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So I've been playing the game that is, like many aging hair metal bands, is big in Japan (that 40 year old Spinal Tap joke is how I'm starting my impressions to this genuinely cool game). The only game played there now it seems. I'm probably not going to go on about the specifics of the game because you can just check the thread for the previous game but I'll just say what I've been up to. As a Splatoon Professional I've beelined right to the cool stuff and stayed there for now. That is 'Anarchy Mode (previously 'Ranked Matches')' and 'Salmon Run'. Since I have a Splatoon 2 save I was given three golden tickets which allowed me to buy weapons freely that are usually soft locked behind a level cap, the weapons I know I like which I know fit my play style for the Anarchy Matches. You see most will play the Turf War mode (the basic whoever makes the most mess wins mode) but as a Professional that mode holds little interest to me and I like the objective based modes in Anarchy Mode. One of the is Splat Zones which is basically King of the Hill; you have to keep a certain part of the map in the middle covered in your ink for a set amount of time so in this mode the fight is more concentrated and I like to use the GAL 96, a long ranged weapon that fires slowly with an ink sprinkler as a sub-weapon... well, I used to but it hasn't been working for me this time. I've found more success with the gatling gun class so I can just hang back and provide support more efficiently but maybe I'm still fucked if I get jumped by someone with a better short ranged weapon but as long as I'm smart we win. I do find these modes make use of the alternative weapons so much more. Playing Turf War just use the weapon best at coverage and that's it. You also have Tower Control; there is a small tower on the map that moves towards the enemies side of the map when you stand on it and once it gets to the end you won. I like to use a long ranged kind-of-grenade launcher for this, I forget it's name. it just means with good positioning I can easily eliminate those trying to ride the tower, but again, it's slow firing and bad at short range. It means I do have to rely on my team a lot, I gotta hope we have like a "sweeper" who keeps flankers off my back, because man, do some people just like using the brush class and ruining my day. This is a factor if we win or lose. Take up a role if you're playing this mode. There is also Rainmaker; there is a powerful weapon (but again, bad at short range) that has to be captured and taken into various points on the enemies side of the map. I tend to play this one a bit basic and use a slightly longer range version of the Duelies, a weapon I do tend to use for Turf War if I do play that mode. OK coverage and pretty good at killing and I like the quick step you can do: it confuses the idiots, but also sometimes messes me up, but I'm getting better at it again. They were introduced in S2 and they quickly became my old faithful. Finally there is Clam Blitz; it's a mode that was introduced post release in S2 so I hve the least experience with it. I remember being okay at it but this is the mode I'm struggling with. You collect clams spread around the map, get ten and they turn into an American football(🤷‍♂️) and with that you can break a barrier over a goal on your foes side of the map, and while the barrier is gone you can throw in individual clams. I suck at it and just take my Duelies and kill the enemy and hope my teammates know what they're doing. To be honest it still feels kinda unfamiliar because while the primary weapons all feel the same they're altered the sub-weapons and you special abilities you get after covering so much ground, those especially have been completely changed from the previous games so the dynamic and strats in these modes take some adjustment., I've found at least. But there is also Salmon Run; this is the horde mode with a bunch of boss enemies that drop collectables you have to take to a point to score while adds ruin your day. The more you rank up the more intense it gets and I think I've just got to the point it's interesting to play. I think it's harder than before since I remember being maxed out before and having less problems than now but I've still got some ways to go. A little change they've made is you can throw the collectable so you can pass it up to other players and that's useful at times and they've added some scenarios where you have to do it to be optimal. There's also a thing where the more you play the mode you make a giant salmon angry so a big salmon will turn up at the end and you have to throw the collectable at it to do damage, so you're dealing with this big mf'er stomping around while loads of boss enemies come, kill them, get collectibles and throw them at the big salmon. It gets intense. I've tried it twice and not killed it yet (definitely let down by my team the second smh). I've not tried the SP, I'm not super into it from the previous games (the last boss always rules tho) but I'll try it eventually. One of you's will have to say how that is.

I'm enjoying this so far. It's broken up in to chapter's, time periods really, with a new character in each. I presume at some point they all tie together in some way but I've not seen it yet. Some are more interesting than others and some are longer than others. The prehistoric chapter was humour filled fun, the Chinese one a more traditional story of master training student, and I really enjoyed that chapter. The Japan one I found a bit irritating initially, it can be a bit of a faff to get around, but it gets a lot more interesting towards the end. Combat wise, it's kind of traditional srpg tile based moves, so a ranged attack might only be able to hit 2 rows in front, magic can do AOE. There's affinities, with enemies being weak or resistant to certain attack type's, and status effects that go along with that. If your meter is full, you can only attack when it's full, then you can move around and potentially avoid attacks It's good so far, I think I'll actually finish it

I played this on game pass, having tried the demo during one of those Steam events and liking it. Beacon Pines is a cutesy storybook adventure with darker undertones. The big conceit is you find "charms" through talking to characters, looking at things in the environment or overhearing other characters etc. At certain points in the story you're presented with the option of choosing from 2-3 of these charms to decide what action take in that situation. The story branches off according to the choice you make, you might die a grizzly death or head off on a completely different version of the story. You can go back to any of these branches and try the other options, sometimes you'll find another charm down one branch that lets you make a different choice in an earlier decision. The branching thing is more superficial in the end than how the game initially presents it to you, you end up exploring most of the decisions on the way to getting the ending anyway, but it's fun and engaging. It's about 5 hours or so in length, which is just right. It doesn't overstay it's welcome. The presentation and art style are top notch.

I’m about an hour into this on Switch. It has the same kind of relaxing vibe as A Short Hike, although I would not say it’s as good as that game, so far. The art style reminds me of Hidden Folks. The game is literally just you running around taking pictures for people. It’s very pleasant, although for Eurogamer to call this “essential” is stretching the meaning of essential…

I have very mixed feelings about this. I love the feeling of adventure, of not knowing what's down the road and if you'll be able survive. It's brilliant when you do overcome the odds and press on after a tough battle. The combat system is great with loads of customisation on offer, you're even encouraged to change class altogether. The Pawn system works really well, being able to hire and fire helpers and changing the composition of your group entirely as the situation demands. Despite all the good bits, the game so far has felt as though i'm playing the middle portion of an RPG where i'm clearing up fluff quests just to pad out the leveling process. There's been no gravitas or urgency to the quests so it's difficult to differentiate between the story and side quests. Things like not having fast travel I can understand why they left out even though it's annoying to have to walk to the same places over and over. I'm surprised more games don't use the MMO style flight paths to get around. You still get to where you're going quicker but you have to travel to a specific place, rather than just magically teleporting everywhere. It's a happy medium between the two. There's other things which are pretty minor and affect my enjoyment more than they probably should. For instance, why did they overlook mini-map markers for people who have something to say? It's incredibly frustrating having to run around looking for colored speech bubbles above NPCs heads. Likewise with the Pawns. As good as the system is it grates when in combat and you're unable to issue commands for something as simple as a weapon buff - the option just doesn't exist. Most of the time you just have to wait for them to apply the correct buff which is very frustrating against the larger enemies. For all it's issues, there are times when this incredible game shines through, and that's what makes it worth playing. I just wish it was more consistent.

Fired this up yesterday and fought my way to the first map destination, and then into the introductory chapter. First things first, it looks, as usual, like a bit of a dog's dinner. I don't know what digital foundry were on about. To my eyes it's just as blurry, fuzzy and framey as any other Xenoblade game. Stick this on your big telly and it's rather disappointing, in my opinion. Not unplayable by any means, but a jarring step back from what I've become used to with the Xbox. You sort of have to 'tune in' to it. Once you've managed that, though, you can just fill your boots with the stuff Xenoblade always does well, gameplay, exploration, and a combat system that starts off basic, but has room (hopefully) to grow into the combo happy monster of the former game. Good news is I'm already thinking about the game when I've put the switch down. The characters are well done, but the narrative premise is instantly gripping. They've set up a really interesting plot, with much promise for twists and reveals, and epic heroism. If they deliver it could well be a most memorable adventure. Just a pity it's on the Switch.

Tinykin is a 3D platformer collect-em-up, reminiscent of something from the N64/PS1 era (but a smoother, more modern experience, naturally). You travel around the levels amassing a bunch of different coloured pikmin-like critters which have different abilities, solve some very light puzzles to complete a bunch of tasks to earn an object and open the way to the next level. It's cute and plays well, it just keeps you going without putting obstacles in the way of your enjoyment. It's nothing earth-shattering, just a simple fun game. I played it on game pass, starting on Thursday night, and completing it the next evening. It felt like time well spent.

I'm pretty sure the venn diagram of this forum and this particular game is just two completely separate circles situated three miles from one another. However, I'm nothing if not weird in my game choices, so let's talk about it anyway. This is Animal Crossing meets Kingdom Hearts as far as I'm concerned. The Magic Kingdom has been taken over by a weird darkness (which also has the side effect of making famous Disney characters lose their memories), and it's up to you to cast out the darkness, visit different characters and restore Disney to its former glory. You do this by completing various tasks , whether that's finding Goofy's fishing rod, setting up Scrooge McDuck's store signs (more on him in a minute) or simply by planting and harvesting different crops. So. Mr McDuck. The Scottish, money-swimming capitalist. He's Tom Nook. Buying/upgrading stores or buying clothes and decorations all goes through him. And his prices are just as disgraceful as Animal Crossing's awful banker. I've paid him to make a little store for Goofy (and subsequently upgrade said store). I've paid him to build his own store, and then spent MORE money in there. And it seems he exists solely to leech from my wallet. At least he's true to character, I suppose. It seems to have a lot more focus than AC right now. While I've never played it, my understanding of AC is that you don't really have a specific goal list where you can change your tasks and set new ones. This has an actual focussed goal list. And while that might mean the end game could end up a bit pointless, Disney have almost a century's worth of content to draw from, so they should have no trouble keeping it interesting. The music is just so. Fucking. Charming. From symphonic takes on Let It Go and How Far I'll Go to the simple When You Wish Upon A Star, there's an awesome little tracklist that rotates, and it gives the game this unique personality that's incredibly sedate. Graphics are... functional. They do the job, but they definitely aren't made to impress. There's tons of character, though. Especially in the Disney character models. My biggest negative, and something that keeps niggling is that the controls feel really loose. It's almost as though your avatar is on a slight delay whenever you press buttons. There's no combat and nothing that needs a huge amount of reaction time, but it's just a little distracting when it looks and feels like you're floating slightly above the floor, rather than actually walking on it. After doing my first batch of goals, I've chosen to go to the Moana-themed level. I've stopped it there, because I started last night when Oscar was in bed and I want him to see it, but it's seemed to worm into my brain already, and I definitely want to see more of what it has to offer.

Played about an hour of this earlier. Dived straight into the casual matches right after the tutorial and having a quick look at the new city hub (which is incredibly well realised and fleshed out compared to Splat 1). Started out with the standard weapon, did OK but not brilliant, so far so Splatoon really, I don't like that they've only got the two maps per 24 hours etc. that they had for Splat 1, I would like them to mix up the maps much more frequently as it gets boring going back to the same maps time after time, I thought the same about 1. But yeah, so far, so Splatoon really, if you played 1 and the testfire of this then you'll probably know what to expect, I've just hit Level 4 so haven't been able to try out any of the new weapons etc. yet, like in the testfire the 'Ultimates' are pretty cool.

I started this earlier and haven’t exactly loved it, it’s decent enough with the combat being the standout, it definitely has promise and I want to dive further in but the presentation is just godawful all over the shop. The menus, graphics, presentation, stilted animation, everything about it just looks like a PS2 game, I actually laughed quite a bit the first time I saw a wolf and they jerked awkwardly across the floor. All the aliasing buzzing about when you walk anywhere and the horrendous menus don’t help matters either. The translation and voice work isn’t fantastic either but the latter I haven’t thought as bad as I originally thought it would be, it is sufficient and does the job but nothing more, there are the occasional bad delivery of lines and things like that bad nothing too egregious. The combat is fantastic, maybe not quite as much strategy to it and more button mashy at this early stage but it’s so damn fun and very DMC/Bayonetta than typical JRPG. It’s just a shame that the environs are so stilted otherwise they’d be beautiful, the island is a unique setting but there’s something about the way the game looks and runs that can’t help but turn me off it. Still very early days though, once I acclimatise to the graphics I’m sure I’ll be fine if the game is good enough, playing handheld it won’t be as noticeable either.

Heretics Defeated! So far, very good. Only got in an hour today (for now) but I'm enjoying everything about this. From the "Happy Tree Friends" aesthetic. To the distinctly Isaac/Gungeon feel to the combat. The cult building aspect so far is the newest gameplay to me and the most intriguing. It reminds me of both Freedom Fighters and the base building of Suikoden. I have fought one boss and indoctrinated three followers into my Cult. While grinning from ear to ear at the presentation.

Quoting the kickstarter - "Darkest Dungeon is a challenging gothic roguelike RPG about the psychological stresses of adventuring. Descend at your peril!" Anyway, it was funded for over $300,000 in March 2014, spent a year on Early Access and eventually released in January this year. It's due out on PS4 later in the summer. It got good reviews and and has a "very positive" Steam user rating with around 15,000 votes. I've played it for an hour so far, it's cool. The game is structured like Sunless Sea in that you have a base, a safe haven, where you can buy provisions, recruit new members, take on quests etc etc. You can only set out with a party of four each time, but you can have way more than four people hired. One of the things you can do in the base camp or "hamlet" is assign people to certain activities which will reduce stress (like dread in Sunless Sea). If someone is assigned to an activity, you can't take them with you on your next trip. I'm not going to drone on about the mechanics in the game, but it is pretty similar to Sunless Sea really. Combat is turn based. Your party stands in formation and different characters have a preferred position...it's not what it sounds like. Both yours and the enemies position will affect the range of your attacks. That's all I can say about it so far. I did the introductory quest.

I’m about two hours into this on the Switch. I’ve been playing the main game, haven’t tried the visual novel prequel thing yet. But I’ll probably play them concurrently. The game takes a few twists and turns early on, but nothing overly dramatic. So far, typical jrpg opening (as jrpg stories go). The combat is quite unique though. Enemies have elemental types and during battles there is an elemental field, which, depending on the elemental spells used causes certain elements to get stronger and the opposite type weaker. For example blue and red (water and fire) are opposites. If you use a blue elemental spell, the blue area of the elemental field (this is shown on the screen) will grow larger, and blue spells will become stronger and red spells weaker. One interesting tactic connected to this is when fighting enemies of different element types, their spells can antagonise each other, which can affect the order in which you might want to take them down. In addition to that, when you do a normal attack, you can choose between weak, medium and strong. Weak attacks have high accuracy and strong attacks low accuracy. Every hit that connects raises the accuracy of subsequent attacks. It’s up to you how you choose to string combos together. There’s more to combat than that but those are just a couple of interesting points.

Wasn't sure whether to create a new thread for this or put my thoughts in the original MK8 thread so I'll put my impressions here for the time being, mods can merge with the original thread if they'd rather Been playing quite a lot since I got it on Friday, exclusively Online Race. Played for 2-3 hours on Friday with the old man, another few hours later in the evening, more the next morning then I played it drunk when I got in last night So yeah, haven't been able to put it down for long truth be told, that crack level addictiveness of MK is definitely still here in spades, constantly find myself saying 'just one more race', 'must end the session on a high' and things like that. Been tougher than expected to get into the swing of things, took me a hell of a long time before I eventually won a race, was usually running 7th-10th (playing it drunk doesn't help things either) but seem to of got better today and have been finishing 1st-4th most of the time. Not tried the battle mode yet to be honest, don't remember playing it much on the N64 so I'm not sure whether I'll like it or not, will give it a go but race will always been my main priority. The new tracks are all decent but not overly impressive apart from the Zelda and Excitebike ones, absolutely love the Zelda one with the rupees instead of coins, master sword jump and the little sound effects throughout the course, the others haven't really impressed me though, good but not great, may need to race on them more before I get used to them though. As far as negatives go, had lots of issues getting disconnected from races, changed my DNS settings and that seems to of rectified the issue, unfortunately I'm not able to join friends games though , just gives me a 'couldn't connect to users console' error message so that's been quite annoying.

Made a start on this yesterday, but managed to put about 3 hours into it today. It really eases you into things, the game starts out really slow and for the first couple of hours I was just exploring the Trading Guild. You can't do anything else but chat to folks whilst you're here, you can't even shop at the many stalls until you progress the main story enough. Every few steps the game will pause and explain something to you. There's a brief Battle guide right at the very beginning then all through the Trading Guild segment it is explaining how quests work, what certain markers mean, how you can look up the controls, how to dive for salvage, stay at Inns and find treasure chests and shit. I do like how they've done this but I still couldn't help but be bewildered by it all, there is just SO much information to take in, it feels like you're reading a 10 page instruction guide at times. The tutorial stuff and information overload continues with the Battle system explanation. It explains the basics at the beginning, sure, but it gets ridiculously complicated the further you get into the game, drip feeding new mechanics to you as you reach certain story sections. It does this to avoid bamboozling you, but doesn't quite achieve it as I'm still confused about what certain combo's do and how to get various meters up - and keep them up - at the right times. It's a long-ass game though, I'm still in the tutorial almost 4 hours in, and I'm sure it will all become second nature, but at the moment it feels incredibly bewildering. The first thing I noticed about the game is the music - it is phenomenal. Just running around the trade guild there's a certain section on the track where some wind instruments come in that almost made me tear up a bit, and I was just running around the damn trade guild! The combat feels very simple at first, but gets more complex the further I got into the game, by the end the strategies needed will be pretty damn complicated I'd imagine. It auto-attacks enemies with you pressing some of the face buttons to do 'arts' which are like special attacks, once you get a 'blade' you can do blade arts, blade combos and stuff and there's a party meter up the top left which if you fill up you can do some gangster chain attack or something? But yeah, I still can't quite get my head around all that yet and just push buttons at random when I think I can affect a fight, all the enemies are very easy so far so I haven't had any issues doing just that. A lot had been made of the voice acting - I did download the JP voice pack, but have stuck to English for now - but I think it's all rather excellent really. The lead character - Rex - speaks with a midland-ish accent sounding a bit Yorkie at times, there's other characters which sound typically American anime but there's one other girl that's Welsh which I just absolutely adore the accent of and quite a few different Scottish accents. Most of the NPCs seem to have some variety of UK accents too. The writing has been pretty good so far, very Japanese/anime, but pretty decent all the same. The story purposefully starts off really slowly, but the end of Chapter 1 went fucking batshit crazy, it was like the finale of some other games I've played in the past, some truly crazy shit goes on there. I can't believe I ended up weeping just in Chapter 2 Don't want to ruin anything, but yeah, it sets things up perfectly, and ramps the drama up to 11 right out the blue, there's a mystery to the world and story already that I want to poke and prod at more. So yeah, I do like what I've played so far but it still feels like there's so much information I need to digest before I can feel fully comfortable with everything. It's damn beautiful too! I think this is the first game on Switch that I feel a bit reticent to play in tabletop mode. I still think it'd be great but to be able to appreciate the size of these worlds, see all the text and HUD info I kind of think you need to see it on a TV. Pics:

Yep, it’s definitely a Smash game. Played a little bit last night and a couple of hours today. Unlocked Sonic, Inkling and a couple of others I think. Inkling seems really fun, and plays like you’d want a Splatoon character to play. You have an ink meter that will run out as you chuck ink about and you have to turn into an octo to get more back (down and B I think shield and B). Also made a Mii fighter and obviously I’m going for the most ridiculous I can make it so far. So a bear head and maid’s outfit is the current look. The amount of stuff in this game already, how it got made and how expensive it was, I’ll never know.

Ok, so this is awesome. i grew up with the Turtles in the ‘90s. Spent a small fortune on the arcade games. Loved Turtles In Time, which was the second SNES game I ever played. Scrolling beat em ups remain my favourite genre. So I was always going to be all over this. Thankfully, it was totally worth the wait. It looks fantastic, you can tell a lot of love has gone into this. The combat is satisfying, with each character having slightly different moves. If you play through Story mode, you gradually unlock more stuff, such as extra health and lives, and abilities. Each level has 3 challenges, ranging from do-able (kill 3 enemies with a specific move), to “not bloody likely” (don’t get hit once). There’s secrets to find, which help to level up a bit faster. The soundtrack is pretty catchy, and I love that the voice cast for the original series is more or less present and correct. I’ve played a few online sessions, and the net code seems pretty stable, even with 6 players, though that can be a bit chaotic. Fairly easy to get into an online game as well, which is good. Trophy wise, most of them are alright, though there’s a few pretty tough ones. Not sure I’ll manage the Platinum. But I’ll definitely have a fair few online sessions. It’s been scoring pretty high with reviews. And it’s totally justifiable, as it’s so much fun to play.

Probably anther topic doomed to die in solitude, but this is such a unique concept that I wanted to put it out there. I also didn't see much of it in the media space, except for a preview in some magazine a while ago. I usually preface an explanation by saying "this game is a bit like X and has elements of Y" but I really can't do that here because I have never played something similar. It's kind of a dungeon crawler with the setup that people get sucked in some game world where they transform into dice. After that you have to go through multiple floors per level with your character, fight baddies, get to the exist and hopefully collect all the loot in between. 90% of it is combat and here's how I'm going to fail at painting a clear picture of how it plays. Your character has a bunch of actions and a number of dice per turn he/she can use. The dice are rolled and therefore random by nature and actions usually either require or are influenced by the number of the dice. For a strong attack you might need to stack multiple values until you reach the total it needs or if you have an attack that does [ ] damage, the value corresponds to the dice you use to activate it. But that's really just the snowflake on the tip of the iceberg. Some actions require even or odd numbers, or have a minimum or maximum you need to use. Then there are the player characters: the first one is super basic and easy to understand but it can get really complex later on. The robot for example doesn't draw dice, but calculates them on a 11-digit scale. For every time you create one, you're getting closer to the limit and if you exceed it, your turn is basically wasted, so that's a nice risk-reward feature. The witch needs certain values to brew attacks in her cauldron while the tinkerer has a special skill he can freely use, but has to switch it out for a new one after every battle, meaning you can't rely on those powerful moves forever. As borderline impossible it is to explain with words, it actually does an excellent job of teaching you when you play it so there's that at least. So far I quite like it. I don't love it, but it's a unique concept and it's the perfect handheld game, something the Switch unfortunately doesn't offer too often anymore. One run through a dungeon is a 10-15 minute affair, there's barely any loading times, battery usage is minimal due to every just being 2D pictures etc. It's currently on sale and I got it for free through star points but I wouldn't have regretted paying for it.

I really liked the original Cat Quest. It's an action RPG that takes place on a pretty small map. It gates you by having huge spikes in enemy levels, so if you wander in to the level 15 area at level 6 you're going to get very fucked up. It worked though, despite retreading a lot of old ground it keeps feeding you more, keeps you on the train, and it's not long before you're wrecking previously unkillable enemies The second one is effectively more of the same. This time there's co-op, you can play as a dog too. In single player you can switch between the two with the other character being controlled by the AI. It works, the a.i. is invulnerable so it can deal damage while you back away from enemies to dodge their signposted attacks. It kind of suffers from 2 problems, the first is that it's more of the same. The combat works the same, the progression more or less works the same (I no longer have to stick to landmass). The gear system works the same too, you can find repeats of the same items that will level it up, or you can pay to level it up. This obviously can make a huge difference along with your level as to how much damage you give and take. It's not something you have to be thinking about all the time but it does help The most obvious difference between the two games, and something I'm not sure is either a problem or a benefit, the map is now significantly larger. It still works the same way, going in to certain areas is suicide, but it's more gradual now, there's more space to spend your time in during the lower levels. Equally though it can mean trecking around is a bit more of a slog, when you're hunting for side quests or ticking off the explorable caves, the end game is going to be slower Ultimately if it has a problem it's that it's more of the same. Given that it's now a much bigger and longer game that's probably magnified, but it's still good fun and I'd still recommend it, it's simple, a bit mindless, but that's kind of what I want at the minute

Well, this is officially out now, I got my code from CD Keys around 7:30pm yesterday. Pre-loaded straight away after that on GOG Galaxy (28gb install), and after I'd watched this week's Game of Thrones I fired her up, played the first hour or so (headphones ran out of juice otherwise I would've played more) can't really give any thorough impressions just yet but the combat still seems a bit shithouse to me (never liked it in The Witcher 2) and the graphics look pretty incredible (despite the downgrade) in almost fully-Ultra settings on PC. Just within that opening hour I've found myself wandering away from the main quest, exploring little villages and cubby holes so it bodes well for the rest of the game, shall give it a proper run-through later today.

Into the Breach is a game that came from the FTL; Faster than Light guys. Instead of being a grid based real time strategy you can pause and plan out your course of attack, here we're in 3D isometric land where everything is turn based. Also I don't think this is a rogue like, or from what little I've experienced it's not show that hand yet, if it does happen to have some randomness to it. The game plays a little bit like the old turn based war games, if you've played Advance Wars or Fire Emblem you'll feel right at home here. However there are a few differences that sort of make this game unique. The first one is that you only get 3 units. You get a big walking tank that can punch things. You get a standard tank that can fire on anything as long as it has line of sight on the target and you get an artillery that can do indirect fire, helping it arc shots over terrain, but also making it so that it can't attack things directly next to it. So far, so vanilla. The biggest difference is that the way these pieces move and interact with the bad guys that pop up on the map. For instance all the units you have at your disposal can push back enemies a square. This comes in very useful, because if something happens to be in the tile where they would be knocked into, that tiles occupant takes damage as well. Remember this. Another difference is that after each turn the enemies show you directly what they're going to attack. This is where the pushing mobs about the tile set comes important. Sure you could use a tank shell to hit that big enemy up the arse, but that's going to push him right onto the city and give him what he wants anyway. The idea is you read what attack are coming and use this pushing system to save objectives and your own armour. Placing your guys in positions that leads the enemies into grouping up so that you can push them into each other and mountains to hurt them or even get them to attack each other is part of the strategy here. You can also instakill any ground based enemies by pushing them into the water. The final big difference is that the fight you are taking place in only lasts a set number of turns, usually enemies burst from the ground each turn, you are thoroughly outnumbered and the general gist of the game is to survive. You have limited resources and it looks like you're just meant to cling onto the objective before moving onto the next mission. There are sub objectives, some of which say you can kill all of the enemies, but for the most it looks like you'll be keeping the wolves from the door before being whisked off to deal with the next insect eruption. Because of the nature of the skirmishes taking a few minutes before you're moved on it makes an ideal game to play when you've not got much time, I can imagine this being a really good phone game for that reason. Not to say it's without depth because of that, there's going to be plenty of head scratching trying to work out how to smash the fuck out of the attackers without them destroying your buildings and setting everything on fire. It's going to be one of those games that's deceptively simple to grasp but really difficult to master. It's left a good first impressions, maybe not quite as captivating as FTL was when that originally hit, but I think most people will really enjoy it if they're into turn based strategy.

It's difficult to talk about this game here since we don't have many Monster Hunters here. There are many nuances that are different to previous games; are they better? at this point I'm undecided. Some ways yes and others no. I dunno how to talk about MH to you guys. Just sack off whatever mediocre shit your playing now and get into this. Fuck your story based games. They're not good: play a few hours of this then watch something from the Criterion Collection. You'll be better for it. The weapon types are made in a way where you need to sink serious time into them and defeat the enemy types optimally. There's true satisfaction in that. The variety of play is so broad and also has so much depth. How ever you prefer to play you're covered, unless you're a stealth pacifist type then either get eaten or disappoint your comrades. But this has been the case this whole time with MH. I can't help you if you're not cool enough to be into it. And I'm sympethetic; I'm also a relative newcomer, but I saw the error of my ways and I hate to see people making the same mistake I did. This is a hard follow up to MH World and not only because of the obvious technical limitations, although a shift in gameplay and level design make up for it since the mobility options make every inch of the map explorable. But I will say that the ground, intuitive routes feel like classic MH so when you start to fuck around with your mobility for a moment it feels like a whole new world is opening up to you. It's so smart. We're here to fight monsters, though. And that's great. Always has been. But what Rise does different is okay. I just say that because the big drama mechanic is mounting monsters and taking control of them, which is really cool to do, but it's rarer, and less immediate than what you can do in Iceborne with the clutch claw. It just feels a bit weird this lesser console having a mechanic (which is literally having control of a monster) more advanced but it just doesn't feel as good as just being able to slam them into a wall from the position you mount them. But there is also a lacking in drama to the gameplay compared to MH World. It's not so lacking it feels like Dauntless, there is definitely more gameplay driven drama here, no doubt. And I can't stress that enough. I guess it just lacks the flourishes I got used to. I always feel like I gotta be more down on something I'm actually hugely enjoying. I'm just countering strawmen in my head. But I'm super enjoying it overall. I would talk more about how the bugs you control give you mobility but I've still not got used to them despite being 15 hours in. I've been doing okay but that new mechanic has a lot of depth I've not been able to figure out yet. Early on you can play like an old idiot and get away with it. But one of the last fights I had was against the new, flagship beast and his fight is clearly designed with high mobility in mind so I guess I gotta work on that.

This is like a fps parkour shooter type thing, like super meat boy in 3d, like cloudbuilt, or ghostrunner with more shooting. Also its like a timetrial thing where you have to beat levels asap to get gold/silver/etc medals, which you actually need to progress. You need gold or above on a certain number of levels to progress to the next set, so far anyway this hasnt been too tricky. The levels are between 10 seconds and about a minute long so far, ive done the first 20. theres a jump button, a fire button, a switch card button, and an alternate fire/ability button, all on bumpers/triggers which is good. You pick up card and that decides what fire/alternate do, it sort of works like a context sensitive button, so youll pick up a pistol just before you need to do a double jump (pistol alternate fire is a second jump). Alternate fire also throws the card away. Other cards have alternates like a boost, or a grenade launcher you can use to blast yourself up high. Its a good system as it keeps the button count low so they can all be on the triggers. I found it can confuse me at times though because the same button does loads of different things which sort of fries my brain a bit. Theres some talking/story stuff but it seems unnecessary and can be fast forwarded. its not surprising i like this as i like stuff like ghostrunner and cloudbuilt, and so far its been really good. Unclear if the confusing multi use button stuff will halt my progress later on. anyone giving it a go?

This ain't Banjo... It's been a long, long time since I played an N64 game. There are certain things you forget, that are distinct to that console. "Jank" I believe is the modern term. I don't remember the platforming being as weird as it is here? Perhaps because I was used to how the platform worked regarding 3D jump mechanics at the time. Fast forward to now and it is jarring to say the least. Jumping is precise and quite unforgiving. Ironically, you cast no shadow to judge if you will land on the platform you are aiming for. There was an infuriating little jump early on, along the way to acquiring the Asson that brought out a little frustration. Later exemplified in areas involving death traps and (early game) one-hit KO lava. You have a dodge mechanic. But it doesn't work as smoothly as you might expect, coming into this from the perspective of modern From Soft titles etc The remaster gives us camera control with the second stick. It is both an improvement and not. Nowhere is this better demonstrated than in the swimming mechanics. The first time I swam in this game. I tapped the action button, as standard and promptly drowned when I couldn't right myself. Later, I discovered the problem and it's solution. You don't use the action button to swim... You use both sticks. Forward on the left stick to move and steer with the right stick. If it sounds like tank controls, it basically is. But being in the water, it does become intuitive quicker. Ultimately my first session went on for about an hour and a half. Collecting four Dark Souls. The second weapon in the Asson and 66 Cadeaux. Quite intrigued to continue at this point.

I'm around six hours in so in the scope of these games that isn't much but I have some stuff to say I guess. So you play a kid in a Tokyo high school and some strange murders are happening and you and your friends who is trying to investigate it like a YouTuber would gets sucked into this world after Armageddon happens. Its posed to you that it's twenty years into your future and Tokyo is destroyed and buried in sand as well as demons hanging out pretty much everywhere. You also kind of fuse with a demon who talks like an android. There is a slight change of circumstances for our boy. I've spent all my time running around this glittery, sandy area so far; fighting demons and helping out some others. The areas are kinda big and make me think of Xenoblade Chronicles more than anything else. I say that because they have these hidden areas with fun secrets and are quite intricate. They're quite a bit smaller but they have similar ideas in how they're built. It's unexpected compared to the fourth game {and I'd imagine the ones before that} as they are dungeon based having you explore these tight areas. The other reason It reminds me of XC is there are tough enemies that are meant to be fought way later roaming around blocking areas and just generally keeping you on your toes. Exploration has this constant pressure though as the combat even with basic enemies can be dangerous if you don't have the right team so it can get a bit stressful when loads of enemies are around a place you want to be. Combat is still strong in this game as it was before because with the right attacks and spells you easily dominate a fight but the flipside is so can the enemy if you let them in. You essentially get another turn if you hit with a critical hit or hit an elemental weakness. This can be easy once you've found those weaknesses but going into a new area with new enemies or bosses make you try to stay safe while you experiment with different moves. I've been finding the game still pushes you hard into really thinking about using everything you can in a smart way. What's working for me so far for the boss I beat so far and harder enemies is having one of the last demons in my squad have a sleep attack so after I've got all my attacks out I just use that then they miss a turn and I can go through my bullshit again. Yes, you have a squad of demons. You have three in a fight and can carry six but that can increase as the game goes on so yes it is a bit like Pokémon. But here you can fuse two or more together to make new demons so that's what I've ended up doing so I can make room for more. But you don't catch them in a ball you have to talk to them and convince them to come with you. You have to try and asses what personality they'd have and basically tell them what they want to hear and bribe them. There's probably an optimal way of doing it but as long as I have enough stuff I just give them what they want and hope they aren't complete arseholes and just bounce {they've not done that yet here but I know it's a thing they can do}. Oh, and a tip; don't try to befriend a demon with a higher level than you because they don't come with you then, but I did have one situation where when I fought the same enemy in the same area it did come with me once I talked to it at the right level with no convincing. I don't have much to say about the story so far as its early and sploilers but it seems pretty typical of the series but I'm about to go to where some angels live so maybe things will start picking up there.