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I know you do son, I know you do. And you used the wrong write you big bell end. I bought it too, made the crazy mistake of only buying it on one console. I am struggling to enjoy it again at the moment, i thought I would love to play this game again as it's been a few years but I'm finding it incredibly dated. I shall play again on Thursday (when I finally get some time to play games again) with the knowledge of what it is and not what I thought it was and see if we get along then.

Very much impressed with Telltales output these days. Walking Dead is brilliant. As is The Wolf Among Us. So being a massive GOT fan, I was well up for this. And Episode 1 is a very good start indeed. Pretty important to state though that the opening section has a massive spoiler if you're not caught up to the events of the start of Series 4/Book 3. So be aware of that. It's the tried-and-tested Telltale format, which I'm perfectly happy with. You play as the Forrester family, and interact with a few of the series main fore-runners. After his frankly god-awful role as Ghost in Destiny, Peter Dinklige is back on form here as Tyrion. 5 more episodes to go, but this is a promising start.

Been playing Arcana Heart 3 all week, It's a 2d fighter, kind of a mix of tone, so there's characters who play very straight, like Terry usually, but then there's someone who fights inside a bubble, someone who rides a wolf, a girl who's imaginary friend comes to life and fights for her, a demon who drags a little girl around The same is true of the gameplay too, there's loads of systems, cancels, clever ways to chain combos, but equally you can bounce people off walls, bounce people off walls, double jump, almost constantly use supers. It's a strange game You don't just pick a character, you also pick an Arcana, a god of sorts. They don't fight alongside you, however they do have their own move set you can tap in to, and when you activate their boost ability your character gets a speed increase, stat boosts and access to more powerful moves. There's little restriction to using their moves in battle, it's a good way to get a projectile move for example, however their boost and supers drain the meter which usually refills pretty quick What makes it stand out I guess is that all the characters (apart from imaginary friends and the like) are women/girls. It's actually, for the most part, handled pretty well, nothing too internet ire raising. I say for the most part, because there's an after story mode that is all about getting the girls to a hot spring, and your reward is a steamy picture of them spashing about that you have to clear. As these things go though I guess it's pretty tame, Anyway, it's pretty good the penultimate boss is cheap as shit, so I've only completed it a couple of times, but oh well. I did a gameplay video to test out the capture kit too

So this was one of the earlier successes on Kickstarter before (or around) everyone started doing. It's a 2D platformer in the style of classic NES games and it's made by Yacht Club Games who are a few ex-Wayforward people. They left over a year a go and Wayforward games aren't quite what they were; coincidence? I say probably (definitely). Since NES games are the inspiration for Shovel Knight it does play things basic. You play with two buttons and a D-pad; one jumps and one shovels. But you also press down and shovel while jumping to do a downward attack and you use that to bounce off enemies. That's what you mostly do and this game, and it stays damn fun while doing it. They've clearly explored a lot of possibilities with your basic abilities. Enemies are either really defensive knights who can be hard to hit or simpler enemies just placed in awkward places that make things difficult (or fun) for you. It's design we've seen before but maybe in not quite this way. You can also make life a bit easier for you by using items you get through the game. You use them by pressing up and shovel, like Castlevania, and the properties of these items are like the ones you find in that game. That's what Shovel Knight is. It's NES games you know put into one well made game. Specifically it's Konami and Capcom NES games that are the big inspiration: pre-SotN Castlevania and Megaman are clear inspirations, as is smatterings of Ducktails and Zelda 2. But it plays a nicer game than those NES games. It controls well, and does actually look a lot better than those games. It's more TurboGrafx than NES. It also has some more forgiving design choices, like the checkpoints, which can be destroyed for more money to buy upgrades but then you lose them for good (like, they're still not there when you pass them after you've died). That's a cool risk/reward mechanic but I think you can still get a lot of gold without having to destroy them, from what I can tell now I'm at the end, so I suppose it's a case of how fast you want to upgrade your stuff. And when you die you lose a percentage of your gold but it can be picked up again if you don't die on route to where you last died, 'cos Demon's Souls. But overall it's a really fun game in a genre that the indies have explored a lot at this point, but I'd say it's one of the better examples. It's made by people ball achingly passionate about that era of gaming and they've crafted the ultimate love letter with Shovel Knight. That's really cool, but it does mean the game struggles to find it's own identity. I wish they laid off the references as it didn't need them since the game's mechanics were all reference enough. Bottom line though is two thumbs up. It's got some awesome bosses and nice, thick, treacle-y chiptune music. I should go finish it now... Oh, it's pretty fuckin' hard if that needed to be mentioned.

This is a game based on a Nickelodeon TV show, and not a hugely successful one, but Activision called up premier action game creators, Platinum Games, and asked them if they'd make a game based on this property... and they did. There is no doubt that this game is 'A Job' for Platinum. They're a working studio like a lot of Japanese developers and they gotta make money to keep their heads above water. So I understand the decission to make this game. And while the game isn't really that remarkable, it does have the elements you'd expect from a game from this studio. It's tight (not Bayonetta tight, but I'd say as tight as Revengeance), it makes you work that controller, and it's damn tough (I've seen folk say it's easy... they're psychos talking bollocks... it's pretty hard for normal folk). It's a good, solid, salt of the Earth action game. But that's about it. There is very little flash in the game. No crazy cutscenes and boss battles that have mind boggling stuff penetrating your eyeballs or anything like that. Even the environments will make memories of low budget PS2 action games come flooding to mind. There isn't even much varity in the enemy types. But this is a £12 downloadable title so concessions obviously have to made. I'd also say it's not Platinums top tier personel working on it as it does seem to be a game working from a Platinum text book, if one exists... especially the chapter marked Metal Gear: Revengeance. But let me tell you about what this game actually does. It's a brawler, obviously, and in the lore of the show there is a person called The Avatar who can weild all four elements: water, wind, earth and fire. Some can weild one, but only The Avatar can wirld all four, and that's you. You can do that. And that's the base of the gameplay. Each element is also tied to a fighting style: water is kinda ranged (think those disc things from El Shaddai), fire is quick strikes, earth is slower and more deliberate, and wind is pretty much an area attack kinda thing. You also have a counter move with some tight timing, and a safer but not as fun dodge. And you use those to fight a variety of differnt guys. The end. Oh and there is a bit where you ride a butch labrador which is basically Temple Run but through the eyes of Platinum... it's kinda cool. Despite it being text book and quite no thrills I am actually quite fond of it. It's coming from a text book I personally like a whole lot, and I'm finding it's low key presentation appealing, in a way. It's like there is a confidence in itself that is nice to see. It's plays a good game of hitting stuff. It's hard to recommend now, what with Bayonetta 2 (and 1) out this week, too, but if you like this kinda stuff then deffo get it on sale sometime.

Playing this tonight, met the alien died twice, thought I had done it got to the lift then the cutscene came on doh! Will give it another go tomorrow, if the background in this is the future its pretty good. I do miss my surround sound but that might be too much in this game!

I'm two and a half hours in so far so these are just glancing impressions that I'll go into tomorrow when I've played a bit more. It's not like a DLC. There's too much effort that's gone into it. However, some of it is incredibly lazy. Not going into it here, but some is just monumentally lazy. The o2 mechanic isn't as stifling as people are making it out to be. In fact I'd go as far as saying it's actually a good thing, I'll detail why when I've played a bit more. The characters talk a lot. Your avatar isn't silent. Outside of the usual spoutings they do they have actual lines referring to the story. Some of the level design is atrocious. Truly maddening that there's parts that have managed to get through game testing and into the final product. The writing is very high caliber. It's actually very funny and isn't above poking fun at itself, real world issues or the player. I'll be back with more in depth impressions when I've played more. If you've got questions about the game leave them and if I can I'll answer them.

Well so far, I'm doing rubbish. I've died maybe 10 times so the captains keep getting stronger. I am upgrading my abilities slowly but so far it's more frustrating than fun. My one true criticism so far is that the text is really tiny and when moves have come up I've had to guess whether the button is R1 or R2.

400 quid on a new system and my favourite thing on it is a ten quid game I could've bought on the PS3 and did buy on my iPad. This video - http://www.giantbomb.com/videos/quick-look-counterspy/2300-9358/ - sold me on it. I didn't realise it was on PS3 so I got it on iPad and, well, it doesn't control great on a touch screen. It's all swipes and gestures and too easy to do things you don't intend. So I got the PS4 version knowing that the game has a rather cool feature in that you can sync your progress across from mobile to console and back again. So the couple of hours I put in on iPad weren't in vain. The art style is pretty cool, it's like Team Fortress 2 but side-on. It takes the piss out of both Russia and America and the ridiculousness of the Cold War - both sides are in a race to blow up the Moon with nukes. Why? Because. Before each level you pick which side you want to go against for that mission (CounterSpy is a third party organisation, trying to stop both super powers), taking into account which bonuses you can pick up. Then you go through taking out soldiers, finding money, articles, mission plans, weapon plans and perk plans. You can use up to 3 perks in a level and the most useful ones I used all the time was one to bring the a Defcon level down one each time and one to make your shots take out armoured guards and cameras. The weapons are pretty smart too - silenced pistol is a must, plus a dart gun that makes enemies turn against his mates and take them out. Ultra useful when surrounded by a massive pack of cunts. The snag for these great weapons and perks though is you have to unlock them eventually by picking up pieces in the levels so you'll start off with nothing interesting at first. Grinding isn't a chore though because the levels are all randomly generated and they're still all pretty short. Longest level I've played is maybe 15 minutes long, depending on your style of play. Though I wouldn't really advise all guns blazing. It's an option, but the game is really geared towards stealthy play. I don't like writing too much so I'll leave it there but well worth a tenner. Though I'm sure it'll come to PS+ down the line.

Hohokum is one of those video games that gets caught up in the debate of 'oh, but is it a video game' and I really hate that debate... well, I don't hate it, I just don't think it matters. Is it a virtual thing you interact and have fun/dramatic/entetrtaining times with? well, sir/madam, that is a video game. So with that sorted, let me tell you a bit about Hohokum. In Hohokum you are a one eyed snake (lol) and you whizz around this strange world full of colourful characters living their wee lives and you have to help them out. The reason you gotta help them out is because other one eyed snakes are trapped and you have to rescue them, and they're stuck in unexpected places. You have to decipher the world and try and figure out where they are hidden. It's hard to explain the game without namechecking others so that's what I'm going to do. So think: Fez Nobi Nobi Boy Animal Crossing. Fez comes to me because becuase it's a game with no hand holding. You're left to go and explore and you have to figure out the problems yourslef. I wouldn't even say the problems are that hard to solve, but when you have a game so full of stuff (cool stuff, mind) it can be hard find them. In fact I found them by stumbling into them, and only in hindsight do I see why. That takes me to Nobi Nobi Boy. To me, that game was just fun to interact with; it was a game that was fun to see what would happen if you did such and such. A few games do that but it's usually based around violence, but this was cute stuff. Hohokum has that too. As well as that I like how the game feels to play, in the way you move. It has a real nice feeling inertia to it, and I also discovered how to move really quickly in it by fluttering the L and R buttons to snake at high speeds through the level. There is so much nuance to the movement, I love it. And the reason it makes me think of Animal Crossing is that it just has that simple satisfaction fo doing simple things for people. Get wee man to a certain place and a cool thingy will happen; get wine to the peole and such and such will happen. It's just full of simple rewards for trivial stuff, but it's fun because of just how the game feels to play. Obviously, it's one of those games that are hard to decribe, but I tried my best here. I think I'd recomend it to anyone who like at least two of the games I'd mentioned.

Huh. No impressions? It doesn't surprise me, it's not really all that great. But I have been playing it due to it just being a couple of quid on PSN at the moment so I decided to finally give it a gos since I have been planning to. Now, I've not played the first one so I don't really know these two guys. I understand they are meant to be total shits, but they're not as bad as I was expecting. They're not as irredeemable fuckers as I was expecting. They seem like characters who exist in a shit world and are trying to get out of it; they're a product of the shit world. I think I was expecting them to relish in their shit more, but so far they come across a bit GTA protagonist-y. I could talk about the game more but I can't say more than it being an okay third person shooter. It has some AI that doesn't offer up much of a challenge except for the times it accidently gets the upper hand. I suppose I have been playing on hard because I'm that cool so that's why I am dying a bit. But it isn't because I feel like I'm getting out smarted. The gunplay feels okay except when you're using assualt rifles. The game has some wierd ruls: handguns seem to be the best for long range (except sniper rifles) and assualt rifles, which gaming has taught us are mid range weapons, are really shit at anything but short range. All the automatic weapons act like an Uzi or something; all kick and noise and not much else. I've actually decided to rock the shotgun mostly as it's actually pretty good at mid range... and shite at short range. I have no idea why they have changed the logic of how guns work in video games, it's certainly not to make it more realistic. But it just doesn't feel all that great. I think the only thing I like about it is the style. I do really like the camcorder style. It's claustrophobic, ugly and low key but really intimate to the violence. It's really great. It suites the game alot and they really commit to it. I just wish it was attached to a better game. It's not awful. Some of the levels are actually well put together and offer up some satisfying action, at least as well as the game itself can offer. So I sorta like it. I think the game it reminds me most of is Spec Ops: The Line. It has similar issues, but I don't think Dog Days' story and stuff is not quite as bold and subversive as that, and the shooting isn't even as fun to be honest. But it's nearly there. If this game played like Max Payne 3 we'd have a real gem on our hands.

The demo is out now. My thoughts are Vancouver did a good job. Not an excellent job, but just good job. Granted this is the first NHL on new-gen consoles. The pre-game show is scare photo realistic. I thought I was watching a game on NBC Sports. But during the game while the visuals are all glossy the character models look last-gen. At start-up you can select Easy (face buttons with Arcade style gameplay), Standard (Skill stick instead of face buttons and simulation gameplay), or custom. Enjoyed the demo, disappointed the EASHL mode will not be in the new-gen version. It would have been nice if EA knocked $10 off the price, but whatever. Will pick this up when I find it on cheaper sale.

I have been playing this for the last few days and it excellent. The levels are semi-open with different paths you can take and hidden areas with collectables. Strider also has multiple difficulty settings that adds replay value to the game. The visuals are great and Double Heilx also included scanlines which was a nice touch. The gameplay is flawless and just makes you feel like a badass. You can unlock new moves by defeating bosses. Double Helix did not stray too far for the original source material and the bosses from the original game are back and tweaked for the modern era of gaming. Out of all the games I own on Xbox One Strider will most likely be a permanent fixture on my HDD. This is how remakes should be done in my opinion. Too bad Double Heilx is now apart of Amazon, they would have been a great fit as an internal Capcom or Microsoft studio.

I've just been playing Grid Autosport. For some reason, my Steam copy unlocked early, but who am I to complain? Anyway, I'll write a better write-up later, but I can say right now, GRID IS BACK!!!!! Gone are the shoddy driving physics of Grid 2 (It doesn't matter what you drive in what event, it'll drive like Ridge Racer). This thing drives just great. I've only done a small season of Touring, and a few Street races so far, but I'm hooked. There are five styles of driving on offer here. They are Touring, Endurance, Open Cockpit, Custom, and Street. Touring is (of course) Touring cars. Endurance is the longer races where tyres, and pit strategy matter a lot. Open Cockpit is the single seat race cars, sort of like Formula 3. Custom is the loud brash street car events, such as Drift. And Street is racing on city streets in everything from Hot Hatches, to Super Cars. The game is much more simulation orientated, although not full sim, and it can be toned down for more novice players. It has a level up system which can be accelerated by turning off driver aids, and flashbacks. Driving with full damage turned on can leave you struggling to control a car after a nasty bump. In the Touring races, it has an interesting penalty system if you cut the corners, whether it's on purpose, or if you're shoved over by another car. The game cuts power to your car for a second or so, with a longer pause it you're taking the piss. I thought it cool.

Ive never played a Sly Cooper game before. And it nearly stayed that way as the tutorial level was so fucking bland and boring, I was thinking if this is how the rest of the game is I'm done already. Luckily once you get the tutorial out the way things start to look up. The hub of the first world was a nice surprise, littered with enemy's to tackle, landscape to climb on and stuff to collect. The individual levels or 'jobs' are accessed through spots around the hub , they again were surprise as they were quite varied in style. Sly as a character is ok but his companions are terrible, Bentley the disabled tortoise and Murry the fat cunt hippo can just fuck right off. The humour is contrived bullshit but I'm willing to look past it which is very big of me. One thing that really annoyed me for no real reason was the intro to each part of the game, it comes up with a sign that says "Sly Cooper and the gang in..." ....it's just so fucking cheesy it makes me want to gag. The story is ok, ive paid mild attention to end but you just travel around in time rescueing Sly's ancestors - that's all you need to know. I watched a big intro before the tutorial level and I get the impression it recapped the other games in the series in a cartoon like style, if so that's quite cool, it takes it's lineage seriously. If not whatever, it was a good intro. Ive finished the first world, the boss was actually a little challenging and quite cool. Just opened up the next world which is set in the Wild West, I'll start that tomorrow.

Destiny!?!?!?! So After the first single player mission, which was alright, some very nice views, then it takes you to the mass effect citadel thing where you can buy stuff. Such a bewildering array of stuff, like playing dota, or borderlands, it's hard to tell what the hell is going on and what all the stuff is for, what do all the stats and numbers mean? I don't really like stuff like that, but if I play this as much as previous halo games I'll probably at least eventually understand some of it. Then did some multiplayer for probably a few hours, had to sign up to psn+ first as I'd let my subscription run out. The hover bike things are really cool. There's 2 maps, one quite small and another bigger one with vehicles. You can't use your hover bike on the smaller one don't seem to be able to board vehicles the aiming is like cod, hold left trigger to look down the sights, which is strange for halo, although I guess it's not halo so... There's lots of differences really. It still takes some time to kill someone, so that's good. Grenades are weird, it's like an ability that recharges over time, which is fine until you respawn and still have to wait for your grenade to charge, which seems odd. You can permanently have a good weapon like a sniper or shotgun, supposedly limited ammo, but if you know what your looking for it's pretty abundant - green ammo boxes. I don't think I've unlocked power weapons yet- these are similar as you have them but with no ammo, then there's an ammo drop occasionally or something. The starting gun is a assault rifle type thing but I bought something that worked more like a dmr or battle rifle ASAP. It's wired using the scope in close range gun fights in this, but probably just because I'm not used to it. The only game mode is 3 plots territories style thing. There's different class people, mine had a sort of odd double jump where the first jump is normal and the second is a sort of jet pack/ hover which seems like it would leave you open to be easily sniped while hanging around in mid air. They also have special power things that recharge I don't know how, mine was a ground pound, just like playing Mario. The player levels affecting multiplayer is a big area of concern for me, as is everything having different stats, I have faith bungie will sort it somehow I guess, but anyway I was level 5 for most of my time playing multiplayer and killed lots of level 8 people but it did seem like the odds were stacked in their favour, for example shot gunning then punching someone of the same level seemed to be enough for a kill, but players level 7/8 you seemed to have to get at least one more shotgun hit in. And in halo, all the weapons are the same so if someone kills you with a shotgun you know why you died, because they waited for the right time to shoot or whatever, but in this people fighting with shotguns may have completely different stats so you haven't a clue if it was because of a more powerful gun, or one with a better range or whatever, so it loses some of the tactics maybe, although too early to say for sure. Anyway most importantly I guess it plays really well and I had a lot of fun, after some initial confusion, can't wait to get back on it tomorrow. Sorry for all the rambling/random points, I'm really excited to play this. Thanks again to mr lakitu for the code! Oh and I was just finishing for the night and joined Ed for a quick dance. There's a dance button, amazing! All games should have a dance button. Also there's some impressions from Ed and Sly in the other thread so I'll try to bring thoes over below...

I have had so many opportunities to play Team 17's Alien Breed throughout my twenty seven years of gaming, but always passed or got busy with other games. Last night I started playing the PlayStation Vita port of Alien Breed and wow it is fantastic. Alien Breed is up there with Dyson vacuums, The Business and Liverpool FC as one of the greatest thing given to mankind by the English. The Vita port includes the original 1991 Amiga game, the 1992 enhanced special edition and what looks like expansions packs (Convergence, Valiance and Synergy). Wi-Fi and Ad-Hoc co-op is included. Team Bloober did the VIta port and it looks fantastic on the Vita's screen. Not sure how the controls where set up on the Amiga, but the twin sticks and touch screen on the Vita work wonderfully. Great game. Highly enjoying it. Easy Trophies if that is your thing.

Deception IV: Blood Tie is a sadistic action/puzzle game from Tecmo Koei for the Vita. You play as the devils daughter Laegrinna who was sent into the human realm to find the twelve pieces of the Holy Versus to free her father. Joining you are three helper demons Caelea, Veruza and Lilia. The plot is razor thin and serves as a reason to fuck with others via traps and other devices. Before a round you can use Devil Eye to check out your targets weakness, immunities and backstory - They’re always assholes, which makes fucking with them a tad bit more fun. After the round you’re given a result card, which scores you on Combos, Single Combo Arc, Clear Time and how elaborate, sadistic and humiliating the traps you designed were. You are then given a final Battle Arc score. The audio and visuals are nothing to write home about, but that should not put you off Deception IV if it’s your thing. Besides a story mode you get a tutorial mode and a free battle mode. You can also upload your user made quest and download others quests to play. Like Earth Defense Force 2017, Deception IV will be a cult classic with a few vocal fans speaking of its glory. I don’t expect this to sell well, but I liked what I have played so far. I’ve had a few traps not work the way I thought they would work and a few time my target would not cross the trap I was luring them too, which resulted in frustration. But those moments are very limited. Overall Deception IV is a very is an enjoyable b-game experience on the PlayStation Vita.

Got this from boomerang, only played the first mission so far. Will see how it goes from here. Escaping the police when I fucked up was a right bastard. Can't even be arsed with Uplay anymore. Didn't load once on ACIV for me.

I think that's all the tags for this, basically it's out on just about everything. Child of Light is actually a surprisingly complex rpg, even if it is a bit on the easy side. During combat you and your enemies share a movement meter. Once you get towards the end of the meter you can cue up an action, that action takes a bit of time to activate. If you manage to land a hit on an enemy whilst they're activating their move you'll interrupt them, sending them back down the meter. You also have a firefly who can slow down enemies as they charge, heal you a bit, and pick up items. If you have multiple characters you can switch out characters, this doesn't spend your turn so you can still perform an action with your new character Out of battle the game starts off like a simple platformer, but then you learn to fly. There's still the odd puzzle element to the map, items to find, even alternate characters it's apparently possible to miss (Brad missed one on Giant Bomb). There's gem stones you can equip to add perks, things like fire damage or resistances. It sort of feels superfluous with how easy the game can be but it's nice that it's there. It looks amazing obviously, and the soundtrack is great, made by someone respected but I'd never heard of her anyway, I'm really enjoying it, it's not the greatest rpg ever, it's just missing something, but it's pretty good so far

I'm starting this thread because I've been playing this game. Some of you will know that I have bought an arcade stick recently, even though I only had the HD version of Darkstalkers to use a stick on. So since this game was only released about a month ago I decided to get it, just so I had a fighting game that was kinda in vogue. But this meant earning a new fighting game. Now I'm not that familiar with this kinda game so it's weird for me. It's a game where pretty much any move combos into another. I hear the Vs. Capcom games are often like this but I don't know, I' only quasi-familiar with them. I dunno what to say about it. You can pretty much make a combo of anything as long as you start with light attacks and work your way up with standard, crouching and jumping variants. Linking in some special and Blockbuster attacks will also do damage and impress. BUt that's all fighting game bullshit. What I do like is you only have eight characters (well nine now thanks to some free DLC) but they are all very different. And even the bread and butter character, Filia, is pretty damn fun to use so there are no filler characters. I don't really know what else to say about a game like this. I think it's a fighting game fan's fighting game and the stories are really cool but I can't go any deeper than that. Even though this version of the game hasn't been out long there is no-one playing it online so that is annoying. I got it hoping there would be a community. So sorry for the shite impressions but if any PS3 Skullgirls owners are lurking lets hook up. I wanna try my button mashing against people.

S'alright this game. This is the game where you play as an invisible boy who you can only see when the rain covers him. It's mostly a stealth game where you have to avoid other invisible beasts and it's all about moving around in the sheltered areas without being spotted. So it's straight forward enough and I'm a third in and it hasn't done anything inventive but it has basically been pleasant... pleasant is the wrong word, I mean it is at times but it can get pretty scary. It's not Silent Hill or anything, it's just the game puts you in situations where you have no way of defending yourself. I think it's the tone of it I like, mostly. It is a bit fairy tale-y and I guess there is some whimsy but it's dark and tense as well, like one of those non-patronising family films. Or maybe ICO is a kind of okay comparison The game is linear and there is always just one way to progress but I'm actually not minding that since I'm fairly poor at stealth games. There is no grey areas where you're not sure if you can bee seen or heard. When you're invisible they leave you alone, when you're not they give chase; nice and simple. So It is an okay thing to interact with every-now-and-then.

This is the new one from Vlambeer, the Super Crate Box and Ridiculous Fishing folks. You're lucky I'm here telling you about it because I have been pounding this game the last 24 hours. It's an arcade shooter in the style of Asteroids but there is so much more going on. The enemies are cunts, there are bullets everywhere and you have loads of types of plane that can massively change how you play. The playing field is leveled by you having regen health when you're not firing, but it's really easy to get caught out when trying to get one guy on your tail; it's one of those risk/reward mechanics done really well which I think Vlambeer have a really good hold on, what with this and Ridiculous Fishing. And then there is the plane building thing. Planes atre made up of three bits and there are about six of each which can be combo'd together in any way: there are laser guns, homing rockets, high impact armour, a body that automatically drops bombs, an engine that lets you go under water with taking damage and stuff like that. I feel like some combos are just plain useless (lol) but there are missions attached to (like kill so many fighters, or sink a ship while maintaining max combo) so it's worth seeing what you can do with the dumb combos even if you're not ever likely to get your high score. And it's probably more about doing these missions than getting the best score, it's the thing that keeps you coming back more (though I have a pretty sweet score ) But that's just all guff. It just feels real nice to play. The speed, the responsiveness, just how it's all balanced in how much punishment you can take, all the acrobatics you can do that aren't hard to pull off; it's just a real nice feeling game and polished to a shine. Get it, it's ace.

got sent this to review, it's a Nippon Ichi game so I was worried it was going to be about 200 hours long, fortunately it's seemingly not that long although I'm still not at the end of it. It shares a lot of the same tone with Disgaea, it has the same art style, the same character types, probably the same voice actors, but it's not a SRPG. The Witch and the Hundred Knight has more in common with Diablo or Ys, it's an action rpg, with a stamina system tied to your attacks and dodging that should mean I can mention DARK SOULS and get a couple of people to read this sentence. It being a Nippon Ichi game there's a lot of systems going on. You can only stay in a level for as long as you have the calories to do so, if you're running low you need to consume enemies (although this is limited and takes up stomach space), use a recovery item, or head back to base to save and recover the items you've picked up during the level (which go in your stomach and can't be used until you leave a level). It's not your health though, you have a separate health bar, but any time you need to recover health, because you've taken a hit or been poisoned, you burn calories quicker. If you take too much damage you'll be downed and will be put back to a check point with a chunk of calories burnt, if you don't have enough calories you're done. there's armour and accessories to equip that boos defence and resistances. There's weapons to pick up that can be levelled up by using them. The weapons themselves have a few different systems attached to them. Weapons do different types of damage, the sword does slash attacks, hammers blunt attacks and magical staves magic attacks, enemies may be resistant or weak to any of these. You can equip 5 weapons at a time, they combo together and eat your stamina as they do so, but if you need a blunt attack and your hammer is the 3rd attack in the chain you need to keep hitting. There's also a system where all your weapons have a number, if you equip your weapons in ascending order you'll get damage bonuses. The gameplay can get a bit mashy and mindless, I've not got to the point where it isn't fun enough, but it's nothing too engaging. One of the problems with it is balance, it can occasionally get really hard (so far only twice really), which means you have to go and grind a bit, but then the enemies don't get any harder through a level, so if you back out, reclaim your new weapons and experience points you'll go back in more powerful. You'll then gain more levels and improve your weapons against a much easier task which means the next level is easier than it should be and so on. It has spiked again for me, nothing too bad just enough that I'll probably have to spend some time grinding to get to the next check point. I've done a gameplay video, it's only SD despite what youtube says, but it shows things better than text does

I'm going to start by saying this is no way a 4/10 game. I know I'm a Castlevania fan, I know I liked the first Lords of Shadow when others didn't, and I haven't finished this yet, but it's really not that bad. The fighting is fun, it flows better than the first game, it's a tad more forgiving too, a bit like DmC compared to the old Devil May Cry games. They've introduced a mastery system, the more you use a move the more you fill it up, once you do that you empty it to increase your mastery of that weapon. I'm not entirely sure what that does tbh, but it encourages you to use the moves you've unlocked. Which is the point I was going to make about the combat, you can tell it's easier because you can choose what move you want to do rather than just hammering whatever's effective The platforming is fairly simple, occasionally there'll be hazards you have to avoid, these could be clearer, but at least it's got something to it. I've also found odd occasions where it's not always clear what you're supposed to do, one of them was simply because I wasn't on the exact spot I needed to be so the jump point didn't highlight, although the one I couldn't possibly reach did. It's not just the platforming that suffers from a lack of clarity either, the boss fights can sometimes, but it's really the stealth sections. The stealth comes in 2 types, ones where there's guards and you have to distract them, posses them, or turn in to a rat to get around them, these are more common. In theory having a change of pace where you have to use your brain is a really good idea, but they're awkward and messy, and just not all that interesting. The other type involve key characters hunting you down, one of them was deemed bad enough it was singled out by GamesTM (I think), I didn't think it was that bad but I'd accidentally read some advice. Certainly it wasn't fun, parts of the ground made noise that gave away your position, a combination of Dracula's loose control and the collision detection on it meant it was a bit clumsy, but I did it in 4 attempts. Certain bits have been great too, When the script is good Carlyle is good, his delivery of "god failed" is great, shame some of the rest of the script and acting aren't quite so great. Anyway, video here, which looks worse on youtube that it did before I uploaded it. The original file was something like 40GB though, so y'know, you can't have everything