drahkon

I see. Regarding your last sentence in the "Endgame" spoiler: A lot is lost to you, because it plays off of the original game.

I take it you never played the original?

Watched the first two episodes today. I enjoy it a lot. Made me feel uneasy right from the start. And Eve Hewson is beautiful. That's a big plus.

Can't contain your excitement, I see

@Hero-of-Time you seeing this?

Remove the phone lines to be safe.

Well, after Chapter 6 it was over very quickly. Nabbed all the trophies and it didn't change my opinion of the game. It's a lovely idea that never comes close to fulfilling its potential. The game could've done without the narrative and should've focused more on the puzzles themselves. More levels, less talk

Chapter 6 of Maquette done. It's been way too easy to softlock the game in the earlier chapters... The puzzles are great, but it feels like they don't fully fulfill the main mechanic's potential... And the writing is soooooo bland...

Oh, I've played a myriad of difficult levels in Super Mario Maker 2. It's kinda funny how I enjoy those hard level created by users more than most levels by Nintendo

It wasn't that bad on the WiiU. I actually found it pretty easy. Now, the increased speed might make it a little more difficult, I can't comment on that. You should give it a go, though. It's pretty much the only level I enjoyed in the game. It's just a platforming delight. If you enjoy that, it's a must play I really wish Nintendo would release something similar to that on a larger scale...slap together some relatively difficult platforming sections, have 100 levels like that and I'd eat it up

Made a little bit of progress with Battle Chasers: Nightwar. I can now confirm that there are dungeons: And they are procedurally generated Each square is a room you can explore. There's fights to be had, lore to be found, chests to be opened, materials to be gathered, fish to be caught and more. Here's the thing, though: Before you enter you can choose one of three difficulties: Normal, Hard, harder (can't remember the exact terms for those). Rewards for finishing the dungeon get better the more difficult it is. This is a pretty cool mechanic. I completed the first dungeon on normal and then on the highest difficulty. Got a sweet weapon out of that Fights got even more interesting now that I've acquired the Burst Meter. When full you can unleash a strong ability. Depending on the character it's either an attack or supports your team. Awesome right? Yeah...but enemies started doing that, too, and sadly, you can't see their Burst Meter. It's a little annoying but eventually you get a feeling for when a big attack might be coming your way. Found and entered the second dungeon yesterday. Highest difficulty, of course So far it's not too bad, I just need to be careful with my resources, aka health and mana potions. Also: I'm spending a lot of time fishing when I find a spot: No idea what to do with the "fish parts" that I get, though. Played more of For the King, as well. Our three player run ended after about 3 hours...we immediately started a new one and put the things we've learned from before into practice So far, so good. Yesterday one of my mates and I started a two player/character run 'cause the other one was busy. We decided to give it a go on the lowest difficulty because we figured that it would be way too hard with one less character in our team. The first two hours we breezed through the run...it was actually ridiculous. Eventually, though, we got to a point where enemies hit harder and cause various dangerous status effects. Seems like things will ramp up a bit.

Indeed. It's why I've decided to skip the narrative completely after I've found out that you can do so via the circle-button. I enjoy the puzzles a lot, but the surrounding narrative is so boring and unimaginative that I'm not going to bother with the "cutscenes".

Had an online exam just now and got 85%. Needs to be verified by the professor, but the official result shouldn't be any different. So now I'll take a break from studying for upcoming exams for today and just chill.

A PSVita game...

Started playing Maquette and completed the first two chapters. Enjoying it quite a bit. The puzzles are great, the game looks beautiful and the voice actors are really good. Framerate is a little iffy, but eh...it's a puzzle game. But man...the story so far...during every narrated part my reaction was pretty much this: or this: or this: It's so "lovey-dovey, hug me, you're so amazing, everything's perfect and romantic"... Maybe it's the jaded cynic in me but it's annoying as all hell Anyways, I really hope Michael's and Kenzie's relationship crashes, burns to the ground and then explodes.

Yeah, I'm just trying to keep my expectations in check. I actually want a free upgrade with all the PS5-goodness. And a pear.

Realistic take: We'll never see a patch

Ah yes, Aliens. Have the trilogy on Blu-Ray...never watched it. Bought Alien: Isolation a million years ago...never played it. And now we have this... *runs*

If it gets a patch

Yup, but I would like to play the entire game again with a shiny new Platinum to get. A PS5 version would provide one

PS5 version announced. This, however, is a complete version being sold at full price. No upgrade for the next gen consoles Guess it means I'll buy the remaining DLCs I gotta get for my PS4 version and live with no new Platinum until the PS5 version is on sale Edit: Nevermind...looks like the PS5 (and presumably Switch) version won't be available outside the US...

Phew, just had a two hour gaming session with two mates. We've recently finished Borderlands 3 and all its DLC so it was time for something new. As luck would have it, For the King is currently on sale on the PSN store so we decided to get it and give it a go. What is For the King? Roguelite. Tabletop. Adventure. The first and third...what's not to love Tabletop in this case apparently means DnD. I've never had any experience with it so I don't know if that's accurate, but from what I know about DnD it sure feels like it fits. Encounters, i.e. combat and overworld shenanigans are determined by "dice rolls". For example: Attacking an enemy with a sword requires strength. The higher your strength stat, the higher the chance that the attack lands and deals increased damage (I think this is a DnD mechanic?). This also applies to what I labeled "overworld shenanigans". Encounters require a certain stat, depending on what kind of encounter it is and the same mechanic from above applies. With the right strategy and a little bit of luck, success is always within reach. Our journey had a pretty smooth beginning. Won a few fights, leveled up once, got some nice equipment, a good amount of gold and some healing items. So we decided to tackle a main quest and delve into a dungeon. What do you expect from a dungeon in a typical RPG? Some fights? The occasional treasure chest with loot? Maybe a wandering merchant? A boss fight at the end? We found all of the above. So...you'd think we would emerge stronger than before, right? Here's the answer: A BIG FAT NO! This is what happened in one fight in that dungeon: One mate attacked with a weapon. All rolls failed. The weapon immediately breaks leaving him unarmed. The other mate was poisoned and started to bleed in the first turn, which cut his HP in half. I got attacked and suffered the "Acid" status effect. Now what does it do? The in-game description says: "Acid destroys equipment after a while." "After while" My next turn: My weapon dissolves. My next turn: My armor dissolves. My next turn: My necklace dissolves. We had no item/spell that could help me. The results of our journey into the dungeon: one of my mate lost his weapon and died two times, the other mate had to use all his healing items, I pretty much exited the dungeon completely naked. Oh well...we barely survived. We then traveled back to a town, healed up, bought some new gear and decided that we need a break For the King is awesome.

I really like the video's quality.

After finishing Kingdom Hearts 1.5 Final Mix HOW MANY MORE WORDS DOES THIS TITLE NEED, I started playing Frostpunk, as mentioned above. All's fine and dandy with this one. If by fine and dandy you mean everything is horrible, life is pain, death is inevitable and misery is all around us. However, there's this little guy inside my head who keeps saying: "Drahkon, listen. Playing a video game that's not a (J)RPG is nice, but come on...you gotta play a (J)RPG. If you don't I'm going to be very mad with you, you miserable piece of crap." So I decided to look through my PSN library and find a JRPG that I haven't played, yet. And since there are approximately 8 million games in that list it was no surprise to find one: Battle Chasers: Nightwar. Bought it a long time ago on a sale and because I'm a stupid idiot who tends to buy games on sale and then only play half of them, I haven't played it until now. "Hey drahkon, why are you here writing this post instead of playing Battle Chasers: Nightwar?" Look, Timmy. We've been through this...you can't just chime in every time I'm talking and make me look like a fool. It's rude. "Hey drahkon, why don't you answer my question?" Sigh...ok, Timmy. You ready for this, Timmy? ARE YOU LISTENING, TIMMY? Here's what I wanna share: One of the first things I do in JRPGs (or pretty much any video game) is: Browse through the game's menus. Stats, percentages, equipment, lore...you name it, I need it in my veins. And this is where Battle Chasers: Nightwar shines (this is a statement that I can give after 30 minutes playtime; maybe this'll change - I doubt it, though). I mean...just look at this beauty: Bestiary done right. You see the enemy, you see its stats (well...not yet, but but you unlock those details eventually), you get info about where to find it and what it drops and more. And goodness me, there are Beast Perks you can acquire by defeating a certain number of this enemy. It's a dream come true. LET THE GRIND BEGIN. Next one: It's gorgeous. All stats visible, sub-menus for equipment, skills, etc. and you can immediately see that there's rarities for gear indicated by colour. Speaking of gear: You can look at every piece of equipment in the Inventory and actually equip it from there. No need to go to the Equipment sub-menu. So simple, so smart, so effective. AND THERE'S FISHING: "Hey drahkon. Are you done with gushing? It's getting annoying...tell me more about the actual gameplay." Alright Timmy, you may wanna sit down for this one... After only a few battles I can say: The battle system may very well be one of the best I've ever seen in a JRPG. It's a love letter to classic games like Final Fantasy. The turn-based nature reminds me a lot of Final Fantasy X and that is, as we all know, my favourite battle system ever. You can actually see the turn-order and how different skills may change it. Wanna use a powerful AoE attack? You gotta wait a bit and maybe let an enemy attack first. Wanna just attack? You can do it immediately, but it's weaker than a skill. However, you do get so called Overcharge Points which can be used instead of Mana. Pretty neat. Also: You got poisoned by an enemy? Press L2 and you can see exactly what it does, e.g. 4 damage per tick, lasts 3 ticks. Makes planning your moves so much better. I'm already excited to see what mechanics/buffs/debuffs/etc. the game will throw at me. "Ok, drahkon. Lots of positivity, but come one...we've just come out of 2020, and 2021 hasn't gotten any better, yet...there's gotta be some negatives." Yes... The overworld. No real exploration...just some paths you can/have to follow. Monsters are shown as little avatars which is weird. The game sadly runs at 30fps which is not too bad given the nature of turn-based JRPGs but it's still quite jarring. Satisfied, Timmy? "Yeah, kind of. But is there anything else other than the overworld?" I haven't come across one, so far, but there are supposed to be dungeons to explore. Nothing I can comment on right now, though. "Wow, great...thanks for nothing. Well, I'm gonna go now. You suck!" Eh, ok...goodbye assface.

I'll believe it when I see it