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Video Games: It's On Like Donkey Kong


Inigima

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16 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

 

I've been playing the first game couch co-op with my son (yay for having a game that does real couch co-op story mode!!) and we are enjoying it. I think playing couch co-op adds a degree of enjoyment that might be missing from playing through this style of game solo.

That does sound like the best way to play it. Maybe I can convince my girlfriend to give it a go at some point and we can go through it together- she has more patience for the tactical combat games than I do.

Civ V with all its expansions is great. Ok, maybe it's not quite as great as Civ IV, probably the game I've spent the most time on in my life, but by this point Civ IV is pretty dated. Try a few games of V with different civs and aiming for different types of victories to get a feel for the game and see if it's for you. The tutorials are actually pretty helpful and for a strategy game, it's not hard to get the basics down. If you find it too slow paced, change the turn progression to quick. 

As for Dark Souls 3, it's actually my favourite of the three games. It's at least the most consistently good. Some of the level design is a bit uninspired, but some of it is fantastic, and all three games have their good and bad levels. And while it may not reach the same highs as the first game, and although the overall world design is definitely a step below Dark Souls 1, it also doesn't have some of the truly terrible moments that game has. I hope you enjoy it.

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1 hour ago, mcbigski said:

Civ5 is inferior to Civ4.  The whole one unit per tile idea in civ5 was a terrible idea.  Haven't tried Civ6 though.

A lot of people seem to have liked that change. I haven't played the 6th one either, but I think that feature is still there.

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30 minutes ago, Caligula_K3 said:

As for Dark Souls 3, it's actually my favourite of the three games.

Mine, too. I know it's a bit of a heretical opinion, but the draw for the Souls games for me was always the game play, and, for me, DS3 has the best game play of the 3 DS games (I'm a PC gamer, so no Demon's or Bloodborne for me). And I think the pvp is a lot of fun. It's actually the only Souls game where I've done any pvp, so I'm not comparing it to anything directly, but I have a blast with it.

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21 hours ago, Mikael said:

Theres a very distinct delay on my Wii buttons, but maybe controllers have evolved enough that it isnt a problem with newer consoles?

The original Wii controllers are shit.  I remember having the same complaint.  I've never had any latency issues on the PS3/PS4/Xbox360 bluetooth controllers.

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Phoenix Point is my most eagerly-awaited game of 2018. I do wish they'd had a bit more ready for this demo, like the in-mission vehicles and huge squad limits (you'll be able to take 8-10 troops on missions, and in base defence missions can control up to 16), since this is looking a little too Nu-XCOM-y at the moment.

Some of the differences are quite nice though, like having the return of a more action point-like approach where you move a little, shoot, and move again. Animation being faster is also refreshing.

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I think the one unit per tile idea of Civ5 (which carried over to Civ6) is an interesting idea that doesn't always work, but I'm glad they went for it. The doomstacks of earlier games were boring and previous efforts to combat them, such as splash damage when on defense, were not enough. The issue with Civ5 was they overly simplified the game in reaction to how complex Civ4 had been; but fortunately after both expansions a lot of the complexity was put back in. I've tried getting in to Civ6, but for some reason it just hasn't clicked with me. I've only played one full game, and had a couple short attempts at others, so I can't speak enough to what changed from 5 to 6.

In Dark Souls 3, I got to the Cathedral of the Deep (and am pretty far into it I think) and it's a real welcome change to how dull and drab the entire Road of Sacrifices/Farron Keep area is. And I seem to mostly have the melee gameplay figured out; except for parrying/riposte, but I've never been able to get the timing on that down in any game. Two things I've noticed compared to 1 & 2 (never played Bloodborne): 1) It seems way easier to run past/away from enemies, 2) Bonfires seems more plentiful and generously placed. Both of which greatly contribute to the feeling that this is an easier game than previous ones.

Also, I don't think I'm over-leveled or over-geared, but I'm using a Claymore +3 right now, and I'm one-shotting most smaller enemies and stun-lock single-combo-ing basically every big enemy except for knights. Which contributes to the easy feeling. At least the bosses still take some work, though there's been nothing close to anything like the Capra Demon yet. I don't mind though. There's still challenge to the game, and I played the Scholars of the First Sin edition of DS2, and I despised how cheap it felt in the name of extra difficulty.

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5 hours ago, Fez said:

There's still challenge to the game, and I played the Scholars of the First Sin edition of DS2, and I despised how cheap it felt in the name of extra difficulty.

Could you elaborate? I bought the SOTFS edition but haven't played it yet.

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1 hour ago, The Grey Wolf said:

Could you elaborate? I bought the SOTFS edition but haven't played it yet.

Scholars of the First Sin continued and greatly expanded the patch design philosophy that existed throughout the lifecycle of DS2, which was one of making changes solely to prevent players from deviating from the "correct" way of playing and to make areas of the game more difficult if players seemed too able to get past them. 

SOTFS removed a lot of loot from earlier areas of the game; it reduced the chances of loot dropping from enemies; it added a lot of additional enemies to areas (including putting some enemies from endgame areas into early areas, which made no lore sense), making some alternate paths through the game nearly impossible; it greatly increased how long enemies follow you; and it added a new type of NPC invader that loved to show up right when you enter boss rooms.

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It's probably true that DS3 is easier than the other two, though in general I think the first Dark Souls game anyone plays will always be their hardest. That's fine by me, though, because as you point out, @Fez, it also removes nearly all of the tedium of Dark Souls 1 and SOTFS. I never enjoyed moments like the Capra Demon or those Anor Londo archers or some of the levels in Dark Souls 2 (the lava castle in paticular) where the bonfire is so far from a boss or an encounter that can easily kill you, or where you have to fight the same enemies over and over again to get to a boss. The increase in bonfires, especially before boss fights, has to be one of the reasons Dark Souls 3 is my favourite.

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1 hour ago, Fez said:

Scholars of the First Sin continued and greatly expanded the patch design philosophy that existed throughout the lifecycle of DS2, which was one of making changes solely to prevent players from deviating from the "correct" way of playing and to make areas of the game more difficult if players seemed too able to get past them. 

SOTFS removed a lot of loot from earlier areas of the game; it reduced the chances of loot dropping from enemies; it added a lot of additional enemies to areas (including putting some enemies from endgame areas into early areas, which made no lore sense), making some alternate paths through the game nearly impossible; it greatly increased how long enemies follow you; and it added a new type of NPC invader that loved to show up right when you enter boss rooms.

This is just baffling.  Lets start with some things.... the invasion thing?  Run into a boss fog, the invader goes away.  You know the exact same way it's been in all Souls games ever.  It was never changed in SOTFS.

hat Late game enemies were added?  If you mean the Dragon outside the Keep that area beyond the Dragonrider in Heide's Tower well then I'm not sure what to tell you.  They purposely clutter up that area with heides knights and big guys to reinforce that the area past Dragonrider is no longer an early game area.  That's the whole point.  It's been done in games for a long time.  You put much harder situations so that the players don't go that way yet.  You can still do it if you like but it will be harder.  Much like the Valley of Drakes in DS1 or going to Lothric Castle before the Undead Village in DS3.  That's how the Souls games have always worked.

What loot was removed without having something better (that was previously late game like the Grand Lance) replace it?  They actually made you have to work for estus shards unlike Vanilla which gave them out like candy. They added enemies but actually made them pullable so you wouldn't get gang ganked like in Vanilla.  They also took away a whole bunch of enemies too but whatever.

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9 hours ago, Pony Queen Jace said:

Finally. After 3 years of training. I am ready to play as Japan in HOI4.

This is exciting! I have a strong enough grasp on the Naval system that this just might be possible!

Blah. Last time I played Japan I conquered all of South East Asia, the Dutch East Indies, India, eastern Siberia,  Australia, Hawaii, and coastal China (inland China consisted of 5 different puppet states).

I ended up rage quitting in 1953 when, after 2 years of heavy fighting, my invasion of Norther America was driven back into the sea. The front stretched from Vancouver to Baja California, but in that whole area the only airfield I could use was in California. It was all over when they got over the Rocky Mountains (despite me dropping +20 nukes along the line) and occupied my only airfield. 

Hope yours goes better than mine did.

I would play some HOI4 myself, but Apocalypse drops in like 14 hours, and I'm not going to have much time for other games for quite awhile.

 

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1 hour ago, Slurktan said:

This is just baffling.  Lets start with some things.... the invasion thing?  Run into a boss fog, the invader goes away.  You know the exact same way it's been in all Souls games ever.  It was never changed in SOTFS.

hat Late game enemies were added?  If you mean the Dragon outside the Keep that area beyond the Dragonrider in Heide's Tower well then I'm not sure what to tell you.  They purposely clutter up that area with heides knights and big guys to reinforce that the area past Dragonrider is no longer an early game area.  That's the whole point.  It's been done in games for a long time.  You put much harder situations so that the players don't go that way yet.  You can still do it if you like but it will be harder.  Much like the Valley of Drakes in DS1 or going to Lothric Castle before the Undead Village in DS3.  That's how the Souls games have always worked.

What loot was removed without having something better (that was previously late game like the Grand Lance) replace it?  They actually made you have to work for estus shards unlike Vanilla which gave them out like candy. They added enemies but actually made them pullable so you wouldn't get gang ganked like in Vanilla.  They also took away a whole bunch of enemies too but whatever.

Pretty sure Forlon follows you into boss rooms, but regardless, it shows up all the damn time.

Late game/much tougher enemies were added up all over the place, I can't even begin to remember all of them. I remember the one that really pissed me off though, all the Undead Aberrations that were added to the deep water in Sinner's Rise. Overall, SOFTS messed up the flow that vanilla DS2 to its progression of fights from easier to harder.

Of course, the first sin of DS2 was the patch nerfing miracles into the ground because "it wasn't right" that players were managing to use ranged builds. Yeah, lightning miracles were a bit too overpowered, but there was no need to turn them into a non-viable option.

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15 hours ago, Fez said:

Pretty sure Forlon follows you into boss rooms, but regardless, it shows up all the damn time.

Late game/much tougher enemies were added up all over the place, I can't even begin to remember all of them. I remember the one that really pissed me off though, all the Undead Aberrations that were added to the deep water in Sinner's Rise. Overall, SOFTS messed up the flow that vanilla DS2 to its progression of fights from easier to harder.

Of course, the first sin of DS2 was the patch nerfing miracles into the ground because "it wasn't right" that players were managing to use ranged builds. Yeah, lightning miracles were a bit too overpowered, but there was no need to turn them into a non-viable option.

That was a bug that was fixed.

I played a lot of vanilla DS2, so I really enjoyed SOFTS and liked the changes it made.  Miracles aren't as powerful, but dark spells sure were.  DS1 was best at making all classes pretty viable (my favorite was a pure caster with miracles + spells + dark + dex), but what DS2 did to clerics, DS3 did to pure casters.  I try not to dismiss a game just because they didn't make every build uber viable.

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I only ever played SOTFS, so I can't talk about how it compares to the original DS2.  But while I think it's not a bad game, I generally found it to be a tedious and underwhelming one. Aside from the world design making absolutely no sense and a lot of the level design being uninspired (which must be shared by both the original and updated version), much of the enemy placement was just deeply infuriating and tedious. I'm looking at you, charging knights in fire castle and poison statues... And yes, the stream of constant NPC invaders was very annoying.

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