourne has one of those bosses that keeps you from moving alone until you get through it, and it's hard. Lots of bosses "gatekeep" the story, but for the most part, you can beat them when you get to them. But one per game is balls hard and you need to gear up/change tactics/find a friend or get lucky to get through.

I'll pick up HOLLOW KNIGHT, but not sure I can get there until I get this SPELUNKY shaped monkey off my back.

WadeMonnig wrote:

Rliyen wrote: With my recent raise and bonus, I ended up buying a cooling/charging station for my PS4 and Fist of the North Star - Lost Paradise.

OH MAN, every time I play, I go back 30 years when I first saw the movie, then the series, in college. Cliff Notes: Bruce Lee with godlike martial arts meets the Road Warrior.

I still have the import for my PS1 and I still play it from time to time, simply because it has the original voice actors from the series.

.

Oh, which one? I loved the final fight type release but there was a Banpresto graphic adventure one that, I swear, no one has ever beaten. The last fight was impossible.
Correction: someone did best it... thanks youtube. Apparently I wasn't smart enough to figure out you needed to use every acquired power at least once in the last boss.

Fist of the North Star: Legend at the End of the Century Savior.

I think this was the last game that the voice actor for Rei did before he died.

Aside from that, the funny part of this game is that it ALLOWS you to change the dialog audio for the cutscenes. Imagine Ken and Souther yelling the following back and forth to each other:

Souther: KENNNNNN!!!

Ken: YURIAAAAAA!!!!!

I have NO idea why the developers added that feature. But my favorite mini game is the Abeshi. Essentially, it's a speed run on how many mooks you can kill in a certain amount of time.

That reminds me of a fun discovery I made with an arcade game when I was a teenager. It was this domed hockey game that was mechanically somewhat like foosball, and it was themed as Americans vs Russians because it came out just a couple of years after that huge upset at the 1980 Winter Olympics that was known as the Miracle On Ice. Along with the foosball style controls of each individual player, there was a Boo button so you could boo your opponent. Anyway, just before the puck dropped from the top of the dome at the start of the game, the American National Anthem would play. And I discovered that the Russian player could cut the anthem short and trigger an early puck drop by hitting the Boo button.

Likewise, I discovered a similar trick in Bloodlines during this recent bottleneck. The most frustrating part about the bottleneck was the closest that I could save up to that bottleneck was just before some cutscreen dialogue by a religious fanatic/vampire hunter. I had to respond to each of his three rants by choosing a dialogue option, but I learned that I could interrupt and end each rant by selecting a response number early.

On a separate occasion, I noticed that the domed hockey table was not secured to the arcade floor. The puck dropped and I suddenly lifted my side of the table for a very sleazy goal.

I picked up Rogue Galaxy Outlaw and it is pretty great. I think I like the flight model more than SW: Squadrons. That may be mostly in my head because of the static background in SW: Squadrons that doesn't quite give you that feeling of you moving, but it moving around you if that makes any sense.

Also, wicked great soundtrack. Enjoyable voice acting. I brings me back to an old game called Hard Nova, but with a Wing Commander: Privateer mash up.

I wish it were in VR.

For... obvious reasons I've been spending most of my non-work time doomscrolling. I decided that I should do something I like, even if it isn't like SO HEALTHY, instead of doomscrolling. So I picked up Stellaris, my old buddy, again. Got the Necroid species pack and decided to get to work with a megacorporation of a species that only lives on space stations.

It's like sliding an old comfy shoe back on.

I've managed to finally clear a couple runs in Hades, though both have been with the Spear, which has become my favorite weapon along with the Fists.

But more importantly my ten-year-old son got his first clear today. I'm proud of him.

My 9yo is doing great in SPELUNKY 2, ZELDA:BOTW, HS:BATTLEGROUNDS, whatever he puts his mind to. I'm proud of him.

I'm trying to advance in SPELUNKY 2 as well. I'll go back to that thread, there is some crazy shit.

Celeste is on sale on the ps4 for like $6, so I guess in going to play that sometime soon. I've heard nothing but love for it.

jeb wrote: My 9yo is doing great in SPELUNKY 2, ZELDA:BOTW, HS:BATTLEGROUNDS, whatever he puts his mind to. I'm proud of him.

I'm trying to advance in SPELUNKY 2 as well. I'll go back to that thread, there is some crazy shit.

My ten-year-old has put in a good 60-70 hours on Pokemon Shield. It was the first game he's beaten with zero input from me.

The downside is that I've had to listen to a LOT of "conversations" about Pokemon.

san il defanso wrote: My ten-year-old has put in a good 60-70 hours on Pokemon Shield. It was the first game he's beaten with zero input from me.

The downside is that I've had to listen to a LOT of "conversations" about Pokemon.

Haha, that's great. I unironically love hearing about video games from my kids. I must have been annoying as shiiiiiiiiit to my parents, and I am trying to break that cycle. Lay it on me, kids. I will do my best to ask insightful questions and engage in repartee.

You want to tell me about the 8th book in the 4th series you've read this month about dragons? Go for it. You have some updates on recent balance changes to the reload time of OVERWATCH's Widowmaker (console only)? Do go on.


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HEARTHSTONE is different now. A whole new quest/experience system for perks. It's confusing as hell, and seems ever-so-slightly gacha-ish. Keeping my eye on this.