Vidya Gaems General

DYRE

But seriously, Tales of Zestiria, asking me to grind
so hard for the skill setup I'm aiming for? In game with so many
characters? Don't push your luck.

After the first 10 or so hours of the game I realized skills don't actually matter so I completely ignored them in my equipment selection and that improved things somewhat.

I guess it's possible they matter on higher difficulties? But it seems like the high difficulties are just extremely bullshit so I'm not sure it'd be worth it either way.

I think I sort of liked Tales of Zestiria overall maybe? But after I beat it I had no interest whatsoever in continuing to play it, and I never even finished the Alisha chapter. Basically, comparing it to other games I played relatively recently, it left less of an impression on me than Final Fantasy X-2 and that game is terrible.

MadassAlex

Tales games are just too big for NG+ style content. 

I will say that I appreciate the lack of a debt mechanic in this installment, however. 

Stormtroper

The only Tales game I played is Phantasia. I ruined it by unknowingly turning on the setting where you have to manually set your targets, making it a bitch to change them and prone to that thing where you run five kilometers to hit a dude then run back while your party is being slaughtered. That and the dull plot (at least the first few hours) made me hate the game, which probably wasn't fair considering it was a settings problem. Maybe I'll try it again someday.

Edit: No, actually I played Symphonia with some friends for an afternoon, too. I was the wizard kid. That was a shitload of fun.

glennmagusharvey

I want Symphonia when it comes out on Steam.

Zennistrad

I got Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth 1 on Steam since I'm a sucker for turn-based RPGs and it was on sale for the holidays.

Does this mean I'm weeb trash now?

MadassAlex

Yes. 

But then again, I play Tales games.

So join the club,  I guess? 

glennmagusharvey

Suddenly I want to play Pokémon Crystal.

glennmagusharvey

I wish Age of Empires were on GOG.

Any of them.

glennmagusharvey

Update: Alisha's Story is now available for purchase again.

glennmagusharvey

I am currently considering buying the following:

Capsized

$9.99



$1.99

Dreaming Sarah

$5.99



$0.59

Finding Teddy

$6.99



$1.39

Hammerwatch

$9.99



$1.49

Shelter

$9.99



$1.99

Banished

$19.99



$4.99

Apotheon

$14.99



$3.74

Any comments on these?

glennmagusharvey

fourteenwings

...
are those real

Zennistrad

Apotheon is pretty cool. I love how well it captures the aesthetic of ancient Greek art.

glennmagusharvey

> How to deal with smurfs?

(FYI, "smurf" is a term for a highly skilled player who makes a new account just so he/she can play against newbies instead of similarly-ranked players in a game's competitive mode.)

> git gud and join them and be a smurf yourself

This is why competitive gaming sucks.

fourteenwings

I read the Cracked article about Final Fantasy. Had some valid points but cherrypicking bad spinoffs and complaining about cutscenes and content rich worlds is kind of reaching.

Bee

I didn't mind cutscenes and content-rich worlds in FF13.  They were just really shallow yet pretentious cutscenes and content.

Noimporta

>I read the Cracked article

This was your first mistake

>about Final Fantasy

This was your second mistake

>It's an article not written by either Seanbaby or John Cheese

Three strikes, you're out.

Zennistrad

Decided to play through La-Mulana again. Despite knowing the solutions to most of the puzzles this time around, it still manages to remind me exactly why it's my favorite indie title of all time. This game manages to be like no other metroidvania I've ever played in that it really makes you feel like everything you find is important.

glennmagusharvey

I'm in the midst of a playthrough of La-Mulana myself, with a couple friends watching (and occasionally helping).

Most recent progress made:
* obtained Chakram
* obtained Isis's Pendant
* obtained Chamber of Extinction Sacred Orb
* obtained Life Seal
* obtained Cross
* defeated Bahamut

FYI I played this game's freeware version with DeceasedCrab's video guide, years ago.  This time I'm playing the remake version, and refusing to use a guide.

A couple other friends have also been playing it lately.

glennmagusharvey

Speaking of freeware games:

idiocy: https://www.change.org/p/make-cave-story-acknowledge-that-it-copied-undertale

Bee

I really need to get around to getting a computer that can run La-Mulana.  I enjoyed what little of it I was able to play before the cascading lagmonster got me.

Kinda blows my mind how it can be optimized so poorly, but there you go.

glennmagusharvey

There's a little tool that is supposed to tell you whether your computer can run La-Mulana; I wonder what it says for your computer. I think it's just called La-Mulana Checker or something. It should be available from NIGORO's site.

glennmagusharvey

You're a kid bounty hunter now: http://safebooru.org/index.php?page=post&s=view&id=1525555

glennmagusharvey

I'm at the edge of my seat and holding my breath just watching this.

glennmagusharvey

HOLY SHIT this person gets through half the battle WITHOUT the fire spell.  Amazing.

Zennistrad

Looking back on it, it really is kind of strange how abruptly La-Mulana changes around 60% of the way through the game. Up until that point it was always nonlinear, but aside from a brief detour in the Inferno Cavern into its corresponding backside area, nearly everything you needed to progress through each area and defeat its boss is self-contained within that area.

Then you get to the Chamber of Extinction, and suddenly you're spending almost four times as much time outside the area to get the items you need to reach Palenque.

glennmagusharvey

Yeah, areas 1F, 2F, 3F, and 4F are largely self-contained in their dependencies.

FWIW I'm at a point now where I can beat a miniboss for the second whip, or beat the time-stopping miniboss, and I don't know what else I can do.  I need to figure out how to get either the Bronze Mirror or the Fruit of Eden.

I'm tempted to look up hints but I promised myself I wouldn't.

----

http://store.steampowered.com/app/332610/

Mystik Belle is -25% during the Lunar New Year sale!

Zennistrad

The Fruit of Eden is probably the one puzzle in the game you'd need a guide for more than any other, to be fair.

glennmagusharvey

So lately I've been playing La-Mulana and Unepic.  Interesting how both of them are metroidvanias directly inspired by Maze of Galious.

Come to think of it, Maze of Galious is probably like, the "third" template for metroidvania games, after Metroid and Castlevania.  It's lesser-known and less popular than the other two, but it's also got a strong set of conventions.

Most distinctive is the mechanic where finding the boss room and fighting the boss are two separate things.  In La-Mulana you need the find the boss room, and unlock the ankh in the boss room, and acquire an ankh jewel, before you can fight the boss.  In Unepic, you need to find the boss room, then can choose whether to activate the boss battle, and you can even teleport out of a boss battle to safety (and reset it).  This is in contrast to many other metroidvania games where the boss just suddenly appears when you get to the boss room.

Also, MoGalious, LM, and Unepic all have relatively small character sprites compared to the screen size (contrast them and the various 2D Metroid and Castlevania games), screen-by-screen mapping with little or no scrolling, and lots of platforming (often in the form of platforms and ladders) on each screen.

Bee

glennmagusharvey wrote: »

I'm at the edge of my seat and holding my breath just watching this.

Now realize,

1) He's overleveled.  Two levels over, actually (Kishgal is 48).  This would utterly trivialize literally any other fight in the game, and would have trivialized this one if this player wasn't so bad about Bursting.

2) He Bursted on the dragons and took icebergs to the face (that he wouldn't have survived without being overleveled).  Never, ever Burst against Kishgal.  Boost for defense, which is the only thing it does for Yunica anyway, and try to dodge.  Worst case you'll take a very small hit.  Burst makes it very likely you'll trade that for anywhere from half your HP bar to instant death.

Though he did have very good rhythm on the phoenixes.  Ideally you want to bait him toward close range, then use it to push him back right before he attacks.  The way the knockback messes with his momentum, he gets hit a good 7-8 times.

EDIT: just watched the other video and oh dear God he's overleveled even more.  No wonder he can just spam Bolt Crash -- he's taking single-digit damage, less than a third of what he would be at-level.