whatchu playing now

Might check it out when I burn out on ff eventually. I've got some thoughts on ffx! It's the best worst best game! Really something special. My least favourite game play and story of any I've played, but also so unique in both aspects that I can't help respect it. Just finished off seymour for maybe the last time? Tides is not having an acid trip in the dream that he is. Tidus is the dream that will end dreaming at last.

I just realised why I love Final Fantasy and what links them all together besides being rpgs: they are all so unapologisingly maximalist. There's really nothing else like it

Also tidus's running animation is just adorable

*tidus is now having

"least favourite game play" what did you hate about it?
Ithink it's one of my fav of the FF battle systems, but it's been a long time since I actually played it so ...

The tedium, having to swap in characters for them to level. The games difficulty pacing is great if you do swap characters every round making sure you are spending 7 actions on an enemy that you could beat in one. If you don't go through this tedium, you're pretty likely to get slapped hard towards the end game unless you love grinding. I love that it focuses on weaknesses beyond the typical elemental stuff. I love the summons. I love Rikku's mechanics. I love that there are 7 genuinely unique characters who all have their use. But the tedium of swapping + the tedium of summons animation is a bit much.

Again, it's really unique and so even though it pisses me off and I think it's bad and annoying, I also think its great and I love it lol.

I'm the sort of person who has a team and sticks with it so I never switch out the characters. if there is a forced team change later on I get fucked over tho lol
e.g. playing Persona 3 atm and the dog and the kid and stupid junpei can fuck right off

That is correct

Fuckin' Stupei

How can ffx be your favourite and you don't switch out characters! But yeah, that's normally my strat.

cosign junpei hate

Didn't realize Pentiment (out now on PS5!) was a point and click game. Bummer, I don't really find those things compelling. But people love this one, and it's only $20, and I like to support good work ...

I lost interest at the halfway point but until that point it was a great experience. Well worth $20 even if that’s as far as you get!

lol maybe I will wait until it is half-off, then.

I have 1600hrs played in apex. christ

I've probably put about the same into Dark Souls 3, but in my defense most of those were on the exercise bike.

It's a good story, Josh! Writing is excellent throughout with some delightful characters.

Turn off the writing sound effect immediately though.

I wouldn't really call Pentiment "point and click." You're not really doing Monkey Island-type stuff. It's more of a low-key adventure game with some odd minigames scattered throughout. As has been noted, the writing is really really good. It's the most "book-like" game I can think of that isn't straight up IF.

I've been playing the demo of Unicorn Overlord. I've never played a game with this kind of "configure your units and throw them into auto-turn-based-battle" system before, it's interesting.

Yeah, point-and-click has a very specific meaning, but if you think of it literally (as opposed to the genre) it does apply to Pentiment. I'd say though that it plays closer to a 2D Obra Dinn (of course without a supernatural pocket watch of death) in an Umberto Eco-adjacent setting.

The art and animation is great too!

Relevant: https://kotaku.com/pentiment-on-playstation-and-nintendo-switch-1851278458

A smaller and more reserved title compared to the rest of Obsidian’s catalog, and an expertly written story that offers the player choices in how they navigate an intricately designed Bavarian town and the murders happening in it.

Balatro…

that one seems cool

I think I have Obra Dinn, and it seemed super cool, but my general rule of thumb is that if I also need a pencil and paper, maybe the game is not for me.

Man, now I'm trying to remember some game I had for the Apple II GS (I think) that was set in some dystopian alternate reality, and there may have been pigs (or police pigs?) and it might have involved vacuum pipes sending instructions around this giant office building (a la Brazil), and there was this one part that was just this convoluted series of bureaucratic tasks that drove me nuts as a 13 year old (or whatever I was). No idea what it was called.

Haha I had that, it was called "Dream Zone," and it was deeply frustrating! There are walkthroughs on YouTube (that music will take you back). The people who made that game later formed Naughty Dog!

hmm, maybe? title doesn't ring a bell...

Huh, maybe it was "Dream Zone"! What a pain in the ass that game was. That was Jason Rubin and Andy Gavin!? Funny.

In the tradition of Tass Times in Tonetown, Dream Zone follows in the tradition of the text/graphic adventure. It's obvious that Dream Zone has borrowed elements from the aforementioned text/graphics classic and doesn't do the job quite so well but does stand out in its own right.

You're having trouble sleeping. You seek the help of Sigmund Fraud, Psychomental Health. He administers a surge of power through your body plus a liquid concoction that will induce a sleep that will put you at battle with the beast that harbours your nightmares. In this state, you can then defeat him and sleep peacefully ever after. If not, you will never wake.

Dream Zone is the brainchild of Andy Gavin and Jason Rubin, who both worked on design while Gavin worked on coding the game and Rubin drew the wonderful cartoon style graphics. Like Tass Times, you have a text-entry parser but you can use the mouse in combinations of using the action buttons and objects in each scene.

Dream Zone is not an easy adventure. There are plenty of ways to die and because you are living the bizarre reality of a dream, if you think too rationally, you'll get nowhere to solving the puzzles. This aspect is unique, because the situations you encounter are common themes found in peoples' dreams, which hopefully you'll be able to identify with. Too bad if you can't remember your OWN dreams!

Some parts of the game can be downright annoying however, chief among these is the necessity to interact with the local bureaucracy. You HAVE to continue to move within the building where they tell you to...believe me, it WILL get you somewhere in the end. Every item to be put in your inventory has a use, which is good. Every person who can follow you around your dreamscape can help you, but in most cases, they can hinder your progress later in the game...not good.

Certainly, it's a tough adventure game. It should keep you stumped for many, many hours. And that's not a bad thing. It's better to use some lateral thinking, instead of simply using logic means to solve puzzles found in the 'adventure' games of more recent years. Andy Gavin has created a solid program and Jason Rubin's graphics on the whole are very well drawn which maintain a style all their own. The two later worked on Keef the Thief, a role playing adventure with a difference.

https://www.whatisthe2gs.apple2.org.za/dream-zone.html

the situations you encounter are common themes found in peoples' dreams ... chief among these is the necessity to interact with the local bureaucracy

checks out

Balatro is extremely good. My favorite joker so far is the one that adds more multiplier every time you convert a two pair... somewhat like Ouroboros in Inscryption.

I have 1600hrs played in apex. christ

the apex of gaming

Mispelled team fortress 2

I've been enjoying my first-ever playthrough of Castlevania SOTN (the true apex of gaming) on my retro handheld. This game looks phenomenal on a 3.5 inch 4:3 screen. Also the soundtrack, holy smokes. I'm actually sort of astonished at how diverse it is: symphonic stuff, thrash metal, jazz fusion, prog, house, baroque harpsichord shit--it's all here, and somehow it all coheres.

truly one of the best OSTs

i recently bought the ROB/SOTN bundle and finished rondo of blood the other day (loved it,) so i'm looking forward to playing SOTN for the first time ever after hearing so much about it.

the main game i'm playing atm though is MGS 5, which is very absurd, feels very large, and is quite fun. i played the prologue first and thought it was extremely lame, so my expectations plummeted while i had thoughts like "maybe even only vaguely realistic military-ish games are not for me," but once i got through the long and boring expository opening sequence i started having fun. the gameplay loop of going to the field for missions and going to the mother base for upgrades and hanging out with my diamond dogs is working for me

damn, wait until more plot and cutscenes talk about the diamond dogs back at the base

they’re bros forever

I also just remembered the nickname of Revolver "Shalashaska" Ocelot and I’m laughing

balatro looks awesome

i've been playing a bit of helldivers 2 and honestly....it's pretty fun. goofy, ott, but it does what it does really well

also need to return to BG3, which ate up my life for a little while right after christmas

damn, wait until more plot and cutscenes talk about the diamond dogs back at the base

they’re bros forever

I'm genuinely terrified of Balatro...if I get into that, I might not ever get out

No FF7 Rebirth chat yet? Shocking.

Think I’ll be waiting for a PC release. Some of the graphical settings (as broken down on digital foundry) for PS5 look disappointing for a game of this stature.

i had been delaying doing the final battle in super mario wonder while i tried to wrap up some of the extra stuff (finding secret wonder seeds, doing the badge challenges) but the badge challenges get so hard and frustrating! it's funny how much easier the boss battles are than even the 3-star badge challenges, but i guess that's how they keep the main game accessible to everyone. i haven't even tried the extra world of hard levels yet, i know they're just going to piss me off.

i'd been thinking about doing chants of sennaar next but now i'm excited about pentiment so i'll probably get that first.

The final special world level is insanely hard. There's a bit where you are invisible and have to bounce across moving balloons.

also i have so many blank spaces on my badges page. how can there be so many badges i don't have?

ah i see now a chunk of them aren't available until after you beat the story

I've made it to the infamous inverted castle in SOTN...not sure if I'm gonna complete this, but I'm definitely gonna give it a go.

It's shorter that the regular castle. i wish i could play SOTN for the first time again.

balatro is too easy i won on my second run. or first run if the tutorial one doesnt count

it unlocked a million things at once so im excited to play again

I'm playing Inkulinati. Stupidly clunky name. Concept is Pentiment's art (including a character cameo from that game) x Monster Train's team building and randomised journey mechanics.

yeah i was interested enough to add it to my wishlist but have a strong suspicion that the history porn is covering up a not-great game

Is Balatro too easy? Feel like with these rogue-likes it’s so much luck of the draw, can land on a perfect set of circumstances in a given run and clean up. I got really far in one of my early runs, but haven’t gotten close to that since.

Cool game. Not sure I’m as hooked on it as most seem to be, but I see the appeal.