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Jun 27th, 2022 at 15:28:08 - Astro's Playroom (PS5) |
I think that this game was described in its review in Edge magazine as the best Nintendo game not made by Nintendo that you'd assume was made by Nintendo. It's a really fitting description and, as I write this having unlocked all of the trophies for the game, I'm just a bit disappointed that it wasn't longer!
There's quite a bit for me to unpack and unwind from my experience so...
(a) Nostalgia
The game is littered with references, many overt others less so, to the Playstation as a brand and its history. In the game levels it is common to spot little robots recreating moments from famous Playstation games - sometimes with little costumes and all. I enjoyed seeing them, trying to identify some (when I wasn't sure what they were) and so on. The game also has a vault of artifacts you find and collect - and they're all Playstation-related (including PSP and Vita, of course). As I'm playing the game and collecting these I realized how intertwined my personal play experience is connected to the PlayStation. The PS1 was my first console (I had played on earlier ones, but never owned one or had access to in my home) and I've owned every single one since - not in all the different hardware models, but still. That's a lot of consoles (7 in total, including the handhelds) and I'm also pretty familiar with a lot of the games that came out for it. So, this really did feel like a trip down my own personal memory lane of games. I'm sure I missed lots of references, but it was fun to spot some of the more "obscure" ones? (Uncharted is easy, but Patapon less so...) It also made me realize how much I miss some of the important series that haven't seen releases recently - Wipeout being the standout example here. Each of the main areas ends with a level that plays the startup/system song/chime for each of the platforms - it's been years since I'd heard the PS2 and PS1 ones...sigh.
(b) Trophies
This is the first PS5-exclusive game I've played, so as I'm playing I'm also exploring and trying to understand the new menus/operation stuff for the console. So far the most striking novelty for me - and I'm not sure if this was just a Astro's Playroom thing or if other PS5 games will do the same - is the functionality for tracking and getting more information on game trophies! Hidden trophies remain hidden, with no way to track or anything, but for the others you can add them to a "task tracker" of sorts AND, read a short blurb with advice on how to get the trophy and, if you're interested, you can watch a short video of the trophy being obtained! I don't think this is a huge game changer, but it's definitely an interesting evolution in the meta-gaming aspects of trophies and all that stuff. Weirdly I haven't heard people talk too much about them recently - and while general chatter about "gamerscore" was a thing 5-6 years ago (perhaps more?), nowadays I haven't heard much at all. It's almost like trophies/achievements stopped being a thing? Nintendo/Switch does not have them (which I've always found curious, because clearly it's a choice they made to not have them), while the system in Steam is pretty wild west (in terms of inconsistency and so on). At this point I have a pretty respectable "score", but it's mostly from longevity - you sort of get there naturally if you play games and have been playing them consistently on PS3 (when trophies started for PS), PS Vita, PS4 and, now, PS5.
(c) Controller/Feedback
As I'd heard, this game really is a masterclass on haptic feedback - like, wow, really wow. It's not just the feedback - all the different kinds of rumble and so on (lots of really subtle options and uses, just in the game - walking on different surfaces felt brilliantly exectued - I could close my eyes and know it was wood, ice, glass, etc.) BUT, I was most surprised at how the controller can change how it feels to press the buttons - or at least the triggers - adding a little bit of resistance and the like - so the triggers feel smooth, bouncy, clicky, hard to press, etc. The gacha machine and the feeling of popping the capsule (or crushing the can, depending on what you pulled) was super... immersive? Verisimilitudinous? Not sure if that's a real world - but it felt realistic in a way I was not expecting (and I enjoyed playing around with it). I wonder if there's a PS5 devkit with demos for controller haptics? Would be SO GREAT to have in a haptics/game design class...just to show students what can be done!
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Jun 14th, 2022 at 16:45:48 - Noita (PC) |
I've been "studying up" on Rogue-like/lites and this game was on my list to check out. And...I feel like I'm not playing it right? Dying often is par for the course - no strangeness there - but I feel like I never get to make the most of the wands I get and that the options for mixing them up are super rare and not that interesting? I guess I was imagining that I would be stumbling into these wild combination of modifiers/powers that would be fun and interesting to mess around with but I've found that I end up sticking mostly to either the two wands I start with or some safe combination of those - so, the super wild ones tend not to be exciting or interesting to play because they're either super wonky and I can't rely on them to hit enemies or super dangerous - like I'll test fire one and it'll blow up in my face.
I've seen a few of the biomes, but not enough that I feel "wow, this is so cool and interesting" and I also never use the potions I find - first I'm unsure about the interface - I think I end up throwing them all instead of drinking them (I've assumed you can drink them), but I also find that throwing them is mostly a waste - like a flask with water is useful to clean up when I'm soaked in poison or whatever, but I can't use it quickly and safely enough for it to really help.
So, I'm enjoying the exploration, and I realize you need to have a fair amount of patience - but when I die it's super fast and feels a bit unfair. Maybe I'm not up for the reflexes part of the game?
The wand options and mixing is what I'm most interested in so perhaps I should just look at a guide/video to see what other people and that will show me a few things I haven't tried yet....
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Jun 12th, 2022 at 22:58:50 - Yeti Quest (DS) |
It's a German match-3 game!
Nothing super notable, but I was able to switch the language to French (there are three: german, dutch or french, which seems like an odd mix - no English?, but hey - I'm not really complaining.
Interesting things:
(1) It's a match-3 BUT at any time on a level you can switch between 3 modes for how you match!
(a) Swap and match
(b) Trace a line of connected tiles to match
(c) Tap on group of 3 tiles (that aren't in a line, but are connected) to match.
This seemed like too much of a gimmick - but I was surprised when I did clear a level by switching between mode (a) and (c) - so, when you're stuck sometimes, it can help.
(2) There are4 penguin characters that look suspiciously like the ones from the animated movie whose name currently escapes be about a bunch of animals that escape from a zoo - get to Africa and shenanigans. The penguins are like a crack team of commandos (in the movie). I think the penguins have powers on some levels - but it's all in French and I couldn't really understand what they triggered/allowed for.
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Jun 12th, 2022 at 22:53:52 - Nier: Automata (PS4) |
I kept on meaning to write about this game, but never did, and now I'm 27 hours in, have decided to put set it down, and want to see/read about the "true" ending from guides/youtube rather than spending another 30 hrs or so. It might be shorter? But who knows...
I almost didn't continue playing the game - this part partially my fault, but I'm glad I stuck with it. When you start the game there some cutscenes but also warnings that the game does not auto-save and that you'll learn how to save in the game itself, later on. You can only save after about 45 minutes of playing...and of course, I died the first time about 40 minutes in. And realized I'd have to play it all over again and was...not happy. Then I started again, and tried to rush through, and died again (but sooner). So, again, not happy.
Then I realized that the dodge/dash button is critical/crucial - and that I would have to practice using it while I attacked, and that made a really big difference and I was able to get to the point where you could save. And wow, I'm glad I did.
The game is, reasonably, and open world 3rd person action game - with lots of RPG-style progression (upgrades, weapons, etc.)but it's got some weird extra things:
(1) In some areas/places the game goes "platformer linear" - the camera shifts to a side view and you can only move along two axes (jump + left/right) - there are even areas with jumping puzzles or combat that's a bit tricky because enemies are coming at your from to sides and you can strafe/kite then around as easily as you do in the open areas. At other times the camera shifts to a top-down view...
(2) Twin-stick shooter games (hacking) - I didn't really understand this until I finished the game the first time (with 2B) and started playing with 9S - you can hack robots by attacking with with the triangle button (which I thought was the heavy attack), and if you land enough hits you "enter" the robot and play a twin stick shooter game where you need to destroy a core - and then the robot is destroyed. You get XP for the hack and then for the kill. This mode of the game only happened occasionally with 2B - but with 9S being a scanner (not combat) android, I guess this makes sense?
(3) There's a fishing game. I never played it, but I think you can catch fish and sell them or something.
(4) 2D shooter games! Sometimes you're flying around in this sort of mecha-wing suit - and it's like a 2D space shooter game! (with a combination of both "Straight" shooting and twin stick shooting - when you're in either plane mode or mecha mode. The game switches automatically, so you can't decide.
The game is "wonky" in many ways - I was often with a companion (either 9S or 2B) who would often just teleport to be where I was going, would fall of ledges and stuff like that. In combat however the companion was pretty useful!
Another cool thing - there's a "online mode" where you can run across bodies of dead YorHa members (other players), you can revive them (so serve as an AI companion - but I think you can only have one, so there wasn't much point to that in my playing) or to recover them - it's an instant heal plus some buffs. The buffs are sort of randomly generated? (or perhaps based on whatever equipment the dead player had?) I like this system and, when you die you get to leave a message for others to read - you can't write whatever, but it's a sort of multiple choice ad-libs system that is designed (I think) for you to leave poetic/cryptic messages.
Oh, if you die - you lose all your upgrades (chips) that you cannot get back until you get to where your body is and retrieve it. Very souls-like, and I only failed to recover everything once (when escaping the factory section at the very end - much frustration!).
I really liked the chip system - they're basically buffs you can install - there are attack ones, defense, xp-related, item drops and so on. I played with mostly defensive and XP ones - and I was surprised that I kept all the inventory and XP when I started the game the 2nd time!
The game has 26 endings! (all tracked/noted as part of your save file information) and I unlocked very few of them. They're all indicated by a letter:
A: First playthrough ending with 2B.
H: Got it my mistake when I left the area instead of going to fight the Goliath.
W: Died in the first mission before getting a chance to save. Oops.
T: Removed the OS chip. The game says you'll die - but I wanted to see what happened anyways.
I think I got one more, but don't remember it exactly.
The game also has some pretty epic boss battles! Once I'd gotten into things and realized the importance of dodging AND that I could always fire with my pod companion, that made things a lot easier. I just needed to have patience and time my attacks just right. I was also loaded up with chips that let me heal automatically (at a set rate) if I was not taking damage - so keeping my distance, waiting to heal, firing with the pod (for very limited damage) worked quite well for me in pretty much all the boss battles.
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