Games Beaten 2014

[BoneSnapDeez]

Wait your daughter is requesting that you play DS games now? How does she even watch you play them?

[Exhuminator]

I finished up Marvelous: Another Treasure Island, and wrote a review.

tl;dr 8/10 and here's some kind of sexy gorilla:

[prfsnl_gmr]

Wait your daughter is requesting that you play DS games now? How does she even watch you play them?

I usually play something while I am eating breakfast in the morning, and my children usually join me for breakfast. Since we dine at our kitchen counter, they can look over my shoulder if they sit close to me (...and I sit in the middle and hold the DS or PSP far enough away so that they can both see the screen). I don't always do it, but it is a nice way for me to spend some time with my children in the morning (and since my wife gets to sleep in, she doesn't mind either).

Looking back over my "games beaten" list, I see that games were played at my children's behest:

3D Dot Game Heroes, LittleBigPlanet, Drill Dozer, LittleBigPlanet 2, Sonic & Sega All Stars Racing, Angry Birds: Star Wars, Thomas Was Alone, Puppeteer, and Giana Sisters DS

They have good taste (and I have LittleBigPlanet (PSP) on deck for tomorrow morning!).

[emwearz]

1. Back to the Future: The Game - PC
2. Syndicate - PC
3. Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag - PC
4. Resident Evil: Revelations - 3DS
5. The Walking Dead - PC
6. The Walking Dead: 400 Days - PC
7. Cyber-Lip - Neo Geo (Via Neo Geo X)
8. Metal Slug 4 - PS2
9. Aliens: Colonial Marines - Stasis Interrupted (DLC) - PC
10. Metal Slug Advance - GBA (Via Emulation)
11. Assassins Creed III: Liberation HD - PC
12. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations - NDS
13. Sam & Max Save the World - PC
14. Bust-a-Move Pocket - NGPC (Via Emulation)
15. South Park: The Stick of Truth - PC
16. SNK Gals' Fighters - NGPC (Via Emulation)
17. Grand Theft Auto V - PS3
18. Titanfall - PC
19. Super Mario 3D World - Wii U
20. Professor Layton and the Miracle Mask - 3DS
21. Uncharted: Golden Abyss - Vita
22. Gravity Rush - Vita
23. Hotline Miami - Vita
24. BioShock Infinite: Burial at Sea Episode 1 - PC
25. BioShock Infinite: Burial at Sea Episode 2 - PC
26. LittleBigPlanet PS Vita - Vita
27. The Last of Us - PS3
28. Peggle Nights - Peggle Nights - PC
29. Lego Batman 2: DC Super Heroes - Vita
30. Donkey Kong Country - SNES
31. Lego Harry Potter: Years 1-4 - PSP
32. Wolfenstein: The New Order - PC
33. Thief - PC
34. Lylat War (Starfox 64) - N64
35. The Wolf Among Us - PC
36. Knack - PS4

Total for 2014: 36

Thief - PC
I did not mind Thief, but it really did not do that much for me, I found it fairly clunky and chore to finish.

34. Lylat War (Starfox 64) - N64
Such fun, I played through the easy run, then the hard run. Really enjoyed it and will be coming back for more

35. The Wolf Among Us - PC
I am a fan of the Fable comics and this did not disappoint, I feel like it started much stronger than it finished, but it was really enjoyable.

36. Knack - PS4
Unlike most people I did not downright hate Knack, actually, I rather enjoyed it. There are a stack of little things that take away from it, but it plays like Crash Bandicoot, with a fixed camera angle. The game had quite a bit of filler, which made it longer than it needed to be (The 'Get Big Knack" chapter was not needed at all).

I purchased this and Killzone with my PS4 and Killzone has not got that much playtime, while Knack is now finished.

[elricorico]

1. Pikmin 3 (WiiU)
2. Kirby's Adventure (WiiU VC)
3. Rayman Legends (WiiU)
4. Mario Kart 8 (WiiU)
5. NHL14 (PS3)

6. NES Remix (WiiU)

Saw the credits/records roll after beating all of the Remix challenges. I'm sitting now at 525 Stars so there are four more bonus levels to unlock but this requires replaying levels that I didn't get 3 stars on. I'll probably do it eventually, but for now I'm satisfied with how much play time I've given this.

This was my Club Nintendo reward. It was pretty engaging, but some of the challenges were more annoying than anything (one of the hole-in-one golf challenges had me rolling my eyes). It wasn't something I was interested in paying full price for but I did want to play it. Having played through this now I intend to get NES Remix 2 eventually, but I feel like waiting to see if it is a Club Nintendo reward next year would just make sense, as I have plenty of backlog already.

[Sload Soap]

Otogi 2 (Xbox)

Beaten for summer games challenge. It's a beautiful and unique game that can also be frustrating and shallow in equal measures. Worth a pop though all the same.

Halo 2 (Xbox) aka Sload's latest essay.

The recent Destiny beta had bitten me with the Bungie bug and so I dug out Halo 2 to scratch that itch.

The game turns ten years old this year and while it's still an impressive piece of software, it also feels a bit loose compared to more recent Halo offerings like Halo 4 and Reach.

The opening is great. You start aboard a doomed orbital platform, before the Chief uses an enemy bomb to take down a couple of Covenant ships, then you crash land in the dusty streets of New Mombasa. Here you engage Covenant forces in the narrow allys before a series of vehicular battles lead you towards a giant Covenant battle walker that you have to board and take over. It's thrilling stuff so it's a shame that the campaign never really hits these peaks again.

Bungie obviously went for the traditional sequel making method: bigger, longer, more epic. This of course would be fine if Bungie hadn't by extension made some of Combat Evolved's worse parts bigger and longer.

As in Halo 1, there is a lot of repeating of indoor areas or set pieces but with slightly different enemy configurations each time. Halo 2 repeats this trick but seemingly repeats it more often. One stage in particular has you take two identical rides on a slow moving train before breaching two identical platforms. It just feels like padding and as Halo 2 is five whole levels longer than CE it really starts to drag towards then end when it should be building to an epic finale.

To be sure there isn't anything as bad as Halo's infamous Library level but there also isn't anything that reaches the heights of Silent Cartographer either. It simmers but never boils over which is a shame. It's almost too safe, like Bungie was adverse to taking any major risks.

One minor risk they did take was by splitting the game time between the Master Chief and his Covenant counter-part, the Arbiter. This isn't a Raiden/Solid Snake deal though, the Chief still gets the majority of of the screen time and the Arbiter doesn't play any differently other than having a cloaking device rather than a flash light.

Disappointingly playing as the Arbiter doesn't mean that Bungie explore the Covenant side of the war in any more detail, it just means killing "bad" Covenant and Flood with a slightly different toolset. It's a missed opportunity to actually kill some humans and perhaps humanise the until now bestial Covenant horde but no. The Chief and his cohorts basically represent some kind of perfect Space America so again Bungie play it safe. (As a side note I was surprised how much of the war on terror seemed to have seeped into what I once previously thought to be an entirely fantastical series).

The biggest gameplay alteration is the introduction of being able to dual wield certain weapons. This actually does impact the game and invites experimentation with various weapon combos, the Needler/Grunt Pistol being a favourite of mine. Or you can just equip two of the same weapon and berserker charge the enemy. It's cool and adds tactical depth in both single and multiplayer.

Halo has a very distinct aesthetic and rich lore behind it, but I also have to point out that I've played every mainline Halo game to completion, some more than once, and still don't have a clue what the hell is going on. Half the story seems like it's being told elsewhere and characters pop in and out of the action with very little sense or purpose. All the while you're being bombarded with fancy sounding names like "In Amber Clad", Prophets of Regret, Truth and Mercy (all indistinguishable from one another), Forerunners, Delta Rings, Halo rings, Sacred Rings and Great Journeys. Shit needs a serious workshopping.

And yes, the Flood return and they're just as obnoxious an enemy to fight as they were the first time around. If they aren't rushing you from a previously unseen dark alcove, they're one shotting you with a rocket launcher or shotgun. Very annoying. Even in open areas they continue to annoy and can even "cheat" with the regular weapons as I found out on one occasion when I got hit by three rockets fired from the same launcher without reloading! As I said, nothing gets as bad as the Library but the Flood seem slightly more ubiquitous than before and are introduced earlier as well. Since they tend to be more uniformly armed than before, they have lost some of their distinctiveness as well. Fuck the Flood.

This sounds like I'm being overly critical when really I did enjoy the game. While it misses some of the comforts of modern shooters, is still a very playable game. You can't fault Bungie for their world building nor for their determination to make every play session feel different from the last. The Covenant are I think one of gaming's more intelligent and distinctive badguys, while Halo 2's sense of scale and scope was unmatched for its generation, even trumping a lot of more recent titles.

Like Otogi 2, it's a game you could use to lord over your PS2/Gamecube owning friends and, some rather long loading screens aside, is a technical masterpiece from graphics to gamefeel to sound design (the game has a lovely soundtrack).

It's just some aspects frustrated me, the game feels overly long and I never really knew precisely what it was I was doing or where I was going or why. The campaign just seemed a bit purposeless and flabby overall.

Multiplayer still rocks though.

*Just as another side note, I started this on the 360 and finished it on a old Xbox save. I encountered some annoying graphical glitches (ghost images, awful pop-in) on the 360, though I think the resolution was a bit higher and it loads much, much quicker. It's not as bad as some other titles (Ourun and Panzer Dragoon are basically unplayable on 360) but I'd advise playing it on the Oxbox. It's also both sad and shocking how Microsoft couldn't emulate one of their flagship titles properly, but that's another rant.

[Xeogred]

Thief - PC
I did not mind Thief, but it really did not do that much for me, I found it fairly clunky and chore to finish.

You going to check out the sequels? A lot of fans seem to favor 2 the most. I can tell you, 2 does away with the zombie/monster stuff for the most part, less weird cryptic caves/forests, crazy weird puzzles and platforming, etc. I think fans wanted more elegant buildings and things to loot, so they did that.

I love the weirdness of the first game and think it has stronger atmosphere, there's also nothing quite as crazy in the sequel as that mansion that warped (walls/ceilings) as your progressed. That level stood out a lot.

But yeah, 2 easily refines some elements and aside from one or two levels in the early beginning, the levels are all around a lot better and easier to navigate. The villain also gets surprisingly awesome and creepy as it goes, almost like SHODAN level stuff. The hilarious thing is knowing that Garret's voice actor does the villain in 2 too.

Definitely give it a shot if you're interested. It's different enough. Be forewarned though, the last level is the most intimating and monstrous level I've ever seen in an FPS period. Not exaggerating haha.

I really enjoyed Deadly Shadows too, which also arguably has some of the creepiest moments in the series. But it's greatest issue is that awful Invisible War engine. They also threw in a city hub world... so yeah, cue loading screens everywhere. It was worth a run, but I don't know if I'd want to put up with that again. Same with Invisible War.

[Stark]

I think em was talking about Theif 2014.

[Xeogred]

[TSTR]

1. Dead Pixels (PC)
2. Magical Drop V (PC)
3. Reaching Out (Android)
4. Nanolife (Android)
5. Darius Burst (PSP)
6. Ridge Racer 2 (PSP)
7. Darkstalkers Chronicle: The Chaos Tower (PSP)
8. Street Fighter II: Special Champion Edition (Genesis)
9. Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike Online Edition (PS3)
10. Super Mario Bros. (NES)
11. Persona 4 (PS2)
12. Final Fantasy (PSP)
13. Gun-Nac (NES via Wii)
14. Ultra Street Fighter IV (PS3)
15. The Stanley Parable (PC)
16. Imscared (PC)

USFIV

Arcade Mode run with Sakura on Hardest a few weeks back. Had to get that Legendary Schoolgirl title.

The Stanley Parable

Spent last evening with Stanley and his Parable. Got all the various ending scenarios except the one for playing through the baby game for 4 hours 'cause ain't nobody got time for that.

I've never played anything quite like this before; in fact, I'd go so far as to say this is one of the most unique gaming experiences I've ever had. The range of thoughts/feels it evokes is quite stunning. One moment you'll be belly-laughing at the narrator, and the next you'll be pondering the whole of game design and narrative itself. It has this really compelling sort of gameplay that, despite doing almost the same exact thing over and over again, makes you want to stay in the world—even if it's just to hear the narrator say a different line in one room.

Of course, once you finally exhaust all your options, there isn't much replay value to it. However, the time you spend with it is well worth it, and I'd say it's a must play.

Also, SECRET DISCO!

Imscared

Just a few minutes ago, I ran through Imscared because someone (Ack, I think) mentioned it in that RE Revelations 2 thread. Not as freaky as I thought it would be, although the stuff that happens after you escape from playing tag was the scariest. It's a neat concept that could definitely be explored further.

There were a few things I thought a little haphazard: getting physically stuck on certain objects while walking around, wandering about trying to find some nebulous golden blob on the floor, and the screen tearing is annoying (although not as much as in other games, because the nature of the visuals allow the tearing to somewhat play into the lo-fi feel).

Worth playing for the extremely short time it takes if you like horror games or quirky game design.