General discussion / Latest purchases / Currently Playing?

[raphael_is_cool]

I tried TF2 because my friends were harping on about it. I just could not get into it. Everything just looked like one big cluster**** of a gunfight. I hear about all the nuances and getting to know your class but I just did not find it enjoyable enough to stick with it.

As for new games since last posting some:
- SSFIITHDR on PS3 (shared between friends so was worth it)
- GTA IV: The Lost and The Damned
- Street Fighter IV on PS3. Man, is this game tough!

[raphael_is_cool]

Originally Posted by Peanut

If there's one thing that can make me quit a game almost immediately, it's unexpected and cheap game over's leading to a ton of replaying. It happened to me most recently in both Lost Odyssey and Tales of Vesperia, two games I've avoided since.

Save points are the biggest piece of sh*t design still around in games. Die, please!

Agreed. Especially when you want to go do something else but you can't since you can't bloody save. Although with regards to dying and losing progress in Lost Odyssey I realised it created auto-save checkpoints in critical places and I've never had a problem since it is generally just the boss fights that are tough. I've not finished the game because, while there are some great characters (and moments) and the short stories are really good, I got bored with the main story.

[Peanut]

Originally Posted by raphael_is_cool

Agreed. Especially when you want to go do something else but you can't since you can't bloody save. Although with regards to dying and losing progress in Lost Odyssey I realised it created auto-save checkpoints in critical places and I've never had a problem since it is generally just the boss fights that are tough. I've not finished the game because, while there are some great characters (and moments) and the short stories are really good, I got bored with the main story.

That's always the biggest problem. Wanting to leave, but being unable to. And yeah, Lost Odyssey does have that nifty auto-save, and most RPG's aren't too bad in that respect, but when you're thrown into something out of nowhere, without the ability to save, is when it really sucks.

Take Tales of Vesperia, for example. I had fought a boss and done a bunch of side stuff. On the way to the next town, I decide to do like an hour of grinding. All good. I head into town, your group splits up for a bit, I walk down a f*cking street and get attacked by 3 guys out of nowhere. Having just been out grinding, my health was very low for this particular character. Two seconds into the fight, I'm dead. Upwards of 2 hours of progress lost, and there wasn't a save point in sight. Not even in the town. Bullsh*t.

[Peanut]

Originally Posted by raphael_is_cool

- GTA IV: The Lost and The Damned

What do you think of it? I don't know anyone else who's gotten it. I haven't had too much time to play it, and it would be a struggle if I even wanted to, but I don't think it's all that great so far. Granted, I'm not very far in, but it already felt like I was playing the exact same missions over again.

[raphael_is_cool]

I think it's alright. The story hasn't hooked me in but it's certainly interesting and has some nice touches. The missions are always going to be a bit repetitive but I hate that it kinda holds your hand through anything different (eg. some text popping up saying 'shoot a grenade through the window and the occupants of the house will flee'); I'd rather figure stuff like that out myself. And Johnny's story seems a little too close to Niko's though (reluctance to violence, being drawn in deeper, GASP! betrayal) and again the missions jar with the character himself. But I'm not a great ways through the plot, been doing gang wars and races, so maybe it improves.

I'm loving the new weapons, bikes, gang dynamic and stuff though. I picked it up mainly because I was having a slow week and I figured it'd go well just as something to hop in and out of occasionally at least. I still quite enjoy just driving around Liberty City and you usually see some random funny stuff.

[raphael_is_cool]

Ouch. I remember on FFXII I did this bit with the confusing different levels of a dungeon all with gates named after star signs and numbered and they had timed switches on other levels and stuff (****ing confusing). I had not warped out after the plot relevant boss battle and was walking back but got lost (everything looked the same!). Little did I know that this was also where loads of high level enemies were and possibly the game's hardest secret boss (the strongest summon creature you can capture, I think). So there I was walking around for two hours longer than I intended to play, barely surviving from fight to fight, desperately searching for the way out and a freaking save point.

On the plus side, I made it out and was levelled up quite substantially. On the downside, I got to bed much later than planned and I got bored of the game not long after. Still haven't been bothered to finish it.

[Wes]

Originally Posted by Peanut

I think I'm done with RE. On two separate occasions, on the way to a typewriter, I've been waylaid by two hunters in a hallway and killed, losing progress through almost the entire residence/aqua ring area, past the fight with Plant 42, which I repeated, and then again through a lot of the post residence stuff in the mansion. ...

Save points are the biggest piece of sh*t design still around in games. Die, please!

Haha, now you're bringing back memories! Though I think it was done in RE partly to heighten the tension of the game -- if you hadn't saved in a while (or hadn't saved at all, if you were trying to go for some of the higher grades/rewards), things seemed even scarier than they might've if you'd just saved. With the save anywhere feature in Primal (and in RE1-3, when I played them on the computer via ePSXe), my heart rate never quite got up to where it did back in the old days.

DOS emulators don't have savestates yet, though, so you can always break those out for some old-school fear! Or break them out anyway, because old games are cool.

Right now? I'm playing TMNT: Manhattan Missions. As always.

[愛]

I just started up Mario & Luigi RPG 3. I played for about half an hour, and the story is already pretty ridiculous. Apparently some dude is selling mushrooms that make people huge and roll around destroying stuff. Of course, it's up to our dynamic duo to save the Mushroom Kingdom. Uh, what?

[ThirdMarioBro]

Does it bring back that fruity fanboy humor from the first game? I found the script from M&L2 disappointing.

[Krang]

A few days ago, I received Street Fighter IV for the PS3 in the mail, although I haven't had time to play it until today.

[愛]

Well, it's kind of in Japanese, so the jokes are a little different from the American versions. The dialog is pretty funny, though.

[Dr. Doom]

Brand new 360 Arcade after the old one's video card devoured itself in the middle of playing SFIV online.

[ThirdMarioBro]

Originally Posted by Krang

A few days ago, I received Street Fighter IV for the PS3 in the mail, although I haven't had time to play it until today.

.......aaaaaand? Whadda' you think?

Been playing Wayne's World for SNES lately out of boredom, and finally beat the game. SCHWING!
It's probably the tackiest game I've ever played. The promotional movie cut scenes were just plain bad and shameful. They made me wanna hurl.

I've lately been interested to try Moonwalker the Michael Jackson game for Genesis ever since I saw Angry Video game Nerd's review. I just need to find something that can play Genesis ROMs...

[ThirdMarioBro]

Oh man, that Nerd review was great. Gens Plus! is pretty good as far as Genny emulators go, and probably the best you'll find for PC. PicoDrive is better, but they only port that to mobile devices.

I might also point out that the Genesis version of Moonwalker is garbage really, but the arcade version is actually a ton of fun. Take a look.




As far as hard games go, I decided to sit down and beat The Lion King for SNES. Probably one of the cheapest, most poorly designed and difficult games I've ever played. Never could beat the second level when I was little, but decided to just knock it out to see if I could. It has such amazing production values for its time, but clearly Disney Interactive didn't know what in the hell they were doing when it came to game design.

[Hannah]

I introduced my brother to ROMs and he's done nothing but play them for days. He beat like 10 games this weekend and thinks it's the coolest thing ever.

Originally Posted by ThirdMarioBro

I might also point out that the Genesis version of Moonwalker is garbage really, but the arcade version is actually a ton of fun.

Duuude! Very slick! What would I need to play that game? I totally gotta try it.

[The Stryker]

I don't know if we can fully reference Emulators on here but look up Arcade Emulators and you should find it. Theres only one really.

[XERO]

Speaking of ROMs, I just got through playing one of my favorite NES games of all time: StarTropics.

Next up, are the Ninja Gaiden series. Gotta see if I still got SOME skill.

[ThirdMarioBro]

Originally Posted by Stryker

I don't know if we can fully reference Emulators on here but look up Arcade Emulators and you should find it. Theres only one really.

Emulators are legal because they are custom written code, even if they are meant to do something illicit. Talking about Roms is fine as well--just don't go publicly linking to them. That will get you in trouble both here and pretty much anywhere else.

Originally Posted by Ryona

Duuude! Very slick! What would I need to play that game? I totally gotta try it.

You would need a copy of the latest version of MAME, as well as Moonwalker MAME romset. Arcade emulation is a lot tricker than the console breed, but once you get it running it's pretty much a standard process for every other game.