Finished Axiom Verge. Loved the game! Got lost once, couldn’t figure out where to go, other than than didn’t have any issue.
Playing Regalia: Of Men and Monarch now. It’s a tactical RPG, kinda like Fire Emblem, but with a lot less serious tone.
One interesting aspect is that your whole team got experience, that is, there is no individual level, it’s connected with your whole party, so doesn’t matter which people you took in the combat and which stayed back. There’s also no perma-death. Dungeons are made of different “nodes”, combat nodes, quest node (text adventure) and camp node. You can go to camp node to revive anyone who has died in the dungeon, but you can only do it once per dungeon.
Other than dungeons there is a kingdom building and social aspect, you can spend time with people to raise your affinity, and get additional perks. Not a very deep system, but there are enough characters that it is going to take a bit of time to level up all relations.
I am still at chapter too, it’s probably going to take a few weeks to complete this one.
What about all of you? What have you been playing lately?
Finished Another Code: Recollection!
Early impressions in my previous post.
The first game is quite decent despite it’s age. It’s short and focused, and that works really well in its favor - there’s little downtime and filler, you’re almost all the time with just Ashley and “D” so it’ easier to get attached to them, the plot is simple but moves fast, you’re constantly finding new puzzles so you never get bored.
Now, the second game… well, that one is a mess. Too many characters for something this short, too much running around doing nothing, and too many irrelevant side-plots that keep messing the pace of the game. Also, I didn’t count them but I have a distinct impression that it has less puzzles than the first game despite being 1h longer - even if you’re nice enough to count the endless “door hacking” QTEs as “puzzles”.
It’s kinda weird how disconnected the first and second halves of the game feel, almost like completely different games. The first half starts with you running around getting involved into minor issues until settling into helping a boy called Matthew find out what happened with his father who disappeared 5 years ago. They clearly tried to give him an equivalent role to “D” in this game, but I don’t think it works very well because you simply don’t spend enough time with him to get equally attached.
Then on the second half Matthew leaves and the story becomes completely focused on Ashley’s family. Story-wise I like this part a lot more, but the gameplay takes a nosedive with the areas being increadibly boring, almost no puzzles and exploration - you’re pretty much just running forward doing QTEs and watching story sections with some rare breaks. All of this section feels rushed and unfinished.
Overall it took me around 5h for the first game and 6h for the second one.
Playing Crystar!
I enjoyed its “spiritual sequel” Crymachina quite a bit, so I decided to give this one a shot. And it’s kinda neat how different the two games play despite being games from the same developer with the same base idea for the gameplay loop.
Crymachina had faster-paced combat, and focused on smaller stages with less enemies on screen - but you had to be careful because enemies hit really hard and healing was quite limited. Crystar on the other hand has much slower-paced combat, bigger stages with a lot of enemies, but they are all individually weak mobs and only gets somewhat scary if you’re surrounded.
So far I’d say that I enjoyed Crymachina’s approach a lot more. The combat was more fun, and the shorter dungeons are (oddly enough) a positive - the long dungeons used in Crystar exacerbate a lot how repetitive the action sections are, and make the game kinda of a slog to go through.
I’m currently on Chapter 7, maybe I’ll be able to finish this one next week.
I didn’t expect you to play Crystar so soon. 😀
So, it seems they learned from Crystar and improved combat in the sequel, which means I should play the first one first.
Thanks for the review!
So, it seems they learned from Crystar and improved combat in the sequel
That’s my impression as well.
which means I should play the first one first
To be perfectly honest I’m not sure I’ll be recommending Crystar when I’m done with it.
I’m still playing Super Mario Wonder. Got it at the same time as I got busy with life stuff so I’m only now putting time into it. Super fun game.
Glad you are liking it. It generally get mixed reviews here.
Loop hero has been fun. It’s addictive in its loop structure lol.
I also picked up tinykin. It has very tight controls and I’m enjoying the paper Mario feel to the game.
Nice! Both of these are in my wishlist. Though with thousand year doors coming out this year, I think I won’t get to Tinykin anytime soon.
It was on humble bundle, but I hear you. I’m looking forward to getting pmtyd at the library.
Well, I just played through the first Paper Mario earlier this year, so 2 Paper Mario-ish games are more than enough for one year 😀
Have you played Bug Fables? That’s another Paper Mario-like game on my wishlist.
I have, its very good at that it sets out to do. The platforming could use a bit of work in some areas, but the battle system, story, and charm is all amazing. Love that game. I hope they make a second game!
Glad to hear that.
Apparently there next game isn’t a sequel, but they may return to it after that.
Ohh didn’t know! Thanks!
Huh, I never beat Axiom Verge.
But I played The Legend of Zelda and Super Mario Bros. on Nintendo Switch Online just now, and they were very enjoyable to me.
Now all I might need is an actual NES too.
I found the original The Legend of Zelda interesting, but difficult to beat without some help from the guide.
What are you thinking about playing next?
I was playing RDR2, but recently modded my Switch and have been focused on tinkering with the NSO apps, adding the games I think should be on there (and testing which ones work) including release dates and box art. Not the N64 ones, though - adding them is very complex and most don’t work. I think I’m close to being satisfied with what I’ve got and will probably resume RDR2 when I have time for long gameplay periods and will actually play the NSO games when I have less time.
