Last Game You Finished and Your Thoughts MKII

I've said before to Balla my English is dreadful and if my word doesn't help me like yours has and it reads back okay to me. I think it's fine.

Yours does sound better but the thing is how I've written it is how I've written for 25 years, that I'm not sure I can really improve on it or learn new things.

masofdas wrote:

I've said before to Balla my English is dreadful and if my word doesn't help me like yours has and it reads back okay to me.  I think it's fine.

Yours does sound better but the thing is how I've written it is how I've written for 25 years, that I'm not sure I can really improve on it or learn new things.

Dreadful is overstating it Mas, as it was more than easy enough to read, and I might add that the message the writer is conveying is more important than grammar, and you conveyed your views on the game in a way that is you and I understood it. Never sell yourself short on learning though, as I did two online English Writing courses last year, Thesis writing and improving grammar, which I did for no other reason than just to brush up what I know. I thoroughly enjoyed them and fixed up a few of my own problems. I will let it go now.

Beat Sneak Bandit

Exactly the sort of tiny, brilliant experience that should line the App Store's shelves, Beat Sneak Bandit is a totally ace rhythm puzzle game. Yes, 'rhythm puzzle game'. You tap in time to the beat to move your character around, whose next action is depicted at the top of the screen. He moves from side to side, climbs stairs in front of him and turns around when faced with a blockage... and that's it, until you reach the level's goal, having avoided all your foe's tricks and traps. Fully charming with a tiny dollop of quirk, the quality drips from every bit. Great, great stuff.

18/20

masofdas wrote:

it reads back okay to me

This is completely off topic, but this point you make relates to something I was discussing with my colleagues at work. We (and by that, I mean I) have got to be really careful when proof-reading. Things we've written automatically sound like Shakespeare when we read it back. The words started off in a part of our brain that handles speech, sentences and so on; if we read it immediately after writing, our brain goes "oh, I know this" and, in a way, "auto-redirects" to the speech we heard in our head in the first place, as opposed to the syntax on the screen. I've corrected this paragraph about 4 or 5 times already.

EDIT: Oh, actual game review...


Donkey Kong Country Returns: Tropial Freeze

Yeah, it's alright. actually, it's better than alright. It's definitely better than its predecessor, as 1) there aren't a many horrible vehicle bits, and 2) you don't have to shake the remote to roll (the latter stopped my sister from playing the game past world 2, and she's a platform maestro). Nintendo's handling of the Extended Kong Family is a lot better than Rare's later work. The graphics are pretty (but, to be honest, I was too busy concentrating on the next platform to look at the shiny things in the background - maybe I have a brain thing). As someone who insists on 100%ing these things, I had a lot more fun doing so in DKCRTF, compared to the Wii outing, and in fact more so than the (occasionally unfair) Yoshi's Island.

9/10

Jimbob wrote:

masofdas wrote:

it reads back okay to me

This is completely off topic, but this point you make relates to something I was discussing with my colleagues at work. We (and by that, I mean I) have got to be really careful when proof-reading. Things we've written automatically sound like Shakespeare when we read it back. The words started off in a part of our brain that handles speech, sentences and so on; if we read it immediately after writing, our brain goes "oh, I know this" and, in a way, "auto-redirects" to the speech we heard in our head in the first place, as opposed to the syntax on the screen. I've corrected this paragraph about 4 or 5 times already.

I am terrible at my own proofing for the reasons you outline. I believe that I am reading it with my brain, disengaged from my eyes. I find the best way to overcome this is to read it out loud, forcing my eyes to work in tandem with my brain. Some of us are better at picking up our own mistakes better than others. That is why it isn't a bad idea for those of us writing for this group to actually send it to another for them to proof-read it and send it back. I am not saying change the words,as it isn't your work, so you shouldn't, but just check for what is wrong and reads badly.

Rattled through Streets of Rage for the first time in ages the other night, specifically the SEGA 3D Classic on 3DS. Fair enough, it's as easy as ever and it's not as good as either of it's sequels, on it's own merit it remains a good game. While I'd say that the appeal of this would depend on if you've already got it, but I'd say that this is the best it's ever been. 7/10.

Yeah, the first game has nothing on its sequels, but I've a real soft spot for it. I used to rattle through it with a mate trying to get the evil ending where you become a crime boss. Fighting each other was always tense. Good stuff.

Did you guys say sequels, I was hoping we all forgot 3 was a thing.

I enjoyed 3. It's not a patch on 2, but still a good game by its own rights.

3 has a character called Roo, which automatically makes it amazing.

That is one of the things that makes it suck.

^

It should be this and only this

masofdas =

Just finished Valiant Hearts The Great War.

Well the game wasn't great just good, it really seem to drag on. I would preferred if it was about 3hrs long. The game play is okay with simple puzzle solving within a platformer.

I can't help compare to the other ubiart games, this is by far the weakest.

I'm glad I've played due to its message and emotional experience.

6/10

JayMoyles wrote:

Yeah, the first game has nothing on its sequels, but I've a real soft spot for it. I used to rattle through it with a mate trying to get the evil ending where you become a crime boss. Fighting each other was always tense. Good stuff.

The first game is actually my favourite in the series. It felt like the characters were quicker to punch and kick - a nuance but something I felt the second game lost a bit gameplay-wise (despite adding in special moves).

Plus it had dumb moments like the classic Golden Axe "walk an enemy off of the stage" parts, and the classic lift level. I love Streets of Rage 2, but the first one is my favourite. I remember 3 being bloody hard and having characters I couldn't care less about.

The lift level was great! It really felt climactic leading up to the final level with that long red carpet.

Metroid: Zero Mission



When I tweeted that I'd started playing this, Drunka replied to say I was in for a treat. I Believe In Harvey Drunka, ladies and gentlemen, because he was right. Very right indeed. It's lasted me a little over four hours but has been much more entertaining than the original game on which it's based (which is now unlocked! Very canny ). It's polished and streamlined so much that physical copies of Zero Mission have been known to slip through people's fingers like a greased pig (true!). It also stands as the first GBA-through-the-Wii-U game I've finished.

17/20

Bioshock Infinite

Here is what I think of this videogame.
10/10

Good read there Buska. I was very concerned upon seeing your score, you troll! Did you play it on the PS3? I noticed your fond impressions of the graphics, but I found the game to look less than impressive on consoles. Perhaps that's due to how massive the gap is to the PC version, but even in terms of what the PS3 can do it wasn't special.

Shantae



Before there was a Curse, or Revenge was necessary, there was Shantae, a GBC Metroid-like. I've dissed this in many different threads here, saying that it was too slow to survive. Then I discovered the run button (read the manual, Zero! ) and everything fell into place. Considering the game is in its teens, Shantae stands up well, though some of the level design smacks of earlier games. Still, a big and bright adventure that I've ended up really enjoying.

14/20

Drunkalilly wrote:

Bioshock Infinite
Here is what I think of this videogame.
10/10

Yeah, I agree with most of what you've written there, but I actually preferred Infinite's story to the original Bioshock. I actually found Infinite to be the more human story, with Booker and Elizabeth's relationship anchoring it and despite the risk of the story's complexities becoming overwhelming, it stays strong throughout. The original Bioshock - even though it definitely has the better world design and arguably has a cast of better secondary characters - smacks of someone having read a little bit too much Ayn Rand and being desperate to put that into a game.

But I didn't play Bioshock for its story - I played it because of its unbelievable atmosphere and cracking level design, which you're quite right in saying is somewhat lost going to Infinite. It's a shame they felt they had to go down the route of making it more of a conventional first-person shooter because that definitely grew old about halfway through the game.

Yep, PS3. I thought it looked great!
Like I said, I thought Booker and Elizabeth's relationship was great but I found that the Ayn Rand stuff was understood and used better than the multi verse stuff here.

I think my biggest issue with Infinite is how early I predicted

Spoiler:

Perhaps it was just my mindset going into the game, but I could just see exactly how the whole game was going to play out. Bioshock on the other hand blew me away in every way.

I do agree with a lot of what you said Drunka, using the name did & didn't help as it would of helped sales still not enough as look at irrational now but due to the name it was always going to get compared to the first which is one of the best games of all time that to top it Infinite would of had to be something special which to me was but still nowhere near enough.

Like how Balla is still waiting for something to top SM64 which I don't think will ever happen as the first was so dam good & the first to do it.

I'm not sure if it's a Marmite game,I think people have made it a Marmite game as I was watching a podcast or something the other day and they brought Infinite up and were talking about when it came out people were calling it a masterpiece then a few weeks later it was the gameplay is muh etc & how it suddenly became cool to hate the game because of Bioshock's acclaim. As I'm seeing it now people are hating on Bloodborne yet it's only just come out but there going it's just Soul's 3 (well it actually would be 4) and it does nothing new how's it a 93 on meta etc but Soul's has now become cool to hate.

But I did write infinite it back in March 2013 (Would of been a good Gintendo piece, if we had back then). It's similar to Jay's thoughts and why I still think it's one of the best games of the decade so far and the best of 2013.

Also it still has one of the best soundtracks ever including this.

But due to what happened irrational I don't know when we see anything again from them or Ken Levine but at least some of the team are making something new in Black Glove but I am worried about the Bioshock IP as 2K could just do more things like Bioshock 2 which wouldn't be great to me but I would take a HD collection of all three if I have to have Number 2 along with the two proper Bisohocks.