Jump to content

Video Games: It's On Like Donkey Kong


Inigima

Recommended Posts

So I've beaten Into the Breach with all but two of the squads (not counting the custom or random squads, which I haven't done yet either).

I'd rank them:

  1. Rusting Hulks - This was my favorite squad by far.  Just really fun gameplay.  You get decent starting damage output plus damage over time via the electric smoke.  You have less control over enemy positioning, but the smoke canceling out attacks mostly makes up for it.
  2. Zenith Guard - Insane damage output, especially in the early game.  Bad map layouts can hurt you, though, as the beam damages friendly buildings and no upgrade removes that.  Still, the damage output alone makes this the easiest squad in the game.
  3. Rift Walkers - The standard team is also the most balanced.  Really fun gameplay, plenty of control over enemy positioning, solid damage output.  
  4. Blitzkrieg - The Hook Mech is borderline useless, but he can at least act as a power conduit to help you string together massive attacks with the Lightning Mech.  The Boulder Mech is nice for both damage and blocking enemy spawns, and his rocks can also act as power conduits.  This was probably the second easiest squad after the Zenith Guard, although this one requires some upgrades and the early game can be tough.
  5. Steel Judoka - You start out with low damage output and the gravity mech isn't very good.  You do get a bonus for enemy damage to other enemies and have some good re-positioning power, but this just isn't a great team, and really needs upgrades to be fun to play with.
  6. Flame Behemoths - Just zero damage output on this team early on, which makes it by far the toughest team in the early game.  Even late game isn't ideal, as you still can't output nearly enough damage most of the time.  You have some solid positioning power, but it's just not enough to overcome the lack of damage you can deal.

The Hazardous Mechs are next in line, and I still need to unlock the Frozen Titans. 

Really loving this game, though.  Each squad creates completely unique gameplay strategies.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Been playing some Vermintide 2. It doesn't officially come out until tomorrow, but everyone who buys it has access to a beta that goes until the official release; it's 4 of the 13 maps and the devs said their goal is to have progress carryover from it.

It's fun. I never played the first game (or Left for Dead, which this mostly is), but there's a nice variety of weapon types and the different subclasses seem to add additional layers to it (I say seem cause I haven't unlocked any yet). Definitely kinda mindless, but I think it'll make a good podcast game. There is a ton of banter between the characters that establishes the story, so that's cool; but since you'll be running the maps over and over to unlock loot, I imagine it eventually tunes out. Though on the replayability side, the map layouts are the same each time, but enemies and most pick-ups are randomized. 

The game needs a way better UI though, not so much for combat, but for everything back at the Keep between missions. Right now there is no way to view your stats, at all. So you'll get gear that says stuff like +1.0% critical chance or +25 health, but you have no idea what your critical chance rate is or your health pool, so its not possible to tell what is meaningful.

Also, it's P2P multiplayer, which I never enjoy. Each map takes 30-45 minutes (and that's at the Recruit setting I've been playing, there's two higher difficulties that I haven't touched) and if the host drops the map restarts. And if you quit out, you get no rewards, you have to party wipe (which doesn't give much) or beat the map to get anything. I've played I think 9 missions and had 1 host drop. On the plus side, it looks like you can set yourself to always host and not need to deal with that; and the playerbase seems high enough on Steam that you'll always find a party quickly.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've unlocked all the normal squads, but getting the secret one is going to be a pain. I had a great run yesterday though and found a secret pilot

 

Trying to get the random squad achievements and I got a chaos roll with two of the ice mechs. I figured I'd give it a shot cause even without Bethany preventing the self-freeze in the second one it's still a good mech as you can use being frozen to block shots or spawns. But then towards the end of the first island I notice this cracked mountain that's glowing. So I blow it up, walk on the square and the next turn I hear the FTL jump sound and a pod lands. It had a freaking Zoltan in it, who provides a green shield every turn. So for the rest of the run I get to freeze two enemies every turn almost anywhere on the map. Couldn't get perfect islands as I didn't have the damage to kill the bosses, but the rest of the run was so easy I wished I'd been playing on hard mode.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Chrono Trigger on Steam = pretty good time. Ignore the haters. All these spoiled kids today, try growing up with your only Chrono Trigger experience being on a 13 inch tube TV, turned into the corner of the living room, your body jammed against the wall, because your mom wouldn't buy curtains because you lived in the country and ninety percent of the day produced tv glare so bad you couldn't see it. 90 percent! That's almost half of your Chrono Trigger playing time.

 

I just remember being smashed up against the wall, tv inches from my face, horrible neck and back pain, but man, I couldn't wait to get Frog back.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 3/4/2018 at 7:49 PM, mcbigski said:

One of the Achievements says something about "..with all ten squads" IIRC.  So presumably the visible 8, a mixed squad, and the secret squad.

Who is everyone's favorite time traveler?  I always seem to pick Abe Isamu.  Getting Armor for free in one Mech is huge.

I'm sure that there are some great synergies between squads and the recurring pilot powers. What are some of the faves?

My favourite traveller is Mafan.  Granted I've only done 6 runs (only completing 2) but the Zoltan shield is too good.  He made the Hook tank on Blitzkrieg awesome for me as I got the upgrade where he freezes everything around you in a wide area but doesn't freeze himself due to the shield.

Has anyone got what seems to be(from the silhouette) the Mantis yet?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I just finished the Blood and Wine DLC so I'm officially done with The Witcher 3. :unsure: What an ending though:

Spoiler

I loved the last few hours with the vampires attacking the city, meeting the elder one in the cave and getting the red Dracula armor. Great send off. I decided to kill Dettlaff, then to not tell the Duchess about her being the intended 5th victim of her sister. So of course her guard was down and the sister stabs her with her own hair clip while they embraced. What a disaster... but still great. 

I also ended with the Grandmaster Wolf gear and dyed it black, with the chest armor being silver. Best looking gear in the game IMO. 

ETA: And Orianna's orphanage!! Damn! I wanted to kill her so badly.

I'm gonna play Dragon Age: Inquisition now. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 3/8/2018 at 1:49 AM, Simon Steele said:

Chrono Trigger on Steam = pretty good time. Ignore the haters. All these spoiled kids today, try growing up with your only Chrono Trigger experience being on a 13 inch tube TV, turned into the corner of the living room, your body jammed against the wall, because your mom wouldn't buy curtains because you lived in the country and ninety percent of the day produced tv glare so bad you couldn't see it. 90 percent! That's almost half of your Chrono Trigger playing time.

 

I just remember being smashed up against the wall, tv inches from my face, horrible neck and back pain, but man, I couldn't wait to get Frog back.

Great game but why give Square all that money for a super shitty port (they ported the android version FYI) when you can just run the OG on an emulator? 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Relic said:

Great game but why give Square all that money for a super shitty port (they ported the android version FYI) when you can just run the OG on an emulator? 

Yeah, there's really no excuse for ports that bad when you can play the game on an emulator in better quality.  Like, it's not that hard to get these ports up and running on a modern PC without having them be absolute shit.  Square has a history of shoddy PC ports of old games, though, so this isn't surprising.  They just throw a lot of their 16 bit games up for cash grabs and put no effort into porting them properly.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 3/10/2018 at 8:23 AM, Relic said:

Great game but why give Square all that money for a super shitty port (they ported the android version FYI) when you can just run the OG on an emulator? 

I guess I don't see the shittiness in the port, and I'm glad to get the game back. If it's an android version, that's fine, it just isn't affecting me at all. It's just been so fun, and I've had no issues with the interface getting in the way, distracting me, or the port itself being a problem. 

There are some extra features in this version too, which I am excited to try. FF6 I also bought, and that took some getting used to (the sprites were supposed to be an upgrade, I know, but man they messed up the aesthetic of that game), but I like that one too. 

Edit: but now that you mention it, if I dig through my external drive that's collecting dust in my desk drawer, I bet I have Chrono Trigger and FF6 (3) on emulator. I guess I still want to support square as I don't see them as doing bad work here. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 3/11/2018 at 0:26 AM, Ramsay B. said:

I just finished the Blood and Wine DLC so I'm officially done with The Witcher 3. :unsure: What an ending though:

  Hide contents

I loved the last few hours with the vampires attacking the city, meeting the elder one in the cave and getting the red Dracula armor. Great send off. I decided to kill Dettlaff, then to not tell the Duchess about her being the intended 5th victim of her sister. So of course her guard was down and the sister stabs her with her own hair clip while they embraced. What a disaster... but still great. 

I also ended with the Grandmaster Wolf gear and dyed it black, with the chest armor being silver. Best looking gear in the game IMO. 

ETA: And Orianna's orphanage!! Damn! I wanted to kill her so badly.

I'm gonna play Dragon Age: Inquisition now. 

I would have recommended the other way around, since TW3 is open world done well, and DA:I is a good example of semi-open world being done by a developer for the first time. Some areas of the game are just way too big and empty. In some ways you can appreciate that the real world is big and empty, so why not have big and empty in the game too. But I don't think it's necessary to have that kind of realism. Some of the areas I did like a lot. And obviously the combat mechanic is going to be very different, and it won't feel nearly as fluid as TW3. I still rate the game pretty highly, but then I like DA2 despite all its faults.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I would have recommended the other way around, since TW3 is open world done well, and DA:I is a good example of semi-open world being done by a developer for the first time. Some areas of the game are just way too big and empty. In some ways you can appreciate that the real world is big and empty, so why not have big and empty in the game too. But I don't think it's necessary to have that kind of realism. Some of the areas I did like a lot. And obviously the combat mechanic is going to be very different, and it won't feel nearly as fluid as TW3. I still rate the game pretty highly, but then I like DA2 despite all its faults.

I should've really done more homework on what DA:I exactly was because it's not my cup of tea. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

18 hours ago, Simon Steele said:

I guess I still want to support square as I don't see them as doing bad work here. 

I hear you, just wish Square would put more care and work into their ports. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

10 hours ago, Ramsay B. said:

I should've really done more homework on what DA:I exactly was because it's not my cup of tea. 

 

6 hours ago, Rhom said:

I wasn’t a fan.

It's a really weird game. It's got some fucktastic things going on. But that open world is just no beuno.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

15 minutes ago, Pony Queen Jace said:

 

It's a really weird game. It's got some fucktastic things going on. But that open world is just no beuno.

Yeah. The pieces are almost all there for me, but it completely fails the atmosphere test. It's the blandest open world environment I've seen in a modern game. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I found DA:I's open world to be just incredibly inconsistent. Some of the levels were self-contained enough that I enjoyed exploring them for their own sake, like the Western Approach. Some had some very cool level quests (the undead swamp zone and Crestwood come to mind). But about half of them were just there for the sake of being there, didn't tie into the main quests or character quests at all, and were just chock full of generic side quests. For all Mass Effect: Andromeda got wrong, it was right to restrict the number of open world hubs, though even there they didn't do a good enough job of giving you a reason to explore all the environments. Anyway, DA:I is a game that really benefits from you doing the main quest, the character quests, and the zones/sidequests that you want to explore, and ignoring everything else.

I finished my first Stellaris campaign in Apocalypse, and by finish I mean my empire got completely smoked by the Prethoryan Scourge. It was a fun playthrough, and now that I've got the hang of it, I really enjoy the Apocalypse changes, especially when paired with the beta patch they're updating. I'll probably take a break from Stellaris now, try out Assassin's Creed: Origins, and come back once Apocalypse has been fully patched.

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

20 hours ago, Ramsay B. said:

I should've really done more homework on what DA:I exactly was because it's not my cup of tea. 

Sorry to hear that. Hope you can either get a refund, on-sell it or give it to someone who will like it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

19 hours ago, Relic said:

I hear you, just wish Square would put more care and work into their ports. 

Hmmm...maybe I have no good port (of theirs) to compare it to. I really haven't played Chrono Trigger (or FF6) since they came out on SNES, so I don't notice the details people point out--except in FF6, as that old art style is iconic, and the reskin looks like something made in RPGmaker.

Now that I think of it, I haven't played a lot of remakes, ports, or remasters in general. I've been real interested in the HD remaster of FF12. I haven't heard as much negativity surrounding that one, so I think I might give that a go too.

 

On a different note, I also picked up Tales of Berseria. I think I finally "get" Tales games now.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Sorry to hear that. Hope you can either get a refund, on-sell it or give it to someone who will like it.

Unfortunately it's a digital copy, but no big deal. After Zelda and The Witcher 3 I was due for at least one letdown. I have Horizon Zero Dawn and Shadow of Mordor just collecting digital dust in my library so I'm gonna go with one of those next... and Bloodborne was free this month. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I just pickled up Bloodborne off PSN+ too. Dunno when I'm going to get around to playing. I have way too many games now because of PSN plus, and I stupidly signed up for EA access just to get ME Andromeda. ME:A is all right. I'm playing the fixed version so a lot of what it got shit for on first release is not what I'm experiencing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...