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Glen-i

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Posts posted by Glen-i

  1. Posted

    On 22/04/2024 at 10:49 AM, EEVILMURRAY said:

    @Glen-i what did you call Isha's weapon? I went a bit dark and called it Killing by Suicide. I'm surprised this was even an option 

    A bit dark?

    Anyway, I can't actually remember. And I played through the whole thing with the NSO Game Trial, so I can't boot it up to check.

    • Haha 1

  5. Posted · Edited by Glen-i

    16 minutes ago, Cube said:

    including an impossible minigame with Mr Vile, sneaky crocodile (although a move from a later level can make this possible).

    Fixed that for you. (Also, the way you phrased that, you wouldn't happen to be aware of the traditional song that's sung at AGDQ when this game shows up there?)

    But anyway, Banjo-Kazooie is easily one of the N64 greats, even if I do prefer Tooie in almost every regard. And it's great that a new generation of Nintendo players have discovered the game thanks to the one-two combo of Smash Ultimate and NSO. It's a very special game.

    • Like 1

  7. Posted

    2 hours ago, Hero-of-Time said:

    With Glen doing something similar in the sequel, it must be a common thing in this series. :p

    Yeah, sure looks like it, I recognised a lot of those things you did in your prep.

    Most games these days would try their best to patch up stuff like this, but this series seems to relish in it. It really rewards players who put in the work to make the SP system work in their favour, and it's my favourite thing about it.

  9. Posted

    Right, bored with Smash. Let's play a funnier game!

    PlayStation All-Star Battle Royale

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    I've done this theme before, but it's gotten 4 new characters since then, and they're pretty heavy hitters!

    So yeah, in case it wasn't obvious, every character here has appeared on at least one PlayStation console, and none of them appear on the actual PS All-Stars Battle Royale, because it's forever funny to point and laugh at that game's roster!

    Mii characters are allowed, but they must be wearing a costume based on a character that has appeared on PlayStation (Goemon, Cuphead, Sans, etc.)

    There are also a couple of costume restrictions

    Cloud - No Advent Children costumes
    Bayonetta - No Bayonetta 2 costumes (Short Hair)

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    Spoiler

    Battlefield
    Small Battlefield
    Big Battlefield
    Final Destination
    Shadow Moses Island
    Green Hill Zone
    Windy Hill Zone
    Wily Castle
    PAC-LAND
    Suzaku Castle
    Midgar
    Umbra Clock Tower
    Dracula's Castle
    Mementos
    Yggdrasil's Altar
    King of Fighter's Stadium
    Minecraft World
    Northern Cave
    Mishima Dojo
    Hollow Bastion

    Spoiler

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    Items are either from specific games from PlayStation titles, or are generic enough, you can get away with it. Except the Fake Smash Ball, that's there because I'm making a point.

    Format - 3 Stock
    FS Meter - On

    See you at 7:30!

    • Like 2

  12. Posted

    1 minute ago, Hero-of-Time said:

    I'm curious, what are these games? I mean, outside of the first party stuff, most games are released on all of these platforms. I suppose the indie scene, MMOs and strategy games have far more releases on PC.

    It's mostly these.

    Granted, the Switch has allowed me to play way more of them compared to the WiiU days, but there are still a decent amount of games that only release on PC there.

    • Thanks 1

  13. Posted · Edited by Glen-i

    3 hours ago, Sheikah said:

    The majority will never take to PC as their main gaming platform. Expensive, inconsistent and not well suited to being used on a TV - which is important for many.

    Yo!

    This is exactly why I don't have a PC. Unlike PlayStation and XBox, PC has loads of games I want to play, but the cost is just far too high for me to justify it. Nintendo's cost to benefit ratio is just far more appealing.

  16. Posted

    23 minutes ago, Nicktendo said:

    And I do not believe that Nintendo games will ever be available anywhere but on a Nintendo system, and that's exactly the way I want it to stay. They are the only dev left in the industry and that builds their software to a specific hardware.

    Nintendo have curated an expectation of quality of gameplay over fancy shmancy graphics as soon as they realised they wouldn't be able to compete directly with Sony and Microsoft after the Gamecube, and it's paying off in spades. Now that graphical leaps are subject to huge diminishing returns with inflating costs, Nintendo are coasting along relatively smoothly on their reputation of "Hey, our games function at launch, and you know they'll be fun".

    Very much, the long con, there.

    • Like 1

  20. Posted

    27 minutes ago, Dcubed said:

    Hey! This game’s good!

    Gonna have to pick it up myself :hehe:

    Yeah, he teamed up with me for my first run of this. We took the 10,000 dollars, because it was funny!

    The Special K.O. system is very cool. It's a very a good way to encourage you to spend that Special bar regularly, luckily, it refills relatively quickly.
    I can already see the potential for some awesome combos when I get some practice in.

    The difficulty slider is a very cool idea. Easier modifiers get you less tokens

    There are a couple of problems though. The loading times are really long. They're not as long as the initial load, but it does slow the pace a bit.
    Also, the leaderboards are not as good as I'd hope. Unless I'm missing something, it only shows the top 50 players, and there's no way to compare your scores to friends. Which means it'll never be any good for me.

    But yeah, it's great. Would love to do some more 2 player runs with other people here.

    • Thanks 1

  21. Posted

    2 hours ago, Julius said:

    Also just seen the full trophy list @Hero-of-Time, looks like it'll definitely take a bit of a grind (max out weapons for all characters). I'll be going for recruiting everyone but I think I'll pass on grinding that out :laughing: especially with how long some of the other mini-game related trophies will probably take! 

    Joke's on you, I'll be getting the Switch version!

    Unless the achievements are also in-game, like Rising... Oh God! What if they're in-game, like Rising!?

    • Haha 2

  22. Posted

    4 minutes ago, EEVILMURRAY said:

    How do you choose your party with so much choice?!

    Helps that I can discount all the characters who are human. Narrows it down a bit, but still leaves me with options.

    But I imagine this is the kind of game where you can just go with a party of the most interesting characters and stick with that if you want.

    At least, I hope it is. It could also be like Chrono Cross, where only 6 of the characters are any good.

    I doubt it'll be that bad, though.

  23. Posted · Edited by Glen-i

    Argh! So many people not going into the NSO options to remove the buttons on the bottom of the screen! I hate it!

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    Star Ocean: The Second Story R is an action RPG developed by Gemdrops, and was released on the Switch, PS4, PS5, and PC last year. It's a remake of the PS1 game, "Star Ocean: The Second Story"

    The game follows two characters, the first is Claude C. Kenny, an ensign of the Earth Federation (Think of it as the Federation from Star Trek). He's on a mission of some sort, when weirdness happens. Said weirdness transports him to the planet Expel, where he meets the second protagonist, Rena Lanford. Expel isn't aware of intergalactic life, so when Claude whips out a Laser Gun to save Rena from the local wildlife, she mistakes him for a hero in the local legends that wields a "Sword of Light". Word of this gets out quick, and the town mayor asks Claude to investigate the Sorcery Globe, a meteorite that has spawned monsters all over the planet. Claude agrees to look into it, but only so he can find a way off of the planet (he doesn't tell them that). Rena tags along because she wants to find her real parents, she's adopted.

    The framing device is interesting, you choose between Claude and Rena as the main character, and this tweaks the plot a little, as there's a number of scenes where the two are separated and you only see what happens to the character you chose. So there's naturally a few gaps in the plot.

    The general plot is fine, but my big issue is that for 75% of the game, the game kinda forgets that it's in a Sci-Fi setting. The planet Expel is for all intents and purposes, a medieval planet, and Claude's laser gun breaks in the first half hour, so he's stuck swinging a sword for the rest of the game. It does remember that the game is called Star Ocean in the last 25% of the game, but it's kinda too late, and it feels like a missed opportunity.

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    The game plays similarly to the "Tales of" games, in that battles are all real time, with you controlling one character, and the AI handling the other members of the party. They're pretty dumb though, with them running towards enemies with no regard for how dangerous that might be. Luckily, there are a veritable smorgasbord of ways to become incredibly powerful, and they all come from the Speciality system.

    As you play the game and level up, characters accrue SP, which can be spent to improve various things, such as "Aesthetic Sense" or "Penmanship". Some of these provide immediate benefits, but with the right combination of stuff, that character develops a speciality that can be used for certain benefits.
    For example, leveling up Penmanship allows that character to write books that help other characters level up specialties. As well as that, there are "Super Specialties" that require mutliple party members. If multiple characters develop a talent for writing, then they can work together to write an excellent book that you can get published and start collecting royalties for, which is an excellent way to amass loads of money.

    It's not limited to that, you can do other stuff like doubling your EXP gains, calling some weird rabbit monster to help you travel over mountains, or even flat out steal from NPC's (Yes, @Dcubed, Octopath Traveler got that idea from this game)!

    It all snowballed into hilarity for me as Claude accidentally forged the best sword in the game halfway through it, and went on to apply a HP draining effect to said best sword. Add to that an accessory that triples the amount of times he hits an enemy, and he was literally invincible!

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    For comparison's sake, the second highest ATK in my party was 2,100

    I haven't played a game that heavily encourages the player to utterly demolish it like this since Bravely Default, it's loads of fun!

    Anyway, the second unique aspect of Star Ocean is how you build a party. Claude and Rena are the only mandatory characters in the game, but there are 13 other characters you can get, and they are all optional. You can finish the game with none of them if you want. I don't recommend it, but you can.
    The problem is that you only have space for 8 characters, so you can never recruit everyone in one playthrough. The ending cutscenes are determined by who is in your party, and how much they like each other. There's 99 different cutscenes you can see in the ending (!), so multiple playthroughs are encouraged. Good thing this game only took me about 30 hours to beat then.

    The game looks drop dead gorgeous, utilising the 2D-HD look that Team Asano games have popularised in recent times. You probably know by now, that I love this style! If only the Final Fantasy Pixel Remasters looked this good. The portraits that show up in cutscenes also look great. Incredible detail that makes the PSP versions look positively amateurish.
    The music is also great. You have the option to use the original PS1 soundtrack, or an arranged version. I preferred the arranged version, but I've not played the other versions before, so I don't really have any nostalgia for them.

    This is a fantastic remake, the only problems I have are small nitpicks with the structure of the original game, but it's not enough to affect my enjoyment. Highly recommended!

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    Dragons, Sci-Fi, that whole connection!

    Spoiler

    Sea of Stars
    Chained Echoes
    Arzette: The Jewel of Faramore
    Princess Peach Will Star As The Main Character In A Brand New Game
    Star Ocean: The Second Story R

     

    • Like 2
    • Thanks 3
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