What games are you currently playing?

[Malacite]

Re: What games are you currently playing?

Just finished The Last of Us.

I dunno, I feel like it was over-hyped.

Good game? Yes. But it falls just short of GotY criteria. There's a few glaring gameplay issues, including something I expected which was sub-par stealth gameplay. Just like in Uncharted, you can TRY to be stealthy, but more often than not you'll end up forced into combat anyway because of stupidly cheap AI/mediocre mechanics. I raged so much at the number of times I would be right behind a damned Runner only for it to magically turn around and scream, alerting every other enemy in the vicinity. Speaking of which, that's another bullshit knock against the "Stealth" approach - in chapter 5 I was nearly done with an area that was quite a pain to sneak around and pick off all the enemies. I had 1 guy left to go - except it was actually 2 because some new enemy had just magically spawned in a spot I'd already cleared and so I had no idea he was even there. The game was giving me the audio cue that I was about to be revealed, but as I had no f'ing clue where I was even being seen from I got discovered and then like 10+ enemies came charging in.

I wasn't aware that I was suddenly playing MGS. If there's only a couple of guys left, those should be the only ones that come at me. I was also rather infuriated at the lack of any suppressors whatsoever. You find a bow fairly early into the game, and sometimes you'll get lucky and the arrow won't break but I would have killed for a suppressor on even just my 9mm. The ending sucks too, btw. I won't spoil it, but I felt like it was a lot of build up for very little. The journey was awesome, I genuinely love the game and think it's overall very solid, but I don't think it deserves all the praise it's getting. I was much more impressed with Uncharted 2.


Still, for a first attempt at survival horror, they could have done a lot worse. I do still recommend buying the game, just don't believe all the hype. Now for that platinum @.@

[Icemage]

Re: What games are you currently playing?

Just finished The Last of Us.

I dunno, I feel like it was over-hyped.

Good game? Yes. But it falls just short of GotY criteria. There's a few glaring gameplay issues, including something I expected which was sub-par stealth gameplay. Just like in Uncharted, you can TRY to be stealthy, but more often than not you'll end up forced into combat anyway because of stupidly cheap AI/mediocre mechanics. I raged so much at the number of times I would be right behind a damned Runner only for it to magically turn around and scream, alerting every other enemy in the vicinity. Speaking of which, that's another bullshit knock against the "Stealth" approach - in chapter 5 I was nearly done with an area that was quite a pain to sneak around and pick off all the enemies. I had 1 guy left to go - except it was actually 2 because some new enemy had just magically spawned in a spot I'd already cleared and so I had no idea he was even there. The game was giving me the audio cue that I was about to be revealed, but as I had no f'ing clue where I was even being seen from I got discovered and then like 10+ enemies came charging in.

I wasn't aware that I was suddenly playing MGS. If there's only a couple of guys left, those should be the only ones that come at me. I was also rather infuriated at the lack of any suppressors whatsoever. You find a bow fairly early into the game, and sometimes you'll get lucky and the arrow won't break but I would have killed for a suppressor on even just my 9mm. The ending sucks too, btw. I won't spoil it, but I felt like it was a lot of build up for very little. The journey was awesome, I genuinely love the game and think it's overall very solid, but I don't think it deserves all the praise it's getting. I was much more impressed with Uncharted 2.


Still, for a first attempt at survival horror, they could have done a lot worse. I do still recommend buying the game, just don't believe all the hype. Now for that platinum @.@

What on earth are you talking about Mal? The stealth mechanics work fine. If you can't stealth through the game, you just suck at it.

The Last of Us is amazing. It's freaking hard on Hard, but I'm enjoying the hell out of it.


Icemage

[DakAttack]

Re: What games are you currently playing?

Speaking of horror, I'm finally playing through Dead Space 3. Single-player, hardcore difficulty, etc. There was literally a sequence where you're entering the atmosphere of a planet while trying to dodge super aggressive pieces of space debris. Literally. THE DEBRIS IS CHASING YOU.

[Malacite]

Re: What games are you currently playing?

No, they're not "fine". I've been spotted numerous times by the jerkoff I was tailing at the last second despite being directly behind them (and I'd have video proof of this if my PS3 wasn't a busted old pile of crap -the component port is literally busted/too old and won't work with my LGP which is pissing me off immensely) and I also dislike that you can't even catch someone from the sides if they're unawares; you HAVE to be directly behind. Case in point, I'm hiding behind an object, guy wanders into the room not immediately looking at me and if I try to grab him just as he comes into range nope, game won't do it. He just becomes shocked and then alerts everyone else.

Pretty much every other stealth game I've played will allow you to do that except this one. The game is really finicky about positioning. Hell I even had a few infected come at me when they noticed my flashlight (I was't moving) even though the game expressly says they don't react to it. Maybe I was just unlucky? I dunno. It just feels like Uncharted again to me when it comes to trying to be sneaky. I can appreciate smarter AI (too many stealth games with retarded enemies) but there's a limit to what I can put up with.


Doing Survivor mode now and goddamn, supplies are seriously scarce. Not sure if I'll be able to clear it given how poorly my stealth attempts went overall last time. I'm gonna have to really hope for more "God Bombs" lol... (In the 1st segment with the clickers in the underground area, I threw 1 molotov that literally ended up killing 5+ zombies and clearing the entire area it was ridiculous, wish I'd captured it.)

[Icemage]

Re: What games are you currently playing?

No, they're not "fine". I've been spotted numerous times by the jerkoff I was tailing at the last second despite being directly behind them (and I'd have video proof of this if my PS3 wasn't a busted old pile of crap -the component port is literally busted/too old and won't work with my LGP which is pissing me off immensely) and I also dislike that you can't even catch someone from the sides if they're unawares; you HAVE to be directly behind. Case in point, I'm hiding behind an object, guy wanders into the room not immediately looking at me and if I try to grab him just as he comes into range nope, game won't do it. He just becomes shocked and then alerts everyone else.

You're doing it wrong.

Runners will occasionally stop and look around them, which means if you aren't "directly" behind them, they will spot you. Clickers usually won't do this. Human enemies CAN be ambushed around corners if you're fast to hit triangle. I don't know where you're getting the idea that it's not possible because I do it all the time?


Icemage

[Malacite]

Re: What games are you currently playing?

Yes I know they look around. Again, I wish I had the footage but it's infuriating as all hell to be pretty much right behind them, literally 1 step away from the grab and then "RAWR I MAGICALLY KNEW YOU WHERE THERE THE WHOLE TIME!!!" @__@

And no, you can't ambush around corners unless they pass by you, and they're usually smart enough to actually check to their sides - which is something I can appreciate, I like that the AI isn't totally retarded for once. But the game just seems to bug out on me far too often with epic bullshit. I've been playing stealth games since MGS on PS1, I know what I'm doing at this point. It's even more horrendous on Survivor Mode as the Hearing ability is disabled. I was already heavily dependent on the Bow in my Normal playthrough, I'm going to be using it almost exclusively I feel on Survivor :/


EDIT: OK just as an example, I'll be hiding behind an object either outside or near a doorway. Enemy walks in, right as I'm next to his side (hasn't spotted me yet but is about to) I try to grab but no prompt and I'm simply just seen instead. Any other stealth game I'd be able to do a takedown from that position so long as I haven't yet been noticed but not in this game. You *have* to be behind them...

Spoilers

... at least as Joel anyway. When I was playing as Ellie in the snowy town, I was actually able to get a few side and even frontal Knife prompts to take down enemies. But it NEVER worked even once as Joel and I don't get wtf is up with that.

[cidbahamut]

Re: What games are you currently playing?

I kind of want to pick up Fallout 3 just for the old timey radio music.

[Malacite]

Re: What games are you currently playing?

While I didn't care for that game overall, Three Dog was awesome. I especially loved how if you killed him, you'd periodically hear it mentioned that "some asshole killed our DJ" XD


I'm up to Chapter 5 now on my Survivor Mode run, and hating it so much lol... but I'm a completionist so yay. Some segments are worse than others, but thankfully I've gotten the hang of abusing friendly AI and fighting intelligently - as I said, the Stealth sucks in this game, I don't give 2 shits what any of you say, and I'm finding it easier (when I have AI support anyway) to just run around and let them deal with the enemies, periodically helping as needed. It takes longer, but it saves a lot of supplies.

One big plus mind you, is since resources are so much scarcer in Survivor Mode, I can just bypass a lot of areas I checked out on my previous run on normal because I know they'll be empty - part of my problem before was I was trying to silently take down every shmuck that got in my way so I could raid all the supplies. Now I just keep going right on through.

And screw the devs, humans are NOT worse to deal with than the freaking zombies, even if they do have guns @_@;

[Icemage]

Re: What games are you currently playing?

And screw the devs, humans are NOT worse to deal with than the freaking zombies, even if they do have guns @_@;

Disagree. Humans are harder. They have a higher detection range, and don't fall for a lot of the tricks that kill zombies dead (Molotovs for instance, can often kill 2-3 clickers at a time).

The only thing is that the developers were kind and spaced the humans out so you could theoretically take them down one at a time. Zombies aren't usually so kind, so without tools and tricks it's almost impossible to take out masses of them.

That and sometimes zombies just aggro you as part of the story and you're forced to just fight swarms of them <- THAT part I totally agree is scarier than the humans.


Icemage

[Malacite]

Re: What games are you currently playing?

I find it far, far easier to sneak up on people actually. They don't take nearly as much ammo to kill, and they also don't auto-kill you if you're grabbed. Can't deny that enemies with guns is certainly a critical factor however - I took a shotgun blast earlier that just barely didn't kill me from full HP (with the 1st health upgrade to boot). Of course, I died right after that from a follow up hit but geez...


Again, I find hordes of zombies rather easy, especially if it's clickers - you'd be amazed how much damage you can do with a single molotov. Runners are another story, and I find are actually even more sensitive to approach than clickers which is quite honestly ridiculous as hell but I've managed so far. I'm almost done chapter 5 and while ammo and supplies have been practically non-existent, I've somehow managed to amass quite a stockpile of parts and supplements.


EDIT: To illustrate a point, right after the Church in Chapter 4, going through the graveyard there's a crapptone of clickers. I've actually managed to crouch up almost a foot beside them and not set them off - it's super ballsy and 1 screw up means insta-death, but it's doable. Can't get away with that kind of sneakiness against humans and especially not Runners or Stalkers = dear God I hate Stalkers... almost as much as I hate Bloaters, but there's only 5 of them in the game in total and you're only ever forced to fight 2 so they don't count.

They do take a metric F-tonne of ammo to drop on Survivor though, yeesh... Kinda wish they'd taken a page from Metro LL - I loved how Ranger Hardcore removed your HUD entirely and made resources much more scarce, but everything (including yourself) takes more damage. So while enemies could kill you much faster, they also died with far less effort which made combat much more fun and tactical. Though again, M:LL had border-line retarded AI with *extreme* tunnel vision, and as long as you weren't spotted, throwing knives were beyond OP.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: What games are you currently playing?

For some reason I started playing Resident Evil 3 the other day.

Either because I never actually played the whole thing and don't remember any of it beyond the first five minutes or because I know Capcom will never make RE like that again. It was one of the RE's I skipped for some reason. And I am a little bit burnt out on the RPG grind right now so there's also that. Might follow it up with Parasite Eve since I also never played that.

[Malacite]

Re: What games are you currently playing?

3 was my personal favorite out of the original 4 (1~3 + CV)

[Firewind]

Re: What games are you currently playing?

Seconded. Resident Evil 3, while a bit more "actiony" than the others (if only because there are more enemies and a way to craft more ammo if you need it), was the best in the series IMO.

[Malacite]

Re: What games are you currently playing?

It was largely Nemesis - just the ever-present fear of him, never knowing when he'd pop out.

Of course, all that went away after clearing the game, but that 1st playthrough was scary as hell - particularly the 2nd encounter with him, when you're exiting the RPD and he jumps in through the window with a god damn rocket launcher!

Tyrants are OP as it is, but a Tyrant armed with a RL? GTFO.


I also loved the ammo crafting. I always did my absolute best to save as much powder as possible so that I could craft the maximum amount of magnum bullets and then just blitz through the end segments - however that did actually require you "level up" Jill's skill by mixing powders multiple times. I forget the exact combination but I believe I basically just made as few 9mm as possible (I had the official strategy guide which helped me know when to stop at the time) until I could reliably get the maximum amount of magnum rounds per craft.


Even with max magnum rounds the final stretch was a bit of a doozy.

[Yellow Mage]

Re: What games are you currently playing?

Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale. On the morning of Day 25 right now; it's too frequently difficult to decide whether to stay in the shop and open for business or go outside and get more stock. This is one of those times, though I'm thinking that I'll start the day by opening up shop next time I start up the game.

I should be hopping back into FFXI for one more month here shortly, though. But I was wanting of a new, easy-going distraction, and Recettear has been waiting in my Steam library since at least last Winter.