Blogging the experience of gameplayhttps://www.gamelog.cl/gamers/GamerPage.php?idgamer=1https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7919So after falling back in to Pokemon GO for a year (after 4 years of having quit) I decided to (after hitting level 42 in GO) bail and replace with another game. I had heard good things about the mobile version of the Pokemon TCG so I thought I'd give it a try. People say the game is quite generous (2 free packs a day!), and it is...but the game seems to already have so many cards that it feels like a real uphill battle to get to a collection that lets you put together a semi-decent competitive deck. Or maybe I'm just bad at deckbuilding (or the auto-deck generator is bad, lol, I've been using it as the basis of my decks - and then tweaking)? Either way it's been fun so far to explore this game - I'm mostly curious about the TCG because it is quite successful commercially, has an active competitive scene - and I wonder how much depth there is to it? (I think less than Magic, but there has to be at least enough to support a healthy competitive scene?) So far I'm not really all that impressed - I was playing ranked and when I played against people that had way bigger collections (and badges demonstrating prior experience in the competitive seasons) I'd get trounced by decks with cards I had no chance of getting (quickly/easily)/ I'd lose three or four matches in a row and then get matched against a player with a single "regular" sounding username (e.g. "Luke", "Cynthia") - and then I'd easily win. I'm pretty sure I'm getting matched against bots - which is a huge disappointment because from what I can see there's no disclaimer/information about that happening! To be clear this is on the next-to-bottom rung of the competitive ladder (A1?). The big buckets are Beginner, PokeBall, Great Ball, Ultra Ball and then Master Ball - and within these there are 4 ranks. I was at the bottom of PokeBall.. What's really weird (to me) is that the season ended and the game paused the competitive ranked matches for a few days! (while it "calculated" results) and then told me how I placed...and the competitive mode is still unavailable! I find this really surprising - and I guess this means that the game's primary mode of interaction is just the card collecting? There's a fun feature where you trade in cards you have dupes of to buy a cosmetic filter that's added to that card (similar to what Marvel Snap has - but here you have to buy the new look). There's also features for showcasing your cards and stuff like that, which really speaks to the collecting and sharing collection part of the game. Interesting! I think I'll keep playing - but now I'm curious if the TCG game is the same digitally as in person - or if it's been "simplified"...and I am getting better at playing the game as well. ;-)Thu, 26 Jun 2025 16:50:57 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7919&iddiary=13415https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7915I was telling a friend the other day that I've been playing this game with my kids at night - all co-op. And it's been fun, but I couldn't remember the name of the game because it was like all generic words like "Dwarf Space Mining" or something like that. I was sure it had dwarves and something mining related in the title. And I was wrong, but the title doesn't really evoke the dwarven parts of the game in the way I imagined. Weird how the game's title got so confused in my head. It's been fun mostly because we're playing co-op and one of us (not me) knows what we're supposed to be doing. At this point I think we're mostly going through the "tutorial" missions that each introduce a different mission type (get this ore, or get these eggs, or fix this thing, etc.). I wonder how much fun we'll have once we've "unlocked" them all? The game seems a bit grindy - you level up each character class, unlock perks, improve your gear, etc. And you have to do this separately for each class - which feels like it would get boring real fast (for me at least) and also means that I'm less likely to try out the other classes because...I don't want to have to "start over"... So far I've played the driller/digger and the engineer class. The engineer is interesting but strange because you lay these turrets that shoot - which means you're then mostly sticking around the turrets (so no exploring/mining) and the game does involve a lot of moving around - so I find I place turrets and then move them along with me (which works quite well - they just fly over and then you build them again). Mobility is a bit annoying - one of the dwarves has a grappling hook which is pretty sweet - but the other two have an ability (dig really fast or place outcroppings you can use as platforms) which is a lot slower and (IMO) interesting but also more boring given the general gameplay loop that tends to favor moving around (going deeper) and then moving back out (quickly, before you get left behind). So, it's fun, I'm enjoying it, but a lot of that fun-load is being borne by the co-op...Mon, 23 Jun 2025 14:02:49 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7915&iddiary=13410https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7914One of the benefits of playing old games I've been sitting on for a long time is that I know that I picked up the game for (usually) a good reason like "this game was well received or interesting for some reason" and, for some games, by the time I get around to playing it I don't recall exactly what those reasons were. To be fair I sometimes pick up random games because they're cheap and I haven't heard of them and they might be interesting. Anyways, what this means is that when I get around to playing them there's a bit of a discovery process for me which also includes recalling what it was that motivated me to get the game in the first place. So, Jedi Fallen order! I don't remember if this game is supposed to be "good" or what (it's sequel Jedi Survivor I remember as being well-regarded critically), so as I start playing I'm thinking ok - this is like an Uncharted game but it's Star Wars! (the initial scenes on a backwater planet in a giant spaceship junkyard where the work being done is stripping old (oftentimes giant!) spaceships... There's acrobatics, getting to places by jumping, climbing, swinging, and so on. There's also cut scenes without too much backstory. And it's all action-based..and feeling very much like Uncharted. Cool! But then, things "go bad" - the game takes place AFAIK between episode III and IV. So, Jedi are getting hunted down and my character has force skills! (which he's been keeping hidden). Oho no! Rapidly the bad guys (Imperial inquisitors!) show up and you have to escape. And here, mostly, in a high-stakes escape sequence (on a moving train! so, again reminded of Uncharted...but not in a bad way!) you're introduced to the different combat moves, and blocking, deflecting blaster shots (you have a lightsaber it turns out), using a force skill, etc. Ok, this still feels sort of like Uncharted - no shooting, but still action and set-piece oriented! Of course this is all the prelude - you escape...and cue more cutscenes and you meet some characters and end up on a planet where you're told to investigate (enter) an ancient Jedi vault or something like this. Ok, I got this! I start wandering around, meet a little robot guy, and waltz into a cave and this monster (with a large health bar) hits me twice and I'm dead. Oh. That was not like Uncharted - felt much more like, say, a souls-game. I might need to tune down the difficulty. And, of course, I'm not yet really accustomed to the controls and the moves, etc. (I'm also pretty bad at these games). Slowly, the game starts to open up, I learn there are skills to unlock, you need to level up, killing monsters helps with this, now I can heal (the little robot is your buddy and carries stimpacks). It's been an interesting introduction to the game - and it's a bit weird how some stuff opens up out of sequence for my exploring (I killed this monster - there was a chest, but I couldn't open it, I still don't really know why, it wasn't a bug though I was suspicious of that for a while because I did have the game crash on me once).... Anyways, I've finished my work on the planet (got into the vault) and I'm now on a "follow up on the leads" part of the adventure. Fun so far, but we'll see.Fri, 20 Jun 2025 14:51:01 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7914&iddiary=13409https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7900I've been enjoying this one so far (slightly over 17 hours of gameplay). At this point I think I've unlocked all the characters, I've also gotten to the "true ending" but I have yet to "beat a run" with all of the characters. As a deckbuilding rogue-like, of which there are many at this point, I've been enjoying the combo-firing aspects of this game. This is mostly in comparison to some of the other games - I find it easier/more common for you to create nice combos that fire off in satisfying ways (I still lose a fair amount though). All of the characters (9 is it?) play very differently from each other - to the point that I sometimes have to figure out how they work through multiple runs. I obviously have my favorites, and I'm not exactly sure that they're all equally balanced (they're probably not), but it's given the game more "legs" for me to be able to keep on playing. In a way, the game is cut from the mold of Slay the Spire - but they added more stuff (characters) and more pressure (time pressure within levels). Strangely the game's name is not really memorable to me and I keep on forgetting it.Mon, 16 Jun 2025 17:11:40 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7900&iddiary=13406https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7911I've accumulated too many PS4 games, so I've been trying to bring them off the pile of shame onto the "pile of played". So, I started this one...a few months(?) ago - but didn't get very far and was then unable to keep on playing. My first impressions from then was that this was really interesting, it would take me a while to learn the details of the stats and equipment and numbers and stuff, but that was ok, and that the world/setting seemed interesting and familiar...but in a way that didn't make it stand out or resonate. So, it's Fallout, but in space...but also on the ground. Oh, but this is now like Borderlands too. So, again from my limited time, I didn't feel like I had a strong sense of "wow, this is different and interesting". After starting it up and getting past the tutorially parts I had a clear sense of what to do - some missions to follow up on and so on. In this case, "you have a ship, but it's busted and you need to get a part to fix it" and a world to explore, places to visit, people and factions to learn about and interact with, and from all of this I expected to - eventually, many hours later, get the ship part and "leave this forsaken rock of a planet". Along the way I realized that I wasn't too much of a fan of the combat in the game - there's aiming and shooting, but there's also a lot of stats stuff happening and I found that I was dying really easily and quickly and wasn't sure what to do about it. Then several months of real world time passed...and I picked the game up again. To my surprise, the "get the ship part" turned out to be a lot quicker/shorter than I expected and within a few hours I was done with that and ready to leave into space where the game opened up with a space map, a new mission, and a general idea of "hey, there's so much more stuff for you to do now". All this while still having open quests back on the original planet! So, I played some more, did some more missions, moved things along and then...after a mission I kept dying on because "shooty-shooty not so good" I sat down and asked myself... do I really want to keep on playing? The answer was no, in part because I was a bit frustrated with this mission - but mostly because, I just wasn't engaged with the story or world - the things that were supposed to be funny, weren't (for me) because it felt a bit too...uh... familiar? (as in, I've heard those jokes about corporations that are dumb and have you do dumb stuff..and so on). I also realized that I might have to dig deeper into the crafting and gear stuff just to be better suited to handle combat, and...well, I couldn't be bothered really. So, I'm done. Not because the game was "bad", I just didn't really gel with it.Fri, 13 Jun 2025 14:16:48 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7911&iddiary=13404https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7827So I finished a full "run". It's weird to call it that even because it felt so much more involved than I would think of in the context of a "roguelike", which this game sort of is...but also isn't. I mean, there's lots in the game (including when you get to the end) that strongly suggests you want to play again, not just to get "different endings" or see "other paths through the story", but because there is a meta-campaign of sorts to explore/discover/investigate. I'm not sure I want to do that - mostly for time - because I really did have an interesting time with this game (it was a big surprise for me since I was expecting less, or at least not to find it as compelling as I did). Perhaps what I need to do is wait enough that I've forgotten a lot of the details of my 1st playthrough before playing again?Fri, 13 Jun 2025 14:00:32 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7827&iddiary=13403https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7892Finished it! I really enjoyed it if, at times, it started to get a bit too grindy/back-tracky, but perhaps the back tracking goes with the territory for the type of game? (what we'd now call a metroidvania). I've been thinking about it's place in these "top lists" of DS games you never heard about but should play and... well, I don't think the game is "OMG this is the best ever", but I DO think it's a game that deserves more attention than it got. So, in that sense it's place is worthy/meritorious...because, sure - it's a "typical" (which may not have been THAT typical when the game came out) metroidvania in many ways, but the two-screen use, your monster companion is really interesting and novel (then and now). So, mixed feelings - but also, I get the sense that the game aims at a younger demographic... The game isn't THAT hard (by this I mean, I was able to beat it, it took me a few tries in the end, but I would describe it as a high-challenge game) - but that's not a bad thing! (to be fair I did think the difficulty is somewhat uneven). Super glad I played it and, this is unusual as I make my way through my DS backlog, I stuck all the way to the end.Fri, 13 Jun 2025 13:57:12 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7892&iddiary=13402https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7909Ok, so I finished the first mission - that then opened the game to other deliveries! The ones that opened up later were much more of the fetch quest variety - take 2 feathers to Jim in town X and not "move the story forward" kind of missions. So, I happened to be able to easily do one (because I already had the materials)...and then, well, I've decided to put the game back on the shelf. It's just really slow! And the combat is not interesting at all and also really slow. You can't select whom to attack, and at best you may want to cast a healing spell now and then. But, even with my caster at level 10 I can only cast a few spells (and maybe the bigger ones twice) so...there's not much do engage with here. Sure, the game might open up more later in that sense (more party members?) but I'm almost three hours in and it was really feeling like a drag. I did find (by accident) some "secrets" while in the dungeon (where I had to fight some sasquatch who had stolen the original/first package I had to deliver). In their dungeon rooms there were tombs - and you could slide back some of the tombstones. In one of them I found a "bone sword" - which I thought was a weapon, but no. It's an item to sell (or perhaps use as part of a delivery quest?). The game's entire set of items and their role/function is really unusual - items weren't in the "categories" I thought they'd be, so I'd end up looking through all of them to swap for a better weapon and that sort of thing.Tue, 10 Jun 2025 12:24:35 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7909&iddiary=13400https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7909This looked to be a "generic" (as in, typical) JRPG game - wander around a map, fight monsters in a turn-based system, meet characters, learn about the story, etc. But, it's surprisingly obtuse..in ways I was not expecting... 1. There's the usual "make sure you talk to the correct person in the village" in order to unlock the next step in the story. (I wasted a lot of time doing what I thought I was supposed to - wandering the thieves forest, when I had to talk to a townperson who "unlocked" a rockfall to another area entirely... 2. There's two modes for combat - in one you get experience (and level up), in the other you get loot (no experience). It took me a while to understand what was going on - and a quick peek at the manual as well - you basically toggle between "virtue " and not - in the former you get experience, in the latter you just get items. I think it's an interesting idea - in theory - you decide whether you want to level up or accrue loot to sell to get better gear. I've mostly been going with the levelling up, but to be fair it's not clear to me if there's an optimal to pursue here (I'm also over-levelled because of the time I spent wandering in the forest). 3. The UI shows a list of boxes and I noticed they sometimes had red check marks - I thought it was connected to combat in virtue mode. Separately I found some blue chests I could not open, and wasn't sure if there was a glitch or what. Thanks to some internet sleuthing, it turns out you have to kill all the monsters in an area (each then adding a red check), on doing that you get a blue effect on the characters that then lets you open the blue chests. I might have figured that out eventually - the red check marks being the clue here. But, there's more... 4. You can dash - but I've only just realized that it costs hit points! I noticed after dashing around that eventually the characters just wouldn't dash anymore. I was confused...and then I was also weirded out by times I healed and then healed again (with effect) without there being combat. So I noticed that dashing cost health! I'm not sure how the cost is calculated - is it linear (to time spent dashing?) or not? The risk/reward consideration here is that walking is slow and the game gets a bit boring (again, I've spent too much time wandering in the woods, so perhaps it's my own fault?), so dashing is REALLY tempting... 5. The first time I went through the woods and got to the town at the other side I was almost out of HP, not MP left and could not find how/where to heal! Yeah, there's a statue in town you activate and it heals you - this might be a "Lunar series" staple that people would/should recognize if familiar with the series? (I was not) and I swear the first time I tried it didn't work - but that might have been a collision thing? So I wasted time wandering around the village trying to find "the inn" to rest or whatever. Overall, I'm not sure I'll keep playing - but I do want to finish the first mission (the game has framed itself as a "package delivery game" - but the first delivery has gone astray and it's taking a lot longer from what I thought it would... We'll see....Sun, 08 Jun 2025 13:25:20 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7909&iddiary=13399https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7908Hell of a long name for a game! According to Gameeye "Keroro Gunso the Super Movie: Gekishin Dragon Warriors de Arimasu!' is a game based on the 4th Keroro Gunso anime movie of the same title. That would explain the pretty cool anime intro movie that played... I wonder if there's a way to watch the movie now? I only picked up this game because it was cheap and it looked like I could play it despite having zero Japanese language skills. And, I could play it! And the gameplay-related text instructions I was able to figure out. Mostly. I think. I'd seen the character before - sort of a cute anime frog with a yellow hat/helmet and I recall the name being "Kero Kero Kero" but a few minutes on wikipedia has set me straight that the character is called "Keroro" so perhaps my understanding was from some other things? The show sounds like fun and I'm surprised it's never made it's way to the US. At least I think it hasn't? It seems like a funny action adventure kind of show... The game itself is a simple 2D platforming game with special abilities - that let you navigate the levels. There are several (6?) different characters - with levels being dedicated to each and they each have a different "attack" ability which you can also power up. It was fun, pretty polished, and with all kinds of things going on I have no idea what they were about. You collect gems and I think you unlock stuff? I was playing off the saved games on the cart which (all three!) had completed the game...and I was too lazy to see how to clear at least one so I could start fresh. But, no matter - I had fun anyways! (just went back to the first levels and did those from scratch).Sat, 07 Jun 2025 21:25:45 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=7908&iddiary=13398