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[The Satellite]

Let's add two more to the list.

 

Outer Wilds. A game I've heard about much. Not heard much about, seeing as it's integral you know as little as possible going into it, and its players respect that. Which is why I will not elaborate much. It's... a sci-fi mystery game. A compelling one, and again, crucial you know little-to-nothing about it going into it. But I highly recommend it. It sticks with you.

 

And now for the other game that's sticking with me but for completely different reasons: Bloodborne. I've actually had my eye on this one for a while, despite bouncing off Dark Souls twice... as chronicled years ago in this very thread. Something about its aesthetics and its more aggressive style appealed to me more, but for a few years I didn't have a PS4, and when I did get one, I had other games on my plate before my PS4 sadly just got kind of neglected. But with Another Crab's Treasure priming me, I just very suddenly felt in the mood. And I saw it was on sale for $17.50 with the DLC, so I jumped on it. Struggled quite a bit with the first boss until I realized I had misunderstood the visceral mechanic, although even then it was a close victory. But from then on, relatively smooth sailing. Yeah, an area or two was a struggle, but I even managed to first try a handful of bosses and didn't need more than a few tries on most... until the DLC. And okay yes, I used NPC summons when possible, but shut up.

 

I'd heard about the performance issues and chalked it up to exaggeration, like how people complain about the smallest framerate dips. Turns out... nah, they were mostly right this time. It even gave me headaches at first but I adjusted. And the load times... I am now one of the countless begging for it to be freed from the PS4. The. PriSon 4. But ultimately it was still worth it. The world is awesome, the visuals are fantastic, the gameplay is largely fun, I just had a complete blast. I didn't bother with any of the chalice dungeons after poking around the first, but I cleared every boss otherwise, base and DLC. And got the true ending boss for the main game. Fuck, that DLC final boss... took me two nights and goddamn was my heart racing in the winning run. I had to take a break after that... for only a couple hours before I went back in to finish the main game. Yeah, I loved this game.

 

That said, I do not see myself trying out any other FromSoftware games anytime soon. The soulsbornes, that is, although I admit I'm not particularly interested in Armored Core or any of their other offerings. If I did, it would likely be either Elden Ring or, in a sense of "unfinished business," Dark Souls. But I have no interest in returning to that Xbox 360 copy of mine and would rather play the modern version... if it ever went on a decent sale at the perfect moment for me to capitalize. It's also a case of like... nothing particularly grips me about the Souls or Elden Ring aesthetics. Bloodborne and Another Crab's Treasure are proof that aesthetics will go a long way with me. I love both of those games, so maybe I might find myself in the land of [insert whatever the name of the lands in Souls or Elden Ring are], but it won't be any time soon.

 

...

 

Saw Cleaver for life.

[WyattSpence]

I'm playing Hades and Control right now. Hades is addicting with its fast action and awesome story. Each run feels new and challenging. Control has a creepy vibe with a crazy storyline, and the gameplay is super fun with all the cool powers. You should totally check out this cheat engine table if you're into cheats and mods. It's got a ton of stuff that can make your gaming even better.

Edited by WyattSpence, 30 July 2024 - 03:44 PM.

[The Satellite]

That said, I do not see myself trying out any other FromSoftware games anytime soon. The soulsbornes, that is, although I admit I'm not particularly interested in Armored Core or any of their other offerings. If I did, it would likely be either Elden Ring or, in a sense of "unfinished business," Dark Souls.

Anyway I'm a fucking liar because I immediately went to try out Demon's Souls. The original. Not entirely sure why but I played it on RPCS3 with the 60fps patch and... it's... mixed. It's neat seeing the DNA that made its way to future soulsbornes (well, Bloodborne is my only real point of reference), and the fact the areas are disjointed with a hub world doesn't really bother me. But it definitely needed refinement, which, well, is what later FromSoft games did. Had more trouble with a couple runbacks than I did any of these bosses, but granted I went into this with more experience in this style, can't speak to how it would be like if this were my first one. Even then, they definitely weren't as complex as later games' bosses. I also found the second world just kind of awful, the first world kind of basic, and the last world... well, it's a poison swamp. If I hadn't saved the entire thing for last, at which point I smoked it all first try, I would have hated it even more. I also didn't like the first part of the third world, but the rest? Phenomenal. Loved the fourth world too, as well as its final boss. So yeah, overall mixed bag.

 

I am also currently working on a Bloodborne NG+ run. Trying to do the chalice stuff this time. It sucks. I also might want to platinum this one day, which will require a minimum three runs, but I'll just focus on the NG+ for now and come back to it another time. Oh and on the Bloodborne topic, Nightmare Kart is actually really fucking fun and I wish this had online, but I get it, it's essentially a (high-quality) shitpost, but one with solid track design and Bloodborne references. Really enjoyed it.

 

Let's see, what else...

 

Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons is a game that starts out melancholy and mostly remains that way. Neat gameplay though, took me a bit to get used to it but I dug it and the puzzles, pretty game too, but definitely on the shorter end. Ori and the Blind Forest was on my radar for a while... and in my library for a while too. It started off feeling somewhat basic, but quickly set itself apart with great mechanics, platforming, and setpieces. Similarly, I'd had my eye on The Liar Princess and the Blind Prince, which I managed to buy for about $2.50 thanks to an eShop sale and having a lot of gold coins. Played it on my downtime while on vacation, very cute game, like a playable fairy tale.

 

And lastly... Well. In my long journey of streaming all the main series Zelda games and some choice spinoffs/adjacent games, the final scheduled "Side Adventure" games were... Link: The Faces of Evil and Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon. The "Remastered" versions by Arzette lead dev Dopply, as I mentioned before. They offer a few tweaks, including faster movement, possibly less stiff jumps(?), tweaking controls to be a little less frustrating, lets you collect all but key items by just walking over them instead of stabbing them while seemingly upping enemy drop rates, and probably most importantly, has infinite lives. With these changes... these games are fine. Not great, but not awful. Sure, there's some obnoxious enemy spawns, sure, some character sprites look off, but honestly I really like the background art. Although that has the caveat of sometimes it's hard to make out what's an entrance. And yeah, the "infamous" cutscenes and animations, but honestly... they're a ton of fun, and we all know how iconic they are now. Yeah, sure, they are probably much more frustrating games without the QoL updates, but even then, I'd be hard-pressed to say there weren't worse games in 1993. There's worse games now! And, yeah, alright, the music is pretty decent, even if it's not what you might expect out of Zelda. But hey, Zelda II isn't the kind of Zelda game we'd've expected for a long time.

 

Okay, yeah, at the end of the day, I don't think I could say there's a single main series Zelda game that's "worse" than either one. I don't think they're abominations either. Plus, they inspired someone enough to give them native PC ports and a spiritual sequel that's actually very good, so that's gotta count for something.