It is mid-week question time again:
- What games have you been playing lately?
- Are there any you would recommend to other Border House readers?
- Are there games that have you ranting or raving?
- Are there any games that you played and want to see covered on the site?
I’m filling in for Gunthera this week. Hello! This week I started Uncharted: Golden Abyss for the Vita. It’s Uncharted plus a lot of touch screen hijinks, some better (touching ledges to climb cliffs, holding a parchment up to the light to reveal secret writing) than others (having to stop while walking on a log to do a stupid “balance” check by tilting the Vita, wiping dirt off of things). I’ve also been continuing my playthrough of the Quest for Glory series, and as you can tell from the header image there I’ve reached Shadows of Darkness. Fun fact: Katrina is voiced by Jennifer Hale, the voice of Commander Shepard and about a million other characters from games and cartoons.
And what have you all been playing?
I’m replaying Final Fantasy V. It’s actually my favourite of the series – the plot’s coherent, the job system is rewarding and fun and I love the characters and the group dynamic.
The game’s 20 years old but still has better representation of women and girls than many current releases, with 3 out of 5 player characters being women or girls, and it has the wonderful Faris, gender ambiguous pirate extroardinaire.
I’ve just got past the forest of Mua – no spoilers, but let’s just say it breaks my heart every time.
Oh, FFV is fantastic! Never actually finished it, though, as my original copy of the playstation final fantasy collection went missing, and for some reason I can never keep my interest sustained on playing an emulated version. One day!
Still playing through Persona 4. If I’m remembering right, Naoto’s dungeon is coming up soon. ……not sure how I feel about that. I have such mixed feelings about Naoto…
I am enjoying seeing some social link scenes that I didn’t get to the first time through. One of the Death ones made me cry like a baby. And I got the platonic ending of Yukiko’s link yesterday, which I really enjoyed. Friendship is the best <3 (In Persona 3, I was pretty uncomfortable with every single female social link falling in love with the MC, so I very much appreciate that there's a friendship path for everyone in Persona 4. …now if only there was a gay option or three.)
Aww, I like Naoto. She’s my favorite!
But yeah, Persona 4 would be one of my perfect games if it had a few gay options.
Hm, I… really do like (and identify with) Naoto a lot. But I don’t necessarily like how the narrative treats Naoto, if that makes any sense. It’s possible that I identify with Naoto a little too much, actually. I’m a trans guy, and just so much of what Naoto goes through reminds me of things I went through in high school… except that the narrative says that Naoto is a girl, and (IIRC) couldn’t possibly be anything other than a girl, and it kinda makes me feel a little unhappy just because I’m identifying with Naoto more than I should, I guess.
Like I said, mixed feelings.
I recently went on vacation, so some of my gaming plans switched around over the last several days. However, I’ve still gotten in some gaming on the iPad, and a bit on my laptop.
Ike and I played some Orcs Must Die! 2 together yesterday, which was pretty fun. Coordinating trap combos and placement is cool.
On the iPad, I started playing Skylanders: Cloud Patrol (which was free when I got it yesterday… not sure if it’s still free). The upgrades for items seem like they’ll take quite a while to get, but the gameplay is fun and the graphics are cute.
I also played the first world of Shark Dash, which was pretty neat. This physics puzzler’s gameplay isn’t the most innovative, but its mechanics were pretty solid and it’s got nice presentation values.
Played some more MageGauntlet. I seem to only play one level every few months, despite enjoying it… though last weekend, I played two levels!
Lastly, Ike and I started up a time management game by the name of Happy Street. It’s low maintenance enough for me to still be enjoying it, helped by some amazingly adorable graphics.
I’m playing Parappa 2 just now, and finding it a lot of fun! It’s my first Parappa game. I find it so much more endearing than Guitar Hero and the like, though I’m still not entirely 100% on how the freestyling works. It sometimes seems quite arbitrary as to whether or not you’ve freestyled well or not?
Still playing Dead Space 2 and Mass Effect 2. The story is getting more interesting in ME2. Also, played some Ultimate Marvel Vs. Capcom 3 last night.
I had such a crush on Katrina’s voice (and character) when I played that game. Oh gosh… I didn’t know it was Jennifer Hale. *blush* I have been a fan of her voice acting a lot longer than I realized.
I found myself back with 4 Elements II last night, working on the challenge levels. I finally got past one that had stumped me and then zipped through several more. Though now I’m stuck on one that has, of all the razzafrazzing things, sliding-block puzzles. THAT ARE TIMED. Why, $deity, why?
I’m still working on El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron, and other than that I’ve been all about Glitch. And Pixelogic on my iPad (come to me lovely Picross puzzles!)
I beat A Witch’s Tale (DS), and am currently going through a NG+ to get all the dolls and cards. Maybe there’ll also be a different ending? Aside from some ‘Guide Dangit!’ moments the first time, this game is actually a pretty good RPG.
After much hemming and hawing I’ve finally gotten into Dragon Age 2. In fact, I’ve been playing it nonstop for the last couple of weeks and I’m nearly finished with my second playthrough. Went through as a rogue the first time around, replaying as a mage – it’s the first time I’ve played a magic user in anything! Dragon Age always has some controversial elements, but I gotta say how much I just LOVE characters like Aveline, my LadyHawke, and Knight-Commander Meredith (maybe love/hate on that last one). Some of the most diverse representations of women I’ve seen in mainstream games. Also my mage LadyHawke is just so incredibly badass in her champion armor set I can hardly stand it.
I’ve been playing Lost Oddyssey — thank you for the rec, everyone
I bought it because of that, but while Persona 3 (another rec) was a clear miss for me, Lost Odyssey is unexpectedly awesome. High-gloss JRPG fun and surprisingly addictive. Okay, the story is nothing to write home about, and the romance (…talk about lack of chemistry) makes me laugh, but everyone’s refreshingly… adult? Also, Kaim is just very pretty and I gleefully enjoy his special manpain more than I probably should. XD
It’s also just so pretty — the design is striking the sweet middle ground between all-out FF ridiculousness and inventiveness for me. I just wish it had a 360° camera!
The one thing that really makes me weep bitter tears …. is Ming’s outfit (and her initial characterization). Augh, it hurts my SOUL. I adore everything about Seth though (I am in love with her sturdy, beautiful back, ngl), so it kind of balances out.
Another thing I like is that the boss battles are actually challenging — you always need some sort of strategy to win (altho now that I have the high-grade protect spells etc it’s somewhat easier.) As a huge Tales fan, I’m always somewhat iffy about turn-based battle systems, but this one’s tweaked enough to not feel cumbersome.
Anyway, I’m really susprised I’m liking it so much! I’m on disk 4 already, currently cooped up in sidequest-ville, but it would need to turn really awfully idiotic, plot-wise, for me to start hating it by this point :>
Anyone else played Spec Ops: The Line yet? If so, thoughts? Given that the developers designed it not only as a critique of the modern shooter genre, but of the players of that genre, it seemed like the sort of deconstructive effort many people here would enjoy.
I for one know I did.
I am playing through that now at the demand–err, gentle urging of a friend–for the very shooter deconstructive efforts you mention. I haven’t progressed too far into the game, but I am interested in seeing this.
And said friend, SleekitSicarian, did enjoy it. Posted about playing it and some thoughts on it a week or two ago.
Well, ‘some thoughts’ being “I liked it and the shooty music was good yes”, so.
I really did think it was very good, though, in all seriousness. A solid effort at deconstruction of the genre, even if it could have done some things a little better. (The ‘difficult choices’ aspect was pretty barebones considering how much they touted it as a major component of gameplay in interviews, for instance) Certainly it’s more memorable than any other military shooter I’ve played, but that isn’t, perhaps, saying much.
I particularly enjoyed it as an example of comparatively subtle character development; you see the characters’ general demeanors change, along with things like the way they say their usual emits. …Well, that and increasing battle damage on the models, as it were.
And the ending impressed me.
I was listening to an interview with the one of the developers, and he said that when they were coming up with the idea to show character progression by changing the battle chatter (and even some of gestures) over the course of the game, he was shocked that nobody else had thought to do that before.
Given the enormous budgets and night-fetishistic attention to detail on some of the games in the military shooter genre, it is shocking, isn’t it? There’s definitely character development in the ones with the better narratives, yet they never thought to demonstrate it that way. Heck, other genres, even, could stand to take notice.
I finished it. I also noticed that the characters and their emits and general demeanor changed throughout the course of the game. Your dudebro HOORAH manly men companions go from pretty typical shooter genre soldiers to broken and conflicted people. From dutiful followers of orders and command to rebellious and defeated and spiteful subordinates. You can hear it in their tone of voice and antics.
I liked the battle damage and multiple changes of character models, too. It isn’t just the same character model from the beginning to the end, regardless of the severe injuries and storyline damage they have taken that should be showing up on the character.
The vistas and aquariums were really beautiful too. Great environmental design. It made Dubai feel fantastical and like a fantasy world within itself, imo.
I do think that some of the deconstructive narrative and ‘moral choice/gameplay choice’ items could have been better. There wasn’t much variety. It seemed like it favored more of a specific endgame and narrative, so choices weren’t really a big thing. The ending choices and various ways the game can end in the last five minutes are interesting, though.
For a third person shooter, I liked it for the twists and deconstruction and subtle spotlighting it does on the genre/players of the genre. It’s not the standard dudebro heroic messiah with a machismo gun story and I like that as well.
Yeah, I was startled by how novel it felt, even though it seems like something so obvious. Some of that might be the relative immutability of characters in general (even in a lot of RPGs, the characters don’t change individually so much as bounce off each other/the PC in new ways) or voice-acting limitations, but still.
Anyway – like you said, it’d be great to see some of the design decisions discussed in the interviews applied to other genres. Or even to have the developers continue developing intriguing shooters, since my tolerance for the more usual variety has run dry
Still working on Dragon’s Dogma. Still unsure about it. Part of me is enjoying it, part of my is wondering why I’m sticking with it despite finding a lot of it rather tedious.
Oh, but it is hugely improved by turning all the voices off! The pawn system is all well and good, but the ‘useful advice’ is just awful. I work with people who insist on advising you when you when you haven’t asked for advice (I had to go on a week-long trip to India with two of them a few years ago. Honestly, there was almost bloodshed!). Your 3 possible pawns do this. All the time. For everything. Every time you come to a crossroads they remind you to check your map to make sure you get the right route. Then comment ‘I wonder where this leads’ despite the fact you’ve travelled it a dozen times. Did you know that wolves and goblins don’t like fire? Apparently this is true. I know because my pawns have told me every time I’ve f*&(*)ing come across them.
I can see that this is something that seemed like a good idea in principle, but it didn’t occur to them to limit how many times individual bits of advice come up.
You can turn their voices off!!?? OMGosh, thank you! I looked for something like that and turned off the screen text right from the start which made me nuts, but did not know about the voice option. Much colourful verbal discourse back from me every time I hear the same old comments from the Pawns, and I end up turning the sound way down. I’ve started only following the main story (well, sort of) because I am at 98 hours playing already (it’s embarrassing) and seem to spend forever trekking, probably 90 of the hours, all over for goofy little quests. I do have a second rift portal I placed, and agonised over where to put it and not had to use it since. Honestly, when I see more side quests on those darn notice boards and I accept them, I think – why did I just do that? I’m not sure how close I am to finishing the main story line, hopefully not too far out. Anyhow, it’s been fun, addictive and the world is enchanting, immersible and familiar but I’m sooo ready for Darksiders II to arrive…
Yep, if you go to the sound options, you should have three sliders: music, voices and something else (ambient sound?). Just move the voices slider right down – problem sorted!
First thing I’ll do when I get home tonight. Thanks again!
FFXIII-2. I’ve been putting it off for various financial reasons, then when I did buy it and play it, I realized why I would have been putting it off anyway. Everything was just what I was expecting; Lightning isn’t the main character, banal narration, cutesy sexualized little girl heroine, blah. It’s better at being a game than FF13, so I’ll be playing it for that … just not … caring yet. Hope it gets better.
Absolutely. Those reasons are the reasons why I skipped it. The demo that I played made the game-y parts of the game seem better than FF13, but… ugh, Serah and this new dude I care nothing about. No thanks. I’d rather have Lightning and Fang: Punching the World in the Face Forever.
Oof, looks like this got double posted while I was still writing. Odd!
I love you for this comment. Can someone please make that game now? Pretty please?
Absolutely. Those reasons are the reasons why I skipped it. The demo that I played made the game-y parts of the game seem better than FF13, but… ugh, Serah and this new dude I care nothing about. No thanks. I’d rather have Lightning and Fang: Punching the World in the Face Forever.
It’s strange to me. It’d be like Final Fantasy 7, only without any of the main cast as returning permanent cast/starring cast.
I’m still playing Fallout: New Vegas and it’s still an awesome game! I figured out that the best way to play the game was to leave the exploring to when I have time to run around and really savour the environments and enjoy looking at the clues from the people who lived there before the castastrophy, then go back and do missions and quests when I just want to play something with a beginning and an end. That works well and is easier to combine with work and life in general. I’ve discovered a couple of new companions, but I’m sticking to my favourite ones at the moment. The companions aren’t as deeply written as say, those in ME or DA, but they’re interesting enough. I just wish they had a little more to say.
I also bought the new weapons for ME3, but after trying them out in the shooting range, I found only one of them would be a good fit for my current playthrough as vanguard. I’ll have to wait for the upcoming DLC to try the heavier weapons out with my soldier because they’re awesome!
On PC: Orcs Must Die 2, The Secret World
On iPad: Happy Street
I have a Backloggery!
I finally started playing FF13 and I really like it. I can understand people’s complaints about the hyper-linear gameplay, but for me, it totally worked. The battles actually feel challenging; I’ve died and hit “Retry” lots of times, and the system that scores you on how fast you win the battles is a big part of that challenge. Although Lightning is officially the main character, the game feels almost as much like an ensemble cast as FF6 did, and everyone gets their own character arc. Oh, and Vanille, not Lightning, is actually the one who gets to be the narrator!
I’m also still playing Etrian Odyssey III. All I have left to do is beat up the final two post-game bosses, but the one that I’ve tried fighting is overpowered as heck and requires something of a specialized strategy to take down; if it’s not under a specific status ailment (head bind) on turns that are multiples of four, it uses a move that hits your entire party for more than the HP cap.
I liked FF13 for a long while. Around the end (when it opens up to the non-linear stuff, surprisingly) I started to … not play. I couldn’t work up the energy to care enough to play the last dungeon or do anything else worth doing. I did force myself to play the ending and it was forgettable. THAT SAID, there were times when I was shouting at my TV because I was so emotionally involved. There are some really good moments in the game and I didn’t have too much of a problem with the gameplay in between, until all those subplots resolved. If it doesn’t bother you now, it maybe will later … Maybe. To each their own.