What game are you playing right now?

[sumwhatkrazy]

This was one of my favorite RPGS I played in a long time.. I got really hooked on the crafting and I loved the story.. Sorta sad I sold it a while back.. Think I might go pick it up again sometime soon since its been a few years since I played through it last.. And I think theres a NG+.



Yeah i loved SO2 but i couldnt beat the end boss.... and i loved SO3 was really hooked on that and spent like 120 hours on it.
I played part 4 for almost 5 hours last night so i was feeling a bit hooked. Probably wont have time to play it for a couple days though^^;

[Gibb]

Not sure why, but last night I spent about an hour getting The Witcher II (PC) updated from version 1.0 to version 2.1 so I could try playing it again as the "Enhanced Edition." I say "not sure why" because Resident Evil Revelations comes out tomorrow, so I don't have much time to invest in a game I'll likely stop playing shortly.

Anyway, I'm still trying to play Suikoden DS, but that'll also stop once RE:REV comes out. Suikoden DS is pretty good, but the battles are way too frequent, which makes exploring a real chore. I'm getting to the point where I'm just running away from most of the battles I get into cause I just want to see what happens next in the story. The way the leveling system works, skipping battles doesn't really make much of a difference anyway, cause it's really easy to get back up to whatever level the game wants you to be at for a specific battle.

Oh and I reinstalled Diablo II last night because I wanted to compare the difficulty between that game and the Diablo III Beta. The DIII beta is so ridiculously easy, that I can go through the entire first act without using a health potion, but in Diablo II I get a run for my money with some of the lesser unique monsters like Coldcrow and Bishiboshi. In fact, both of those enemies are more difficult than every enemy in the Diablo III beta so far.

[MechaFan]

Oh and I reinstalled Diablo II last night because I wanted to compare the difficulty between that game and the Diablo III Beta. The DIII beta is so ridiculously easy, that I can go through the entire first act without using a health potion, but in Diablo II I get a run for my money with some of the lesser unique monsters like Coldcrow and Bishiboshi. In fact, both of those enemies are more difficult than every enemy in the Diablo III beta so far.

This is pretty much what these types of games have came down too lol.. I remember the first unique in the cave outside of town (might even be coldcrow lol think the name changed each time though) whoopin my butt everytime.. And beating any of the bosses required a full party until you MF'd up some very good gear and equipped an enigma armor lol..

MMO's just arn't very "hard" anymore.. I died more on AION then any other MMO i've played since.. And in SWTOR theres not even a death penalty besides like 1k gold for repairing you're gear lol..


I hope D3 brings back hardcore mode and then disables the cash auctions in it.. Then i'd be interested lol

[Gibb]

This is pretty much what these types of games have came down too lol.. I remember the first unique in the cave outside of town (might even be coldcrow lol think the name changed each time though) whoopin my butt everytime.. And beating any of the bosses required a full party until you MF'd up some very good gear and equipped an enigma armor lol..

MMO's just arn't very "hard" anymore.. I died more on AION then any other MMO i've played since.. And in SWTOR theres not even a death penalty besides like 1k gold for repairing you're gear lol..


I hope D3 brings back hardcore mode and then disables the cash auctions in it.. Then i'd be interested lol
Well Diablo II had a couple different types of boss characters. It had random ones that had names like "Puke Gorge" or similar, and they would show up in various spots completely randomly. They also had unique monster mini-bosses like Corpsefire (the zombie boss in the Den of Evil) and Coldcrow (the cold enchanted dark hunter archer chick in "The Cave, Lvl 1").

Diablo III has the same thing going on, with both random mini bosses and unique mini bosses. It also has rare and legendary bosses (presumably both random and set ones). Also, there is hardcode mode already in the beta, so your wish appears to be coming true. I hate the idea of hardcode mode tho, cause 95% of the time my deaths are related to lag, and I'd hate to lose days of playing a character because my roommate decided to watch a movie on netflix.

[MechaFan]

Diablo III has the same thing going on, with both random mini bosses and unique mini bosses. It also has rare and legendary bosses (presumably both random and set ones). Also, there is hardcode mode already in the beta, so your wish appears to be coming true. I hate the idea of hardcode mode tho, cause 95% of the time my deaths are related to lag, and I'd hate to lose days of playing a character because my roommate decided to watch a movie on netflix.

Haha.. I lost 90% of my hardcore characters to lag or TPPK.. I already know their getting rid of town portals so that fixes half the problem.. Now if they announce Hardcore mode won't allow the cash auctions then I'd be first in line.. Hopefully they boost up the difficultie in D3's hardcore mode; i know they didn't in D2 but thats because the game was hard enough.. Half the fun of HC mode is knowing you can lose you're character at anytime to other mobs..

I mean, even on my pimped out cold sphere enigma sorc with all 40+ lifers and 7/20 charms would still die if I got myself cornered somewhere on my way to baal lol.

[Jon]

All this talk Diablo...anyone wanna start a new AN D2 group?

[MechaFan]

I'd be down when/if they reset the ladder again.. I always thought the day of/week of the ladder resets were the funnest because no High runes are duped yet and its a race to build up your first pvp character and stuff.. Find out when the next ladder reset is and if its soon then I'm more then down lol..

I could always sale all my NL stuff for FG on d2jsp and use that to buy me some good ladder items.. :)

[Vaikyuko]

I found my DII discs again, so I wouldn't mind lagging you all out with ridiculous amounts of summoned hordes. JUST CALL ME THE NECBROMANCER

[Gibb]

I found my DII discs again, so I wouldn't mind lagging you all out with ridiculous amounts of summoned hordes. JUST CALL ME THE NECBROMANCER
You do realize you can enter your DII CDKey into your battle.net account and unlock a digital download version of the game? It's extra handy because you don't need to mess with the 4 separate discs (+1 for the expansion), and you don't have to patch anything.

As for playing with you guys, are the servers even still working? I tried US West and US East and neither one worked a few days ago. Do you have to use Open or whatever it's called?

[Holy Knight]

An AN DII party, eh? Don't they never get off the ground? :P

I kid, I'd be down... In two weeks. Too much stuff going on atm. You guys start without me, I can just rush and be like lvl80 in two days, lol.

[MechaFan]

If we are going NL then I already have accounts full of stuff lol.. Especially since I heard they unbanned accounts/characters now..

As for weather the servers are still up IDK.. I'm asumeing so since there were still trades going down on d2jsp.com's ladder section last time I checked a few weeks back..

Still I don't think the games any fun anymore unless its right after a ladder reset.. That way theres no buddy getting rushed and no huge mass dupes.. But idk weather Blizz even resets ladder anymore.

[Gibb]

I would say I'd be down to join you guys, but Revelations comes out today, and it'll be sucking away most of my time, at least for the next few days I would think. Then Tales of Abyss comes out next Tuesday. (Good month for 3DS games)

If you guys do start something up, post a separate DII thread rather than cluttering up this thread with a ton of DII posts.

[Vaikyuko]

^Will do, boss.

And thanks for the heads up on the digital download thing. I knew they took away the necessity to have the disc in the drive but I didn't know they took away the necessity to even have the discs. :lol:

[xLadyLunax]

I'm in the middle of replaying Dragon Age Origins.. everytime I play this game I fall in love with it all over again ^^

[Gibb]

I'm in the middle of replaying Dragon Age Origins.. everytime I play this game I fall in love with it all over again ^^
Interesting, I had the exact opposite reaction. I loved the game as I played through it the first time, but when I restarted the game it completely lost its appeal almost, immediately. I hated that all the enemies and items were in the exact same spot, so almost nothing about the game was random. I guess I'm just a sucker for games like Diablo where you open a chest not knowing what's inside.

[cris]

Gravity Daze, fuuuun
Tales of Innocence R it actually plays better, not just graphical update

[sfried]

Finished Resident Evil Revelations. Just in time for Rhythm Heaven Fever.

[Toravisu]

Parasite Eve from PS3 PSN

Great game, reminds me of the ff series

[Shining Heresy]

Been playing Sakura Taisen for the last couple days. Figured I might as well make use of my modded Sega Saturn.

[MirKz]

I've got too many on the go :(

3DS:
The World Ends With You -Only up to the sixth day in with Shiki or whatever her name is.
Pokemon Black
Final Fantasy IV - I've not technically started this, I loaded it up the other night for 5 mins but didn't get right into it yet because I've been waiting for a time where I have plenty of time and motivation to get into it.

PC:
Bioshock 2 - Just started it this morning, looks nice, it's pretty identical to the last game so far, although it seems to have started almost where the previous one left off.
Minecraft - I'm very addicted to this... I need to back off a bit to put more time in elsewhere :P

PS3 -
Final Fantasy XIII-2 - Yet to start, but should be getting into it today or tomorrow.

[MechaFan]

Heres what I been up too latley -

Mass Effect 1 -
Working on a new playthrough as a bad-*** renegade femshep on insanity.. I love how I've played this game 5+ times all the way through yet I still find out new stuff and new ways around situations.. Like on Noveria theres so many different ways to get that garage pass.. I can blackmail Opold for smuggleing (i didn't I just took his package and sold it to his client cutting him out the deal), I can blackmail Anderolis for takeing kick backs (which eventually leads to his death and is the funniest way IMO), or I can give Lorik Qin the evidence and get his garage pass.. Im sure theres other ways but its amazing how much choice you get.

Mass Effect 2 -
I'm on some of the last missions for one of my playthroughs as a paragon shepard so I been slowly chipping away at this one too so when ME3 rolls around I can have a fresh paragon playthrough to go off of also.

Star Wars: The Old Republic -
Hit 50 and just been PvPing for my battlemaster gear.. Had a good time with my guild on Ilum last night defending off our bases and shooting down their walkers.. I'm so addicted to the warzones and world pvp in this game I havn't even done any of the hardmode flashpoints, nor do I really plan too atleast until im in full battlemaster gear first.

[Vaikyuko]

Right now, working on several, namely...

Alan Wake: I haven't actually started this, but I'm looking forward to it. Got it gifted to me the day of release. Thanks, you gifty person you. :P

Battlefield 3: Almost to rank 32, which is when I unlock what will hopefully be my ideal gun, the futuristic PDW-R (a real life gun which, I believe, is being developed and is only available in limited test form). Enjoying it a lot more now that I have unlocks and teams that aren't necessarily dumb.

Puzzle Agent 2: Continuing the story of Scoggins from the first game. Interesting and inventive, though I wish it had a bit more of the "horror" angle the first game had. The puzzles, however, are significantly better in style and explaining themselves (in the first game, some of the rules weren't clear and there wasn't a "preview puzzle" option so you sometimes got things wrong because there wasn't enough information...and to make it worse, sometimes hints just clarified the rules!).

[ryushe]

Dabbling with a few titles here and there, but mostly:

Resident Evil: Revelations (3DS)

- Game's good. Hard, but really good.

Tales of the Abyss (3DS)

- Man is the worldly lore in this game confusing. With all its talk of "Verses", "Fonnon's", "Hyperresonance", etc. It feels like I'm playing FFXIII all over again - only without a codex, making it harder to dissect.

I do like it though, because it makes its world feel as if it were alive before I chose "new game"... if that makes sense. The main character - Luke - also helps in that he doesn't have his memories from when he was younger, on top of him being extremely ignorant of the world outside of his cushy life growing up in a manor. It makes them explaining the rules of the world, the factions that reign over it and the terminology of everything not feel so undermined to the player as result.

Oh, and Luke better get better as a lead (as I'm sure he will), because man, oh man, he is making me want to punch my 3DS right in the face! Still though, I respect and have to give credit to the tales team in making such an unlikeable lead. That's really ballsy, I think.

Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning (360)

- I don't know how I feel about this game yet. Like Tales of the Abyss, the lore in the world is freaking huge, and it does an ample enough job of familiarizing itself to you. Its main character is also a blank canvas, so like TotA again, it theoretically makes explaining everything to you [the player] not feel so rote...

Unfortunately, it still does become rote since everyone (so far) goes the extra step to explain to you why things are the way they are. Also, while the gameplay is really fun, there's no real sense of character, mostly because you can switch how you play with no consequence whatsoever. It's both freeing and damning that there isn't a hard lock as to who you can play as.

Need some Magic? Switch to a staff and your good to go. Melee? "Where's those swords at?" Rouge? "Daggers to back? Don't mind if I do!" It's all so inconsequential, it ends up becoming blasé in the process.

I'll see how I feel about it once I pour more points into the systems and skills I want for 'my' character.

Mass Effect 2 (360) [replay]

- Didn't start yet, most likely later today. Gotta' make some battle preparations before I do, but I plan on playing through the game on insanity + all of the DLC that came out after the game.

This'll be fun... maybe.

[Siendra]

Uncharted: Golden Abyss: The aim mechanics could use some tweaking, and the whole camera thing is just stupid and annoying. Still, it looks pretty good, sounds better, and is legitimately fun. And reasonably long too.

[Gibb]

Been playing a good amount of Uncharted: Golden Abyss as well as Lumines Electronic Symphony.

[Holy Knight]

An AN DII party, eh? Don't they never get off the ground? :P

So... *Coughs*

'bout that party...

[Gibb]

Now that I've finished Uncharted: Golden Abyss, and played a ton of Lumines Electronic Symphony and got tired of how unlike Pangya Hot Shots Golf Vita is, I picked up my 3DS again to keep playing Suikoden DS.

I'm 16 hours into the game now, so I don't want to quit just yet. I finally got to the point where they put up the big 108 stars stone slab in my castle, so I at least have a goal to shoot for to fill it up. I don't seem to have barely any characters tho, which seems odd for being 16 hours into the game. I suppose I'll start collecting them by the tons pretty soon.

[Nano]

Mass Effect, could of finished it much faster if I had wanted to, 17 hours in had been on insanity when I loaded the save but I couldn't be bothered doing that so I switched it to Veteran.

I'm mostly playing through ME2 all in time for ME3, but I have been switching over to Tenchu Z.
There aren't enough ninja games in the world.

[Lacan]

I'm playing Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 for ps3 to prepare for Ninja Gaiden 3 next month. I also played a little bit of Ninja Gaiden II for the 360 to check out the differences between the regular II version and the Sigma 2 version.

[Daichi]

Star Wars Battlefront and Red Faction. Some of us still have a PS2.

[Gibb]

I finally got my hands on a rental copy of Twisted Metal (PS3) and played it for a good 5 or 6 hours last night.

When I was reading up on this game before it came out, I was confused by the supposed lack of character, cause it looked like only Sweet Tooth, Dollface, Mr. Grimm, and Calypso were in it. "Surely, it doesn't just have 4 characters!?" I thought. Actually, it does only have 4 characters... BUT those 4 characters can drive any of the cars that you're used to seeing in the old games.

For the first couple levels there are only a couple of cars available, Death Warrant, Sweet Tooth, Kamikaze, Road Boat, and Junkyard Dog I think. As you play through the story you unlock Reaper, Shadow, Roadkill, Vermin, Warthog, Juggernaut, Talon, and others. It's kind of weird the drivers of these cars aren't around anymore, but I suppose it's good the cars are still in the game.

Most of the levels let you use 3 cars (you can swap them out at a Garage if your health is getting low), and I mainly use Talon, Sweet Tooth, and Death Warrant to have a health mix of car types. Talon is a helicopter, which is incredibly fun to play as, but has low armor and is very easily targeted by other cars. Talon seems a bit cheap tho, as it's really easy to pick up the special items around the map, especially the "better" ones that are harder to get to for cars, as they require hitting jumps or getting on top of buildings. Sweet Tooth is a monster still, who can take a lot of damage, and deal a lot as well. He's slow, but that doesn't matter for most of the levels.

Right now I think I may have hit a wall in the storyline tho, as I'm at a level right now that seems ridiculously hard to beat. You basically have to finish a race before everybody else, but the race requires you to hit check points every 200 yards or so, and they're in buildings that require you to make these really difficult precision jumps, and if you miss a single one, you fall 8 stories to the ground, taking you out of the race completely. Most of the cars can make the jumps, and the cars that can are so fast and hard to control that if you're off by 2 degrees on a jump, you'll miss it, and if you try to spend time positioning your jump, you'll get attacked by the 8 cars behind you, knocking you off the building or killing you outright.

Aside from some frustrating stages, the game is quite cool so far. It also has a bunch of live action grindhouse styled film clips showing the stories of the 4 main characters.

Btw: swapping out the default Twisted Metal soundtrack with the "Infamous 2 Red Soundtrack" was one of the best decisions I've made recently. The Twisted Metal soundtrack is pretty awful, full of a bunch of bad rap and heavy rock music that is really distracting. The Infamous 2 OST however fits the game quite nicely.

[Mickeymac92]

I found Rune Factory: Tides of Destiny at the Library, so I picked it up. Some guys on another forum played it as their first RF game and loved it, so I figured it might be worth at least a free rental. I played some last night and so far it's...okay. It's colorful, the characters are charming, and the music is great. I'm new to the gameplay, but the game has been pretty good at teaching me what to do so far. I've explored my first island, beat the first mini-boss and got a half-dozen pets. I haven't gotten to the farming yet, though. In fact, I don't even understand how it's supposed to work in a seaside environment.

Still, despite being my first Rune Factory game, and even my first time playing the game, it already has some rather glaring issues. The story is outright bad. Two people walk into a random spark of light and now one of them is trapped inside the other. It doesn't make sense, and it seems to get worse as it goes, with time travel, a random golem who pulls wholly formed and furnished islands from the bottom of the sea, and some useless pirates who appear out of nowhere to attack me for some treasure I don't even want. Then theres the voice acting, which is also pretty bad. It's barely tolerable, and I almost shut the game off right away when I found out I couldn't switch the language to Japanese. I'm a dub fan who's been putting up with bad voice acting since the 90's and I still can barely take this. Also, some of the characters are downright weird. While that sometimes adds to their charm, usually its just off-putting. And I'm talking subtle weird, like something's unnatural about them. Some of them are unusually generous and understanding, for instance. Most react rather calmly to the main characters' situation, and they all believe it upfront despite the how absurd it is. Next, there's the AI. I took on a partner after my first encounter, and he was pretty much useless. He walked around aimlessly, barely doing anything, and I lost him halfway through the tiny island I was conquering just fine on my own. The combat also feels rather hard to handle, made worse by the wonky camera that I have very little control over. Maybe it's just the weapon I'm using, though, and I'm sure if I was playing with the classic controller, I'd have no problem with the camera. Too bad this game doesn't have that option.

Err...sorry for the wall of text, but I think it speaks wonders that I can talk so much about this games problems after only 4 hours of play. From what I understand, it doesn't get any better, but at the very least the other games in the series are far better. Again, I'm glad I'm playing this for free, and now I can pick up its predecessor, Rune Factory Frontier, without fear. I am enjoying the basic gameplay after all.

[Spike]

Darksiders and that game is just awesome!

[Gibb]

Asura's Wrath (PS3)

I decided to snag a game pass from Blockbuster, as there are a few games I want to rent right now, as well as some more coming out this month. I snagged Asura's Wrath first, as it looked like an interesting "rental" type game. I put a good 5 hours into it last night, and it's pretty cool. The story is pretty cool, tho the dialog and yelling are pretty tough to watch sometimes. The battle system (when the game actually lets you play) is pretty decent. The rest of the game is a giant cut scene with quick time events, so if you don't like QTEs, avoid this game.

Pros:
+ over the top action sequences that feel like they're right out of an anime or epic action film
+ awesome soundtrack
+ pretty cool boss fights
+ decent story

Cons:
- far too much yelling/teeth grinding
- they changed the lipsynch to match the horrible English dub, so playing the game with Japanese voice acting looks like you're watching a badly dubbed Chinese movie.
- annoying QTEs during cut scenes
- too many non-labeled flashbacks make you feel completely lost for a couple of minutes

That being said, I'm enjoying the game quite a bit, and I have a feeling I'll be able to finish it tonight and take it back to Blockbuster to snag the new SSX. ^__^ If I can find the OST for Asura's Wrath, I will likely buy it.

[Shadow Raven.]

Mass Effect 3 - PS3

[Gibb]

Played Journey for about an hour last night (got home really late), and it's really cool. I ended up co-oping with some guy for part of it because of the cool way it does multi-player.

[MechaFan]

Playing Mass Effect 3 right now.. I had marathoned ME1+2 these past 2 weeks, put about 27hours into ME1 and then 35hours into ME2.. I finished ME2's suicide mission (along with all the others) a hour before Mass Effect 3's midnight launch.. That way I've got all the codexs, missions, ect fresh in my mind before I sink my teeth into ME3..

Well, that was a few days ago.. Now im 15hours into ME3 and havin' a good time.. Just.. It feels a little "rushed", it dosn't have that complete rushed feeling like Dragon Age 2 but it still is sorta giving a "New Vegas" type rush-vibe for me.. Characters glitch up in conversations (I had shepards head roll around on his shoulders a few times or stare off into space during a more serious conversation), the level designs seem a lot more smaller, clicking on objects requires you to be right next to them so no longer can you do a 360 pan around each room to find its goodies, and the art style takes some getting used too.. I really wish they would've stuck with ME2's art-style.. But worse of all the freaking Journal is atrocious! Why would they mess with something that was so perfectly done in ME2? It seriously needs a secondary journal + it needs to update itself so you know when you need to turn a quest in.

Besides those few complaints the game is really good and I feel very emotionally invested into my Commander Shepard.. I can't wait to see how things end up for him.


Omg the reaper being taken down by the thresher maw is probably one of the most epic scenes I've ever seen in a video game.

[ryushe]

Played Journey for about an hour last night (got home really late), and it's really cool. I ended up co-oping with some guy for part of it because of the cool way it does multi-player.I should've and wish I told you this earlier, but you should've dedicated some time to play this game in one sitting (It's really not long, about 2 hours, if that), with your best pair of gaming headphones on, totally devoid of the world outside for that time.

I ended up playing that way and found myself co-opting it with some person maybe about 20 minutes in and we both ended up going through and finishing our "journey" together, which was utterly breathtaking, poignant and touching and to be completely honest with you, kind of emotional at many points of the game, especially in its climax. Whats amazing is knowing that you're on an adventure with what is ostensibly a stranger and end up emotionally attached towards that person even though there's no communication of any sort.

It's the reason why I wished you finished it in one go, because by the games ending and given you have a good partner, that experience is unparalleled with anything I've ever done where gaming or pretty much anything else is concerned.

[Shadow Raven.]

Street Fighter X Tekken - PS3

[Gibb]

Put 4 hours or so into Mass Effect 3 (360).

To be honest I'm not all that impressed. Maybe I'm just spoiled by other AAA high budget games, but this one just seems lacking in a lot of areas. It feels rushed, like a lot of other people have said, and the whole end of the world yet let me take the time to do all these goofy fetch quests concept isn't sitting well with me.

That being said, there are some good things about the game. The combat is pretty solid, and the characters are pretty cool.

I really like (slight character spoiler)
EDI's new look ^___^

[Melion]

I really like (slight character spoiler)
EDI's new look ^___^

Enjoy her Cameltoe

[Vaikyuko]

I've been playing Alan Wake. I'm in episode 5 at the moment and will likely end up beating it today. General thoughts:

Surprisingly well written so far if they keep it up, though there's moments it's a bit tacky (usually in some of the manuscript pieces which just need a better editor). The gameplay, on the other hand, is...argh. I want to like it but a lot of it is badly designed. Maybe it's more responsive or better on a controller (I'm playing the Steam version) but Alan controls like a drunk, cinematic dodges are annoying as hell to actually pull off because there's no rebind for them and default is Shift + any move key (WHAT!?), and the Taken seem to ignore flashlights half the time, which forces you to rely on those crappy dodges. I've also died twice, I think, due to Alan jumping off a ledge when I'm telling him to jump straight up onto the next object he needs to hurdle. It's...exasperating.

Also, the birds. What's with the birds and the ooze? Did they throw those in just to ape Stephen King a bit more? They have no real plot purpose as far as I can tell and only serve as nuisances. Everything else in the plot (except Nightingale who is a complete "wait, what?") is logically explained. Granted I haven't finished it, but still.

[ryushe]

Surprisingly well written so far if they keep it up, though there's moments it's a bit tacky (usually in some of the manuscript pieces which just need a better editor).I don't know if intended or not, but I personally took the game being overly curt in the quality of writing present in those manuscript pages as intentional. Reason being, Alan, from what I gathered while playing the game, is a B rate writer -- the likes of which works you'd see at airports or at the checkout line at the local supermarket, so It'd make sense that the game would show his level of writing to the player, through the manuscripts.

This notion is brought further home because, as you've said already, the writing outside of the manuscript pages is fantastic, so there's a clear as day disconnect with the way the story is being told and then what is told to you about the story via the manuscripts. I might be giving the game too much credit but I at least thought it was indeed intentional and brilliantly done.

[Gibb]

Played a couple more hours of ME3 last night and I'm done. It's getting boring, and right now it just feels like I'm going on one cameo trip after another. Going across the galaxy to talk to an old friend and catch up, then fly back seems kind of pointless in the whole "world is ending soon" scheme of things. I don't think people who missed ME1 and 2 would get much out of this either. I'm also hating the character animations with a passion (it's as if every character has the same mocap actor, and it was a large beefy man), and the way female Shephard sounds like a T-Rex when she walks around.

[Vaikyuko]

I don't know if intended or not, but I personally took the game being overly curt in the quality of writing present in those manuscript pages as intentional. Reason being, Alan, from what I gathered while playing the game, is a B rate writer -- the likes of which works you'd see at airports or at the checkout line at the local supermarket, so It'd make sense that the game would show his level of writing to the player, through the manuscripts.

This notion is brought further home because, as you've said already, the writing outside of the manuscript pages is fantastic, so there's a clear as day disconnect with the way the story is being told and then what is told to you about the story via the manuscripts. I might be giving the game too much credit but I at least thought it was indeed intentional and brilliantly done.

Yeah, it occurred to me that might be the problem. The "curt" tone you're talking about is actually good writing though. It's good to be concise. The excessive metaphors, adjectives, and adverbs, on the other hand? Not good writing, but also a staple of many "standard" fiction authors. Whether intended or not I couldn't say. The writing on "sentence" level was pretty alright, not especially amazing or especially bad, just alright to me. Most of it seemed like exposition in dialogue with an exceptional lack of enthusiasm on the part of some of the cast members (THE SHERIFF WHY IS SHE SO DAMN WEIRD WITH ALL HER LINE DELIVERY).

I beat it today and it's got one of the best written stories in gaming in a while, though, so the plot writing is very nice indeed. There's only a handful of loose ends (the opening line from the tutorial, near the end, talking about the port and oceans, Nightingale and his motivations, and the mysterious "Emil") and those don't factor in too heavily. It was pretty alright. Too bad the gameplay aspects were so clunky as to be annoying sometimes. :P

[earsofdoom]

Edi's look is basically what the 70's thought a sex bot would look like, if you think doing all the running around is bad just wait till you get near the end, you'll find out every quest you did was completely pointless. (the game itself actually kinda makes everything that happened in ME2 pointless, because of poor writing everyone pretty much did nothing while you delay the reaper invasion for like a 6 years.)

gameplay wise the game is decent but mostly just copy/paste from ME2, seriously they could have added a physics engine so your biotic powers can do stuff like move cover, (being able to set down a singularity and then throw grenades into it woulda been cool.) improve the targeting system so it doesn't switch over to other dudes when you try to angle a power to curve around a corner, etc but instead all they did was give you a heavy melee attack.

[MechaFan]

I think its safe to say ME3 could've used another few months of developement.. I don't know how much they tested the game but theres defiantly a lot of basic things they are over-looking..

With that said I'm digging the storyline, Gibb is right a lot of it ends up being cliched since they try to throw in cameos left in right but I thought Jacks + Grunts were done rather well.. Grunt especially has a bad *** scene..

I think it helps that I just recently played through ME1+2 so I'm getting a lot out of the codexs and story.. I just hope the ending is done well and we get some answers, theres still too many plot holes to fill and I know i'm more then half way through.


I also think its funny that almost all of my friends list is playing ME3 but they are all playing multiplayer and none of them have previously played ME1 or 2 lol.. Maybe adding that multiplayer really did boost up the sales.

[Tonyx35]

On the topic of Mass Effect 3 does anyone here have a general strategy when using a Shotgun? What situations would they be useful. Is it worth upgrading or modding?

My current load out is Sniper Rifle, SMG and Pistol.

[Tidusauron12]

Final Fantasy X and Digital Devil Saga. Two favorites.

[Gibb]

I rented Yakuza: Dead Souls (PS3) last night and played it a couple of hours. I honestly like it quite a bit. It feels like a cross between Disaster Report and Dead Rising (and obviously feels a lot like the Yakuza regular games). It's quite entertaining, tho the controls are a bit wonky.

[MechaFan]

I pretty much all but dropped ME3.. Bout 28hrs into it and I can't find myself to get back into it.. With ME1/2 I played till I finished and still wanted more.. :(


Oh well, Battlefield 3 has been keeping me more then entertained.. I just went out and bought a wired 360 controller to hook up to my P/C so I can fly the airplanes and helicopters now.. I was hella good at flying the choppers on BFBC2 and the airplanes on 1943 so naturually I'm whoopin *** (not really usually a valkyrie will take me out after 1-2 map passes lol.)

[Spike]

I pretty much all but dropped ME3.. Bout 28hrs into it and I can't find myself to get back into it.. With ME1/2 I played till I finished and still wanted more.. :(


Oh well, Battlefield 3 has been keeping me more then entertained.. I just went out and bought a wired 360 controller to hook up to my P/C so I can fly the airplanes and helicopters now.. I was hella good at flying the choppers on BFBC2 and the airplanes on 1943 so naturually I'm whoopin *** (not really usually a valkyrie will take me out after 1-2 map passes lol.)

Still interested in BF3 with EA saying things like this to the public (http://forums.gametrailers.com/thread/ea-does-not-exclude-possibilit/1280918).

[Vaikyuko]

Still interested in BF3 with EA saying things like this to the public (http://forums.gametrailers.com/thread/ea-does-not-exclude-possibilit/1280918).

It's a vague statement and not a guarantee. Relax, tiger.

[Spike]

It's a vague statement and not a guarantee. Relax, tiger.

That's my Chinese symbol lol.

[ryushe]

I pretty much all but dropped ME3.. Bout 28hrs into it and I can't find myself to get back into it.. With ME1/2 I played till I finished and still wanted more.. :(Honestly, hearing this from you is really disheartening.

[MechaFan]

I'd be down to pay $15 a month for BF3 if it met a constant update of new maps, guns, ect.. Otherwise I'd just go back to playing oldschool Counter-Strike on STEAM lol.. For some reason even to this day that game keeps me entertained.

Honestly, hearing this from you is really disheartening.

Yeah, but don't let me stop you from purchaseing it.. Majority of ME fans I've talked too seem to like it and the reviews paint it out to be a great game.. But I just can't seem to get into it..

I've invested pretty much a whole 2-3 weeks of my life last month to replaying ME1/2 (around 30ish hours on each) to get prepared for ME3.. I was there at the midnight launch and just finished up ME2's suicide run an hour before in preperation.. I forked over $9.99 for the DLC.. But after popping it in it came apparent rather quickly that the game was rushed rather badly by Bio Ware..

To me it just feels exactly like what they did with Dragon Age 2 but in this case ME1/2 are Dragon Age 1 and Mass Effect 3 is Dragon Age 2.. But Even Dragon Age 2 I brought myself to finish rather quickly..


I guess put it this way.. ATM I'd much rather re-play ME1 (again) then finish up my run with ME3 lol.. I know eventually I'll go and beat it but right now I'm just a little too disgusted with how much I feel let down by the game.

[sumwhatkrazy]

I will not be playing battlefield 3 anymore if they want to charge a subscription thats for sure.
maybe if it were as good as it should've been like BF2 for instance.

Anyway iam currently playing;
Dead Rising but not sure if i'll persue as the controls are a bit sucky and the AI of the people your supposed to save is wretched.
Death Smiles I actually quite like this. Old school arcade style space shooter but with an anime twist. instead of being in a space ship your a young girl(choice of girls) with magic that can fly(lol).
Quite fun, gets crazy on the hard difficulties.
Doubt there will be much longevity here but i do intend to finish with all characters and see both their ending. gets hard but i think you get unlimited continues so..
Arcane hearts 3 yeah ahh i didnt expect a huge amount but this game isnt as fun as i had hoped. probably be fun to play with friends but really nothing special here. Anime style graphics, just another old school style fighter that isnt as fan servicey as i thought either (lol). Cant say the game play felt great the controls arent laid out very well on the xbox i was too lazy to change anything.
I dont really play fighters anymore but i swear to god the end boss is impossible. Bison, Seth and Shao Khan aint got sh*t on dis b*tch...
Prolly wont bother with this.
Battlefield 3 Still play it a little but tends to get boring quick.

[Shining Heresy]

It's been all Tales of Graces f since I bought it last Wednesday.

[sumwhatkrazy]

Mass Effect 3 apart from things i mentioned in the ME3 thread, seems bloody great! wish i could keep playing but need to go to bed. Dam time.

[MechaFan]

Mass Effect 3 apart from things i mentioned in the ME3 thread, seems bloody great! wish i could keep playing but need to go to bed. Dam time.

When you get further into it I'm interested in your opinion when it comes to weather its better then the first two.

[MechaFan]

I've gone back to playing The Witcher: TEV since my internet decideds to move at a snails pace latley.. I hate wirless.. Been two days where each BF3 game I join is 100+ ping.

[Nano]

I've gone back to playing The Witcher: TEV since my internet decideds to move at a snails pace latley.. I hate wirless.. Been two days where each BF3 game I join is 100+ ping.

Ther's a gizmo that you plug into an electrical socket near yor modem then ito your modem and you plug another one near your computer then into your computer. hard to explain but it's better tha wireless. local computer store should stock them, not sure how much they cost.

[Audiomancer]

Currently switching back and forth between Minecraft and Earthbound of all things, as much as I like earthbound the level grinding is a real pain! I'm currently in Onett beating up the same gimps over and over again before I go up against the boss. I was about 25xp from level 8 before the emulator decided to freeze >_<

[MechaFan]

Wow Eathbound is still around? lol.. I remember the rubberbanding at launch killed that game for pretty much anyone that played it.

[Audiomancer]

Rubberbanding? I'm afraid I don't follow.

[MechaFan]

Rubberbanding? I'm afraid I don't follow.

Sorry I mistook Earthbound for another game called Earthrise lol.. Its a MMO that sucked like all hell at release..

^_^ ignore my earlier comment.

[Lacan]

Still playing Ninja Gaiden 3, and finally finished Hard Mode just now. Now onto some more Ninja Trials and Clan Battles before starting Master Ninja mode.

[Carhill22]

Just started Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword.. so far awesome!

[Gibb]

Snagged Yakuza 4 for $20 since I liked Yakuza Dead Souls so much. I knew it wouldn't be as action packed since you're not mowing down zombies, and so far I really like it.

[sumwhatkrazy]

I just gave Total war shogun 2 fall of the samurai a crack. Cant say i overly like it so far. I watched some of the tutorials and i started a new game a couple of times but couldn't overly get into it.
i think i was being a bit impatient with it though. But yeah seems pretty darn complicated and a bit slow.

[RayearthIX]

Tales of Graces F - absolutely loving it. about 10 hours in.

[Nutmeg]

The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker

Does it count as me playing if I'm the one guiding Mr. Nutmeg as he plays? :lol:

[Caster13]

Legend of Dragoon. Why was this never made into a series? This is a good game.

[neiru_3]

Just started Rogue Galaxy (PS2)

[ryushe]

Legend of Dragoon. Why was this never made into a series? This is a good game.It's an all right game with an awesome battle system. Nothing more than that, honestly.

[MechaFan]

Legend of The Dragoon will always be one of my favorite RPGs.. Back when everyone was playing Chrono Cross I was all about LOTD.. It did have a very interesting battle system at the time and for some reason guys in bulky armor that turn into dragons makes for a interesting story IMO.. I've seriously debated purchaseing it for $30 down at Pheonix Games on several occasions, but I've held off in hopes of it getting a PSN release sorta like Xenosaga finnally got.

And theres been quite an outcry for a sequel.. I think even Sony ackowledges that it deserves one.

[ryushe]

Didn't Legend of Dragoon sell like crap, though?

As for what I'm playing, primarily Kid Icarus: Uprising and Final Fantasy XIII - 2, which are both games I feel that are better than what their average scores are.

Trying to finish XIII - 2 before Xenoblade come out.

[Siendra]

Like 1.2 Million, but it had an absurdly huge development budget for the time.

Trying to finish Tales of Graces F in time for Xenoblade.

[MechaFan]

Just started back up on Persona 4 but this time I just continued where I left off instead of starting all the way over for the 3rd time.. So I just beat the 8bit level and Mitsou Shadow.. I think I'm pretty close to beating the game but idk, I thought that with Persona 3 and it wasn't another 40hrs till I actually finished it lol.. I wish they came out with a FEZ like expansion for this game also.

Oh well, in a few days i'll have this wrapped up then I can go download P3:FEZ on the PS3 Market and re-play that game as its been a few years.. Can't wait! :)

[Gibb]

The Darkness II. After finishing Yakuza 4, I wasn't sure what I wanted to try next, but I saw it on the shelf at Blockbuster and wanted to swap out SSX (which wasn't too exciting) for something.

I played a good hour or so of it last night, and I'm actually digging it so far. Nothing earth shattering, but the story is interesting and the voice work is really well done.

[Jon]

FFXIV. And how much was the Darkness 2 Gibb?

[Gibb]

FFXIV. And how much was the Darkness 2 Gibb?
$15/mo for my Movie/Game combo pass. I sign up for the combo pass every couple months, then go through all the games I want to play but don't want to buy.

[AsukaxSohryux]

WKC2, damn timesink.

[MechaFan]

Im bout 15hrs into Tales of the Abyss and things are getting interesting.. Finally gettin' some answers but i still dont really know whats totally going on :lol:

[ryushe]

Monster Hunter Freedom Unite (PSP via Vita)
Someone... please, help me... I can't... I can't stop playing this game. :'(

Xenoblade Chronicles (Wii)
22 hours in and I'm kind of not seeing how this game is the savior of the genre when it has all the crap the other JRPG's have. I'm honestly starting to get kind of burned out, too.

Mass Effect 2 (360) (Replay on Hardened)
'Ehh, doesn't seem too bad so far, but I'm only about an hour or so in, so there's that. Would've been further in, but had a whole bunch of issues trying to import my ME2 character only to find out I can't change my class, and then wound up messing around with my multiple ME1 perfect saves to see which one I wanna bring into this game. What's even worst, which I just found out while going through this, is you cannot skip the opening movie. As incredible as it is, that's just silly.

Fun Fact: When looking through my save files, I noticed that my longest playtime with the game was a little over 97 hours... Like, WTF?

That was the first and arguably the last game this gen where I've not only exceeded the 50 hour mark, but was almost in the triple digits. I just think that's crazy and shows how much I love that game.

Also going through the story in Kid Icarus: Uprising (3DS) again mopping up some of the achievements and playing the online which, even though I'm not super great at it, is honestly too much fun. What surprised me most is the game has extra lines of dialogue that you can (and most likey will) miss in your first playthrough.

This game, man!

[Spike]

Dark Souls and got to say this game is so good and much better then demon souls but that's my opinion.

[Gibb]

Disgaea 3: Absence of Justice (PSVita)

Yup, I'm hooked.

I'm 5 hours into it right now, and my highest character is level 12 or so.

[Lacan]

Ninja Gaiden 3 on Master Ninja mode on the middle of Day 2, and Castlevania Symphony of the Night on Richter Mode.

[MechaFan]

Finished up Tales Of The Abyss so now im back Battlefield 3 and gonna try out Devil Survivor: Overclocked tonight.

[SapperSix]

I played Dead Space on the computer, and I'm enjoying so far. I also tried DCS A-10, but after a little play time, I realized that I need to get to get a HOTAS joystick for it, and my ordinary joystick.

[Vaikyuko]

I played Dead Space on the computer, and I'm enjoying so far. I also tried DCS A-10, but after a little play time, I realized that I need to get to get a HOTAS joystick for it, and my ordinary joystick.

Dead Space 1: Proper action horror. It is genuinely unsettling at times and while the majority is pop scares it's still horror enough. Great choice. I'm actually looking to do a (recorded) replay of my master run of the game, which is Impossible difficulty, no upgrades, plasma cutter and Lv1 RIG, and using the store for ammo only.

[SapperSix]

Dead Space 1: Proper action horror. It is genuinely unsettling at times and while the majority is pop scares it's still horror enough. Great choice. I'm actually looking to do a (recorded) replay of my master run of the game, which is Impossible difficulty, no upgrades, plasma cutter and Lv1 RIG, and using the store for ammo only.

You're utterly insane, but good look to you.

[MechaFan]

Yeah I too have been craveing a DS1 re-play on Impossible just useing the plasma cutter.. I'll do my upgrades though lol..

My second play through all I used was the plasma cutter and it was a lot of fun.. Besides the last boss thing was sort of a pain and that was normal difficulty.

[Vaikyuko]

You're utterly insane, but good look to you.

Well, tbh, I've actually done it already, it was a while back. The only problem was the final boss is next to impossible without the first damage node upgrade on the cutter. The problem wasn't damage per se, it was damage per second and ammunition concerns. You can only hold so much and the boss has an attack nobody ever sees (because by that point they have maxed gear) where it spits out two Pregnants...and can and will pop them itself with the sweeping tentacles, resulting in a dozen swarm to deal with, minimum. It becomes exceptionally difficult if not impossible at that point. The only major trouble spots in the run are the Leviathan, Valor's barracks (OH MY GAD), the third tentacle sequence, and of course the final boss. It's not too bad otherwise. EDIT: Oh, the segment where you drag the SPOILER to the pedestal is DEAR GOD WORST THING EVER as well.

I also plan on doing a Dead Space 2 run with similar restrictions, but on Zealot (since Zealot is actually more difficult than Hardcore -- HC is just Survivalist difficulty with limited saves and no checkpoints).

[Gibb]

44 hours into Disgaea 3 Vita. Since I went through a lot of the bonus chapters first, I had to bump up the enemies levels a few times, and they're giving me a decent challenge right now. Most of the enemies are between level 50 and 80, and my highest level character is 52 or something. As usual in these games, I make a ton of characters, so I probably have 40 characters right now.

[Jon]

The Darkness 2. WOW. Didn't have the highest of expectations but its shaping up to be a great game. Not as good as the first, but still very very fun. At least the story is awesome!

Glad I found it at Redbox. Should be able to beat it today so my grand total will only be about $4 :)

[cris]

still need to play bio hazard rev.