Last Game You Finished And Your Thoughts V3.0

I took delivery of a physical copy of the Purrfect Edition of Bubsy: The Woolies Strike Back on PS4 earlier today, and I beat the game in about an hour. Simply put, it struggled to make much of an impression. I rattled through it's fifteen levels just a couple of hours ago and I hardly remember any of it. Fair enough, it was playable and it all worked, but it's just a very plain and unexceptional 2D platformer. Nothing stands out. 4/10.

Ouch. I was wondering if a fellow forumite was going to get the new Bubsy; I remember being quite happy with the SNES original back in the day. That was when everyone and their dog were releasing sassy mascot platformers... I remember it well. Cool Spot was a good one. Anyway, sorry to hear that the comeback has failed to impress.

Gorogoa was, for me anyway, a sufferer of Undertale Syndrome: a term I'm coining for games that are good, hyped up to be world-changing, and are therefore more disappointing to play than they should be.  

I took a punt on Gogogoat because a bunch of places described it as unique, clever, and great.  It's another arty puzzle game, of which there are several, so that's not true.  Its scenery-shifting stuff is unique, but the general feel has definitely been done before.  It is definitely clever... but not as clever as it thinks it is, or as it's been made out to be.  Its wonderful gameplay ideas peak with a moment in the first fifth of the game and another in the second fifth.  It's consistently good, and there are some real forehead-slapping moments, but it never regained those heights.

As for greatness - the gameplay's good, the visuals are nicely drawn, the music is... there, and the story is thought-provoking if nothing else.  Given a chance to bloom, for those ideas in the first and second fifths to evolve, it could have been great.  But I polished the damn thing off in ninety minutes.  Apparently it took the developer six years to create: I don't know what he was doing for most of those.

I would recommend Go!Go!Go!a to puzzle fans, because although it's another arty puzzle game it probably is unlike anything you've played.  But get it for £5 on 'phone.  It's not substantial enough to be worth £15 on Switch.

Balla wrote:

Gorogoa was, for me anyway, a sufferer of Undertale Syndrome: a term I'm coining for games that are good, hyped up to be world-changing, and are therefore more disappointing to play than they should be.  

Doesn't that say more about the person than the game though? Genuinely interested as I tend to try and put any hype/praise out the window for a well received game when I get around to playing it.

Speaking for myself, I find it hard to disassociate hype from experience. Take The Hunger Games, I heard nothing but superlatives about it, but when I watched it I thought it was incredibly mediocre. The same is true for Persona 5. I'm not sure that this necessarily would make me change my verdict of a thing, but a part of me is always going to be weighing my experience against the hype, wondering if I've missed something or everyone else is just silly.  

I mean I soldiered through P5, in part because it was expensive, but also because I was hoping at some point maybe, just maybe, the hype would click.

Otherwise:



Heard a lot of hype about its sequel on the forum so I bought the original a week or so ago. Thoroughly enjoyed it. There's something nice about carving out paths through the dirt, and I tended to encounter new things frequently enough to keep things interesting. I'll definitely consider picking up the sequel when it's on sale. I can definitely see it benefiting from being on the Switch, I think I'd have preferred it on the go, but equally having it on the big screen via the PS4 was nice.

Hype and expectation can make or break a game... but it's usually 'break'. I try to avoid hype, disregard it, and use it sparingly myself, because I know how much it can change expectation. That's one of the reasons I'm not as mad keen on Super Mario Odyssey as I might be: I let the hype get to me.

As for SteamWorld Dig, I'm glad you enjoyed it, Muss. It's a slight game, I reckon, but I just couldn't put it down.

I did think of you and Bravely Second as well Zero!

Jas fair play to you if you can do that, but are you saying you don't get excited for a new MonHun game, say? And that excitement doesn't feed into the moments you first play it? You'll forgive me for saying that I find that hard to believe!

Anyway, like Muss, I can't regulate the level of hype I feel for a came so well. Also: the entirety of Gorogoa was the moments I first played it.

Yeah that's fine as it was just a question that popped into my head & I wasn't trying to make it seem like I can do it all the time, most games are unbelievably hyped up these days which is why I try to keep it in check.

I finished Floor Kids on Switch over the weekend. It's a really hard game to rate, and an even harder game to describe...!

In terms of originality, it's very definitely a game all of it's own: it's sort of a hip-hop/breakdance-em-up with gameplay reminiscent of absolutely nothing else I can think of, and mechanics that I can only compare to the way in which you pull off tricks in EA Big's old SSX and Street games. It's got even more creativity and flamboyance than those though. Once you get your head round it and understand what you're supposed to do, Floor Kids is really good. Of particular note is the sound and art design - both are brilliant, working fantastically together, and they add much to the game's unique and organic character.

Sounds good - and it is - but I found that Floor Kids got a little samey before I reached the end, with nowt in the way of customisation or different types of music. And reaching the end took me just over two hours. For £15.99, that's a big thing, and definitely something to keep in mind if you're considering downloading it. I'll give it 8/10, but my advice is to get it in a sale.

TCK wrote:

Sounds good - and it is - but I found that Floor Kids got a little samey before I reached the end, with nowt in the way of customisation or different types of music. And reaching the end took me just over two hours. For £15.99, that's a big thing, and definitely something to keep in mind if you're considering downloading it. I'll give it 8/10, but my advice is to get it in a sale.

Some indie games are taking a weird turn on pricing, aren't they? I know you still get ones for 10 quid or less but I think some of them are realising people will still bite at around the 15 pound mark...........who knows maybe the overall dev cost has just went up though.

Interesting - I'll wait until it's cheaper, but there's something incredibly charming about it...

The Wonderful 101



Difficulty Setting Used: Very Easy

Oh, man. I want to like TW101 very, very much: the voice acting is great, the action is spectacular, and the plot feels like playing through a season of a non-too-serious anime show. However, it's hard to control, even if you use the touch screen instead of the right stick to engage Morphs. Two of the symbols you need to draw are similar enough that I occasionally had trouble getting the one I wanted recognised. Also, any bit where your view switches to the GamePad is diabolical. Thank goodness that's underused. Still, it's fun, funny and fresh.

16/20

Blossom Tales: The Sleeping King



Difficulty Setting Used: N/A

So, I don't know if you know this, but I am quite partial to the Zelda game A Link To The Past. Blossom Tales is not so much a love letter to that game as it is camped outside A Link To The Past's house, licking its lips suggestively when it catches a glimpse of ALttP through the window. Of course, ALttP is a classic, and Blossom Tales isn't. It's alright, is what it is, with both art direction and music a bit below par. The idea that it's all the story that a man is telling his grandchildren is neat and could have been used more. Decent enough game but there's so much better on the eShop than this.

13/20

This is a sequel to Xenoblade Chronicles.  It is simultaneously a rejection of Xenoblade Chronicles X.  That's no bad thing.

The game is still about exploring vast landmasses, driven by a story with an anime-tastic hero and the girl he loves.  Only she's a sentient weapon, because reasons.  The story is strong enough, the characters good enough, to give you drive to enjoy the gameplay.  And it makes more sense than XCX's lot of rubbish.

They've improved the gameplay in several small but significant ways, such that I don't think I could go back.  Treasure hunting is less tedious, due to the treasures in discrete locations.  There are treasure chests, which are fun to find, and uses for all your money in the shops.  The mini-map, though still flawed, is greatly improved.  I don't know whether I prefer three blades with nine arts between them to having eight immediately available, but there's not so much of a difference as some (Andy) would have you believe.

There are several small flaws, most of which are caveated.  The use of multiple continents means you can't roam over the entire landscape, like you could in XC1.  The tutorials are hopeless, which is why the Internet exists. The graphics aren't the best (Cappa said they wouldn't have taxed the Wii U, and he has a point), which I barely noticed once the game hit its stride.  The dubbed accents are... variable, but I ended up liking most of the main characters, and finding the others funny ('THINK YEW KIN TAKE ME!?').  And the female character design is chuffing stupid in places, which is partly made up for by two of the main female characters being excellent.  (Pyra... not so much.)

The biggest flaw this game has is a severe case of ludonarrative dissonance.  The term maybe wanky, but it's appropriate.  Steam-rollering a baddie, then being shown a cut-scene where your blokes go, 'He's too strong!'  Characters spending Aegis (sorrynotsorry) going on about how they don't have much time.  The ability to fast-travel wherever, even when theoretically trapped.  Things like that really took me out of the experience.

But it's still a top game, offering masses of explorative freedom, with a battle scheme most JRPGs will weep at, over 100+ hours.  That's at least 90 hours of enjoyment there.  It won't win over non-JRPG fans (sorry Cappa), but it's an excellent example of the genre.  

Basically, it's more Xenoblade.  

Ah, but then when you have games throw unwinnable fights at you for the sake of narrative consistency you have cases of the player throwing most of their resources out the window in an attempt to survive what ended up being a unwinnable fight.  

Sorry but nothing's going to convince me Rex's voice is anything but a reason to accept the game's dubtitles and go JP voices.  I've heard Rex's battle cry. We went from Shulk's genuinely bloodcurdling screams of rage to... Whatever the heckles comes out of Rex's mouth during combat.  

Alsoalso Pyra's design is great on the eyes, and we all know ultimately that's the only thing that counts!  Ridiculous breast physics aside at any rate, haven't seen jiggles that silly since the last time I used Taki in Soul Calibur.  

Yep, trust someone finishing a jrpg to bring me out of hiding.

It's like the Bloody Mary curse! There are actually worse jiggles than Pyra (awakening of Rare Blade cut-scene - may be considered a spoiler?).  Worse designs, too.  She's just badly dressed, and at the forefront of the game.  I wrote this pretty-much-spoiler-free-if-you've-seen-the-trailers-and-art piece on it.

There are gameplay reasons for what they do - I can see somebody being stuck in a place with high-level enemies if fast travel's removed, for instance.  But there have to be better ways around it than the massive discrepancies you see here.

As for the voices, that's fair.  I prefer Rex when he's salvaging ('Aw man, did I come up with a load of guff again?') to his battle cries and occasionally stilted cut-scene dialogue.  Nia is genuinely great though, I won't hear a word said against her English (actually Welsh) voice actress.

I've been looking at downloading Virginia since Colin was talking about it on Kinda Funny but for someone never did, even after Muss's review a while ago, I never got around to downloading it.

As it went on sale yet again on PSN for £2.49, I thought I'd finally take the plunge. It's okay, I've played better in the walking-sim genre and will play better but for £2.49, I can't really moan.

If you like the genre then give it a go as it's cheap and likely is on Xbox or PC as well but if you don't then I would say avoid.

I would like to games like it to have more of a presence on Switch.

Batman: Arkham Origins (Wii U)



Difficulty Setting Used: Normal

Arkham City remains my favourite Wii U game. Arkham Origins isn't close, sadly. I don't mind that the voice actors changed: the new fellows do a great job, particularly Troy Baker as The Joker (who voices Batman himself in The Telltale Series - weird). The gradual increase in difficulty I felt in City is absent here - I was probably expected to do more side quests than I did. After a few hours in, I just wanted it to be over. One of the worst problems I have, though, was the glitching. I experienced three game-ending glitches in the last few days alone. Unacceptable.

11/20

It's a Batman twofer!

Batman: The Telltale Series



Difficulty Setting Used: N/A

Telltale games have certainly moved on since Back To The Future on the Wii! A lot less point and click, with a bit more dialogue choosing and quick-time eventing. There is a lot to simply sit through, though, and this is where one of my conflicts comes from. For reasonable chunks of the game, I'm just watching, or pressing X to not die (and I died twice). I also felt that the choose your own adventure elements meant that the story didn't fit together quite as neatly as it could have done. Quirk of the genre, I suppose. Still, being Bruce Wayne for some of the game is a nice take and it looks kinda good, with decent voice work. Happy enough, I would say.

14/20

It would be nice to have a few point and click puzzles in contemporary Telltale games. The first Walking Dead had some nice ones, which weren't particularly difficult, but which also meshed quite nicely with the pacing of the game. The detective stuff in that game was a bit of a let down in that regard from what I recall.

I also hated the game's ending, absolutely hated it.

I chose :

Overall I thought it was a decent effort that didn't quite hit the mark, leaving me tepid about the squeal.

I have a free copy of Origins sitting on my Steam account, pretty sure it was a gift from Warner Bros after cocking up the PC release of Arkham Knight. I've never even downloaded it, heard too many negative things for me to bother giving it a go.

origins has a lot of technical ugs, bbut in terms of design its pretty decent. a little dry, but wortha pop.

The problem with the whle "character driven" defence of telltale is . . . how much can you really personalise and interperet batmsn? hes batman, he punches crims and hates himself. hd has a pointy hat. thats him you cnt not be that guy

Yeah i think that's why their games work better with unknown characters, which is probably why borderlands and walking dead are their biggest hits.

Might give origins a go one day, but oftentimes the free stuff I get via psn is something I'd rather give a first.

Did Lovers In A Dangerous Spacetime on Switch the other day, so I did. It’s a very kitschy co-op space shooter that plays a little bit like Affordable Space Adventures on Wii U, in that it has you controlling several different parts for a spaceship by individually running between them. Quite smart, and it all plays very smoothly. Unfortunately, I did it all on my own, and I felt it would have been much better with other folk. Still, even though I’ve seen every idea that it’s got to offer, the randomly generated levels and the warm and appealing presentation means that I’ll want to come back to it. It didn’t outstay it’s welcome either - £7.99 for four hours of solid entertainment is grand by me. 7/10 because I played it on my own, but surely a comfortable 8/10 if you’ve got a co-pilot.

Most of us would say Ocarina of Time is one of the best games ever and certainly is for the N64, it got released a few more times such as with Wind Waker but the most notable version after the original release would be the 3DS Remake.

Which brings me to


This remake (I'm still not sure I'd call it a remake) doesn't as go as far as OoT3D but is a very close second on taking a classic and improving on that game to bring us the definitive version for now (You can't tell me we won't see these games again).

SotC, of course, improves in the graphics department but may lose some of its charms compared to how it looked on PS2, yet its a great advert for HDR for games which is really hard to show to you guys but it's like night and day even with 4K resolution, which I played it in over the 60fps mode due to the game being a cinematic marvel that I felt resolution should actually take priority over performances as it's not an FPS or something.

Other things have been updated such as the controls and stamina meter along with the gameplay of scaling colossi compared to the PS2 and PS3 remaster. Bluepoint has done a top job bringing this PS2 Classic to the audience of today and I'm glad I got to experience Wanders journey to save his love Mono with his trusty steed Agro all over again for the first time 12 years as I didn't want to sour that original experience (why I didn't play the remaster).

I left the Team Ico collection in my Top 25 games of all-time and sure this isn't exactly the same but does cement it's placed amongst the very best in gaming and a true piece of art.

9.5/10

What can I say?  Glad you enjoyed it, it isn't for me.


TSB is the product of British house Cavalier Studios and Spanish lot Tequilaworks.  I'd never heard of either before playing the game, but on Tequilaworks' website, I saw exactly one other game I recognised: RiME.  They do indeed share one thing in common: their abysmal performance on Switch.

Massive great loading times when you fire it up.  Loading screens every five rooms, sometimes every three.  At the end of some of them, horrible stuttering while the game catches up.  With gameplay that involves going into the same rooms over and over again, this is a big flaw.  I must admit that I'm not sure about the gameplay either: it involves running through the same twelve hours again and again, learning what happens when, with skips only to 12 4 and 8 pm.  A lot of patience, and a fair amount of repetition, required.

But I still liked it.  I played it off the back of Castle saying it was one for fans of Ghost Trick, and while nowhere near as good or as tight, it definitely has a story as mind-bending.  The characters are generally interesting enough for you to want to save them from their grisly fates (there's a lot of brutal(e) and not much sexy involved), and the amount of foreshadowing that clicks into place once you know the twists is immense.

That said, I've docked a mark from my initial score because I did not like those twists.

The art style's very nice indeed, although possibly not so crisp on Switch.  The soundtrack's catchy and reminds me of The Butler Did It!.  It has all the hallmarks of a good visual novel, and while it's not and employs clunky gameplay instead, even that works with the story.  Not enough to give it a free pass, but enough for me to appreciate it.

If you're a fan of the Metroidvania-Ghost Trick-Majora's Mask sub-genre, you could do worse than checking this out.  But get it on another platform if possible.