Bubsy: The Woolies strike back

   Let me spin you a yarn. Coming off the back of quickly finishing South Park: the fractured but whole and Mario Odyssey I finally went in and traded my old ps4 in that I had been holding in to since buying a pro several months ago what with my laziness. Anyway, I took that in (and a few games) to Game (the shop chain), and instead of walking out with a bunch of cash to spend on my upcoming weekend away (as planned) I walked out with Wolfenstein, Assassins Creed, Evil within and Shadow of war. Which to choose first was the question, I know Sonic Forces is out on the 7th November and what with it being me every other game goes on pause for a new Sonic game. I needed to pick something fairly short then, so obviously I chose to pay £25 to purchase Bubsy: The woolies strike back.
   So, who is Bubsy? Bubsy was a 2D mascot platformer from the 16 bit era appearing on Snes, Jaguar (which had it's own exclusive Bubsy game, nice) and most importantly Mega Drive. I played a lot of Bubsy 1 and some of 2, and they were okay, but as a kid when I only had a handful of games so for many years I would play games over and over again, and Bubsy 1 was one of these games. As a mascot he's not exactly Sonic (or Mario I Guess), hell, he's not even earthworm Jim, more of a Gex or James pond kinda guy, so it's easy to see why few people would have heard of him. Obviously, with my lifelong love of Megadrive, and the whole bizarre nature of a game being released in a long since forgotten series 21 years after it's last instalment, (which was Bubsy 3D, which itself is known to be one of the worst video games of all time (never played it but looks pretty awful)) I was always going to buy this, no question. But then I saw the price, was shocked, then bought it anyway (what am I like?).

   So, the actual game. Good god it looks bad, 2.5D, urgh, I get that real pixel work is expensive but at this price maybe they should've made an effort because it instantly made me think of Mighty number 9, not a comparison anyway wants. As for how it plays, well, Bubsy was never a great game, and unfortunately there is no difference here, don't get me wrong, it's not the worst game ever made but it's average at best. Trying to be positive now they've introduced an interesting idea on a platformer that I have never come across before where they give you a set amount of lives at the start of each level (9, cause he's a cat (Did i mention that yet? That was where the yarn joke at the start came from)) rather than carrying lives level to level. This is an interesting idea but not implemented well, because there's too many lives. Some of the levels towards the end of the game are quite difficult (what with their insta-death sections (that being a part of a level that will kill you that the only way you would know it's coming is by dying to it already (or dumb luck) that appears in varying amounts in platforms depending on how well designed they are)) but due to being given a large quantity of lives you can brute force your way through these levels fairly easily.
   They also have an interesting idea on bosses where the damage dealt to the boss carries over even after you've died (until you've lost all 9 lives anyway) which is great for me because it makes them easier and as I say nearly every time, I hate bosses. For a player who isn't so easily frustated as me this would no doubt make it way too easy to defeat them. that said, I still struggled a lot of the second boss (yet got through the last one on the first time of asking). A final issue, this game took me approximately 3 hours to complete, maybe less, and half hour of that was being stuck on the second boss, sure there are collectables but I have no interest in getting them (maybe if it had a platinum trophy (still probably not)) and this game was £25! twenty five pounds!
   In many ways it's somewhat unfair to judge a game on its price, but right now on PSN for £25 or less you could get the likes of Resident Evil 7, Fallout 4, Dying Light and my personal 2016 game of the year Doom, which is £9.49! Bubsy is a below average 2D platformer that could only appeal to the likes of me who has an undeserved attachment to the game from 20+ years ago, because it's certainly not going to get good reviews (if it even gets any beyond some guy with 500 youtube subscribers) or word of mouth. If it was less than a tenner then maybe I could forgive it as a half hearted attempt to bring a long forgotten franchise back, mainly for the lolz, but for £25, no.
 
I guess if you like this game you could also play mighty number 9, but just play Sonic Mania (£16) instead.

Pyre

   I have talked before about how much I enjoyed Bastion and Transistor (I think). Pyre is the third game by 'Super Giant' (the developer of these games) and this is the best one yet. They've only gone and invented their own sport and mixed it with a fantasy RPG. This is not a mix I thought I'd ever see, or would work (if you made this on Game Dev Tycoon it would be crap) but it does, oh it does.

  Firstly, this game isn't Rocket League, which is the first thing I'd be thinking about a video game invented sport (or maybe Mutant league football), it's not a speed fest (although that can come in handy from time to time), it takes thought to play the game, especially s you're only in control of one player at a time. Essentially it boils down to 2 teams of 3 players trying to get a ball in to a Pyre (geddit, like the name of the game). All characters have different abilities and you can choose any mix. I don't want to go in to the rules of the game now, there's a lot to take in, although it's slowly spooned in over time so you never get overwhelmed, and ultimately the sport is fairly easy to understand, but describing all the nuances will take a lot of time, and dull text (though you could argue this is all dull text).
   The actual story in here is based on your character and a group of rogues (not affiliated to the X men) being sent to purgatory for various crimes and having to win games of this sport to return them to the surface world. Over time you meet more characters to add to your party while also losing some characters as you send them off to the world above, just make sure you don't send your star player off at the start because you'll be without them the rest of the game (Jodoriel was my star player (I didn't send her off early though, I'm not an idiot)). The story is deeper than this but that will enter spoiler territory, suffice to say there are multiple endings depending on how many of your squad you rescue and your decision at the end.
   As usual, there's no such thing as a perfect game, and some elements of this story can drag. A lot of the plot is repeated over and over, really drilled in to your head like you're at an internment camp for repetitive storytelling. Some characters really aren't that interesting and the majority of the rival teams don't come across as menacingly as the game seems to want them to.

   Lets talk music though, and just like Sonic Mania before (although Pyre came out a few weeks before that did, but this is the order I'm writing them in) the music is fantastic. Different enemy teams have different songs when you meet them. fitting to their characters as well as other area music like the shop or inside the wagon (what a great time it's been for video game music as of late between these two, Crash and Arms). Music talk moves fairly smoothly on to artistic talk (I recon) and this game looks fantastic. The design of the characters in the still cut scenes is fantastic and the look of the sport is very good as well, with an array of different looking fields in which the games take place, from fiery pits and muddy swamps to gothic sports stadiums and beyond, it looks flippin' great.
   This game truly is special and can stand alongside, and arguably above Transistor and Bastion, this developer keeps getting better and better, I can't wait to see what they do next, but for now, the stars have aligned to create a fantastic game.

Sonic Mania

   It's been a while since a post here, but if one game was ever going to bring me back, this is it, plus I want to catch up again and I've got another idea for a different blog, a more structured and interesting one that's not jut some rambling nonsense like this. Rambling nonsense is the way this is going though and is the way it shall remain, for better or worse, in particular for this post there will be assumed in depth Sonic knowledge that no one I know has except for myself (but other people will have), so best of luck.

   After looking forward to this game it is finally here and it didn't surprise me that I completed it in one sitting (there was a 30 minute dinner break in there), an ode to a 16 bit Sonic where the speedster made his name, before flikies (unbelievably not a real word) island began a downward spiral ultimately resulting in making out with a human woman and turning it to a (sigh) werehog (plus shadow had a game where he had a gun and there was a kinect racing game but they're spin offs (what next, Blaze P.I,? (that's right, multiple brackets are back))) . I've spoke before of how I like Sonic generations, and even though there's been a slump since it seems at least 2/3 of the upcoming Sonic Forces will be along the same vain, so hopes are up on that. I'm not here to talk about Sonic forces though, or the Sonic list I promised and never deliveredupon (kinda seemed like no one but me would care and hence a waste of my time (though argument could be made that all my blog posts are)), I'm here to talk about Sonic Mania, and how great it is.
   Sonic Mania sees the return of some classic zones (with a few surprising choices) that are remixed in to something semi knew, but not in a bad way at all, parts touch the nostalgia bone in my body (though I need several for this insane year (can't wait for them Woolies to strike back), and it was already tickled by Crash) while also offering new challenges, and tunes. Speaking of music, this is one of the best sounding games I've ever heard, probably last challenged by Saints row 4 (btw, what is volition doing with Agents of Mayhem instead of Saints Row 5, seriously?) and that had actual songs in it, this is created music specifically for this game. That great music passes on even better to the new levels which have all new music, yet sound in the same style as any of the classics, and most of these new levels are great too, Studiopilis and the second act of Mirage Saloon are particular stand outs (the latter of which which may be the best sonic act, ever). Bosses are good too (and you know my views on them), not too hard but still a challenge, apart from Oil Oceans', which annoyed me.
   Many new ideas are in there too, as well as old ones, it could be seen as they threw every gimmick from every one of the Megadrive games, and some new ones at a wall and waited to see what stuck, and very nearly all of them did, praise must be given to the developers who were made up of Sonic fans and fan game creators, not even touched by Sonic team, which is for the best in this day and age.

   This is not a totally perfect game though, no game is, the penultimate level reminds me of  Metroplos zone from Sonic 2, my second least favourite Sonic level from the originals (labyrinth being the worst, obviously). I found this one to be full of traps that are unavoidable where you don't know what's coming, although to be fair this always comes up towards the end of every 2D platformer every made, not that it makes this right. I also wasn't keen on the final zone, not for the difficulty but for the length, I ended up being timed out on both acts, which seems to be Casino night and Carnival night zones both mixed in to one, yet somehow longer than both combined (if you ignore the fact that as a child I couldn't figure out how to do that that up and down spinning platform bit on Carnival night zone as I thought you had to jump on it rather than just hold up and down (jeez, the amount of time outs I got from that). That zone in particular being where the gimmicks just cross the line of going too far.
   I don't want to linger on the negatives though, so let's get in to the reference fest that is Sonic Mania, made by fans, for fans. The games is full of references to the main 2D sonic games, beyond just the levels, with the best of all coming from the Sonic CD level Starlight speedway, that's right, time travelling returns, and even the odd choice of sounds from that game turn up. (speaking of Sonic CD, what a shame that until The Sonic gems collection (back on PS2) this game was restricted to the Mega CD (and roms you thief's (definitely not how I first played it...)) so was criminally underplayed, bu at least it wasn't stuck on the 32X like Knuckles chatoix, a game I still haven't played and isn't even referenced in Mania (I think, the chaotix team certainly don't appear (see Sonic the comic/ Sonic heroes as to how I know who they are (I've lost the amount of brackets I've opened now so this should cover it)))). There is also an appearance of famed 'Sonic the fighters' characters Bean, Bark and Fang (though to be fair the latter did appear in the game gear only Sonic chaos sequel, Sonic triple trouble (yes, I've played (and completed) it, pretty decent tbh)). There's also a reference to the reference to Sonic from Deus Ex. The best one of all though I don't want to mention, as it was one of my favourite video game surprises of all time (and no, it's not a Sonic Spinball reference, fortunately).

   So there you have it, for any Sonic fan back from the 16 bit era, this game is for you, and any fan of 2D platformers should get a kick out of this. Can't really do a 'you may also like' thing in here, 'cause the answers are obvious (also Freedom planet, the best Sonic fan game, of which one of the creators worked on Sonic Mania (I think, I'm sure I heard that somewhere a while ago)).

   I want to start writing more blog posts now, I need to catch up on what I've missed and Pyre definitely deserves it's own post (though no one will read it, indies don't get much traffic). I also want to start my new idea for another blog soon, but I'm not setting a date for that.

Zelda and Mass Effect

   So many big games this year, it's insane, especially as last year was quite pants. Even when it feels like there's a gap coming up now, there isn't really, like how Prey came out Friday. I wish Bethesda would remove their stupid policy of not sending out review copies of games until release day so the reviews are out late. I'm semi (ha) interested in Prey and had a weekend of so might've played it, but as I'm not pre-convinced (definitely a word) I've gave it a miss and will now likely not buy it for some time, potentially second hand now if I ever do, so Bethesda lost out on my money.
   Speaking of missing out on my money, I was quite interested in Injustice 2, the DC fighting game based on and made by the Mortal Kombat guys. However, they have announced DLC before the game is released... If you're not going to release a completed game then don't charge full price. People went nuts at Deus Ex last year for the game being portioned out in to 'pay to play' sections so the whole game didn't come out like the developers wanted because the publishers were dicks, but it seems no one cares about the same thing happening now. Well, fuck this game now, I'll spend my money on something more worth while, like biscuits. In my eyes they've made a fatal(ity) error. Rant over
   Anyway, I'm here to talk about Mass Effect and Zelda, though not in great detail, everything in the world has already been said, but I'll add a few of my own thoughts now.

Mass Effect: Andromeda

   Well, I already put my kinect away, so no more videos recorded by me, no great loss there. Until another game come out where you can play as a middle aged man dress as Cammy then why bother?
   So, one of the best things that Zelda did for me was take so long that I didn't get to starting Mass Effect until the patch came out so I never had any issues with crazy facial animations and monster faces that people had early on so that is a non factor to me.
   As I have said many, many times third person shooters really aren't my bag, I enjoyed the Mass Effect series in the past (especially 2, the best one) because it had such a good story, and the game play was good enough in short bursts, but 3 took it in a bad direction where it was nearly all shooting. This game reminds me more of 3 in that sense but it seems to me that the game play has improved. I find it immeasurably better than other games of this genre like Uncharted and Gears of War which I get bored of after 10 minutes, this had enough variety with teamwork included that I enjoyed it. I'm not saying that I prefer playing these parts more that a good FPS or platformer, it certainly isn't that good, but it's solid. Until you come across yet another orb dude of course.
   The main story here is good, overall. It's a good story set away from, and yet simultaneously to (sort of) the original trilogy, although the actual script isn't the best. Most of the loyalty missions are good although there wasn't any Zaeed-esque questionable choices that stopped me from hundred percenting no. 2 cause my Shepard wasn't a total dick. Millions of little side quests are available to varying degrees of fun and tonnes of missions related to building up planets to let the colonies live on.
   The biggest issue I have with the game is travelling, so many of the missions involve travelling to different planets (with their long loading times) or around the Nexus (the new version of the Citadel) that the game can become so tedious. you can play a mission for 10-15 minutes of just travelling between loading screens to have a conversation with a dude before going somewhere else for another and so on. I worry that this is done intentionally to break up some of the monotony of shooting as that's what I suspect, but there has to be a better way to do it (not that I know what that idea is). There are also mining, developing, multiplayer parts to help you upgrade your abilities, weapons, armour and so on but I finished it easily after barely dipping my toe nail in to any of this.
   So, in summation I feel there has been some harsh criticism of this game but also kind of fair. It's enjoyable but if it wasn't a Mass effect game I'd likely have never touched it. If you're a Mass effect fan give it a play in the (very) unlikely event you haven't already, don't believe the hate. If not I guess it depends how much you like a game that gives you a million things to do that can last hundreds of hours if you so desire.

The Legend of Zelda the Breath of the Wild

   I am not a Zelda fan. The only main Zelda game I played was the early Wii game Twilight Princess, which I didn't think much of. As mentioned so many times I was a Sega kid to such of an extent in fact that I didn't realise that a Sega kid kid was really a thing until I got to uni when I met people who actually had nostalgia for old Nintendo.  I am not sure I played any Nintendo console before that outside of not getting how to play Goldeneye with the one thumb stick and giving up quickly.
   What I am getting to there is that I'm not one of these Zelda lovers who decided this was the greatest game of all time before it even came out, that said I'm also not a hater just to be contrarian. This is a very good game. The world is incredible, full to the brim with things to see, so and find. The varieties of areas are amazing and it looks fantastic, including the spectacular draw distance. The puzzles are fantastic too, many of the shrines are very good and can make you feel like a smarty pants when you figure it out, and this goes multiple times over for the Divine beasts. The combat is fine as well, very simple, but effective and I didn't hate the bosses, somehow.
   Not so good is all the different things to pick up, and no I'm not talking Korok seeds that actually do something. I mean all the bones and plants and such things you pick up, I know they all have a use with cooking and crafting but the only ingredient I ever needed to actually use was fire lizards for that volcanoey area of the map. Of course the breakable weapons are a whole ridiculous thing of their own.
   A quick summary then is that this is a must play, despite that most people wont have a way to play it 'cause it's impossible to get your hands on a Switch and who actually owns a WiiU (except for me)? This is another game that could last you hundreds of hours if you want it to, but in my opinion, Horizon is the better game this year due to it's far superior gameplay, and as far as the world goes, Witcher 3 is better. Those 2 are, in my opinion, pretty great games to be compared to though. Just remember Nintendo fan boys, being able to climb every wall alone does not the greatest game of all time make (does that make sense).
 
   Two more things. 1. Telltale's 'Tales from the Borderlands' is free on PS plus this month, a game I've nearly bought several times as so many people seem say how it is if not the second best (after walking dead) telltale game then maybe the actual best because it is so 'hilarious'. Well, I played the first episode and it isn't, people are idiots. 2.  Why is Puyo puyo Tetris £10 more on the Switch than on PS4 and why is it only physical on ps4? I guess Sega are a mean scheme machine or that Nintendo are feeding us an Avalanche of shit...

 

   No time to explain is very good too (as seen above). A platformer where you control the jumps with a big laser beam, which is also your weapon. Has loads of references to other games too, which obviously I appreciate. 

Snake Pass

It's 10 O'clock on Friday night, what better to do than right a blog about a child's video game, drink a box of Perry, listen to Alanis Morrisette and pour peanuts directly in to my mouth? (none is the answer).

   I say 'childs' game but that is a bit harsh, it's more of a throwback. The game is made in the style of a 3D mascot platformer (think Crash, Banjo, Bubsy 3D) in so much as it is a colourful game just aiming to have fun (ignoring the fact that the first Crash was ridiculously hard (and crap)). There is no platforming though, snakes cannot kick, punch, chop or block, so how does it work? You gotta believe! Obviously that's not the answer, actually, as a snake you have to crawl up bamboo shoots (as pictured above) and other objects to get around, there are no enemies (apart from the environment), except your own ability! Good job because otherwise what you gonna do, when they come?
   On each level there are 3 colourful orbs you must collect to advance to the next level as well as a bunch of other collectables along the way, and it can be really hard to get these, but you can, you just gotta believe. Practise makes perfect in this game (which can be said for any game really), at first getting over one tiny gap can be a major issue, but as you get a handle on the grip function you'll advance much further, while of course mixing in suicidal jumps that the developers probably wouldn't want the player to do, but why leave the option in? you gotta believe that people will take advantage of it.
   As an aside, they have some of the best named achievements/ trophies I've ever seen (well, 2 anyway), one named 'snakes on a plain' hence me not being able to make a joke on that, and then one one you may think more like to come from the mouth of Hal Emmerich. No Penis jokes though, shame.
   Point is, this is really good. A fantastic zone out game while you're listening to music or whatever. It's not as hard as people make it out to be and it doesn't outstay it's welcome. It's on everything, even Switch! You should play it, you gotta believe me.

Parappa the rapper remastered just came out btw.

Night in the Woods

   After spending dozens of hours on Horizon, probably 10 or so on Ghost Recon Wildlands in a co op play through and then at least a dozen (probably more) on Zelda (yes, I got a Switch and breath of the wild, more on that another time) I needed something to break up the ridiculous lengths of games going on. So I went for night in the Woods. Of course, this doesn't stop the fact that Mass effect has been sitting unopened on a shelf for a week and now Persona 5 reviews are out and apparently it's amazing. Jeez. At least Yooka-Laylee isn't out for 2 weeks... Just a short one today to crank it out before heading back to Hyrule (that's where Zelda is set btw).

   Much like Oxenfree this is a 2D story based game where a bunch of youths try to make sense of a crazy situation and even though it does have many things in common with Oxenfree, it is quite different. For one, it takes place over a whole 'fall' (that's autumn for us normal people), which means it advances at a slower pace and really helps character building, which really is the games strong point. The 4 main characters of Mae (the person you play as), Gregg, Angus and Bae are fantastically designed characters with loads of personality put in to them, which is impressive from a game with text only speech and no real facial animations. Side characters add to the main plot but it really is all about these four and how you communicate with them and who you spend time with to build relationships and get more out of these characters.
   Unlike Oxenfree again there is gameplay in here too, albeit it occasional. There are puzzle platform dream sequences and a way to explore the town by jumping around power lines to find mini games and back story on the town, who wouldn't want to increase the towns rat problem by feeding them stolen pretzels? Light bulb rounders is also a thing (yes rounders). There is a whole extra game on your computer as well, it's not just for instant messaging and making a shark dance, there's a passable top down dungeon crawler in there. What a Bizarre place to put it...
   Not everything is as good as Oxenfree in this game. Despite how much better the build is for the main story, the actual reveal and ending are pretty bad. Not only does the twist come out of nowhere but the characters are happy to let the horrors of what has happened to them wash away like water off of Howards' back. This strange turn of events totally goes against their characters and leaves a sour taste in the mouth after an extremely interesting set up. This is not to say the game is not worth playing, it's very good up to that point, just be prepared to be let down. Oh,  One last point, the characters are all anthropomorphic animals, but then there's real animals as well. Odd.

Horizon zero dawn

Time to drop the week numbers as I'm in to the big games now. My first world geek problem of not enough time is adding up. Between this, Zelda, Mass effect, Ghost Recon (and maybe Nier) that's a couple of hundred hours gone there. Hey, at least it's something that I like doing, assuming that I like the actual games, and in the case of Horizon I sure did.
   Let's start with a brief history lesson. This is a PlayStation exclusive game made by Guerrilla studios who are most famous for making the Killzone series, which has been Playstations first party fps series for many years without ever being anywhere near as successful or acclaimed as Halo from the Xbox side but I guess they thought they had to make an attempt. That said, The last Killzone game by Guerrilla was a launch PS4 game and was pretty good. Horizon though is a third person open world action RPG which is quite a step in a completely different direction and it seems to have paid off.
   As an overview of a setting you are part of a tribe that exists in some kind of end of the world scenario (I say 'some kind' but actually I know what happened but don't want to spoil the plot so lets stick with that) so you use a mix of bows and arrows, electronic bombs, turrets, spears and other crossed idea weapons that come with a reborn distopian future. These weapons are used to fight off the predictable evil tribes and the lest predictable robot animals which roam around the map. Some are nice and simple like bulls and deer up to giant robot crocodiles and Ligers.

   As you get further in to the game and face bigger enemies you learn the areas to hit. The bigger machines have weapons and armour that you can shoot off with certain weapons/ ammo types. If you can get these parts off in a large battle early you can remove many of their abilities and can make them end up as big arrow sponges. You just nead to learn that technique which took me a while. Other useful abilities you gain overtime to help defeat them are stealth kills, critical hits, multishot arrows and the ability to override enemies and get them on your side. Master these techniques (and get the power armours) and the last few missions will be a breeze (if that's what you want, if not, don't do the side missions).
  The main story is brilliantly told as you discover the history of how the world got to this situation and Aloys' purpose in it (Aloy being the main character). The pacing of the reveal is fantastically done as you search through different derelict sites and find audio and video logs that tell you the story and get some help from Xbox turncoat Phillip Broyles ('cause this is a PS exclusive and around this time last year he was in Xbox exclusive Quantum break) who brings his signature delivery to the game.
   The general RPG elements are simple but all there. Side missions, collectibles, weapon upgrading, trading, levelling up and other little things that you expect are in and all work fine. Unfortunately I was always seemingly running out of wire which is an element used in making both arrows and tripwires (the 2 best weapons) which is a pain in the arse as I never had problems with any other resources. One other issue is that you can't modify the map to show only certain things so it constantly looks like a mad cluster of little icons that can be fiddly if you're looking for locations of collectibles, corruption zones, hunting lodges and other side questy things.
   All around this is a truly fantastic game and for a first game of this nature Guerrilla have knocked the distracting rock out of the park. If they carry on in this trajectory the next game could be an all time great, no Joke.

   I was going to the return the 'you may also like' section which tells you that if you like this game then another I think you might like, or if you prefer you could see if you like the game I said it's like and judge this game on that but I spend 10 minutes looking through what it's like and although it has lots in common with many games it gathers ideas from a lot of different places so I can't really pinpoint one or two games, so just google 'open world 3rd person action rpg' and figure it out from there.

   As one last push in the direction of the game it has a character called Erend and he has this hair combo:

 

Week 8

Or as it's otherwise known 'the week before Horizon and Switch'. So, I didn't want to go in to anything big, so I looked at what was left in my masses of owned yet never played games (thanks Ps Plus/ Games with Gold) that were short but also not crap. Most of the games I have that i want to play that I've picked up from all over the place are long, some of which I'd like to play some day, although I know damn well around 90% I never will. But I found something off PS plus and also splashed some cash.

Not A Hero

   Did you ever play OlliOlli? Well, I didn't. That was the first notable game by the English team behind this game. This is a 2D side on shooter where you zip through levels (at first anyway) and shoot up the place in different blocks of buildings while trying to help a Bunny become Mayor of England. The game is fun as you try to get past hoards of enemies while covering behind walls and leaping through windows and constantly facing new types of enemies that frequently appear. The real fun though is the cast of characters. As you move along in the game you unlock more playable characters, all of which have OTT British accents, but in a good way. There's a cockney gangster, a scouse piss head, a female chav and more. What's better than playing as a Welsh girl shooting up some enemies while shouting 'Flippin' Eck!'. Well, lots of things, but that is good also.
   Unfortunately the game gets a lot harder in the last few levels. Well, that's bad phrasing (I could go back and change that but that would mean less words), what I actually mean is it gets harder (like it should) but also has longer levels and no save points. I get the point that that is the challenge but when I'm spending 45 minutes trying to do a level that takes about 2 minutes to complete successfully I start to get frustrated at playing the same bits over and over just to get back to the bit I'm struggling on, then die, again, and have to repeat. this really does fit in with my dislike of bosses as it's the same kind of thing. I have not finished this game yet but there's only a couple of levels left so I'll get there and if you're a PS plus member you should download it (as you should every PS plus/ Game with gold game as they're free, you can still delete them from your console but the store knows you own them so you can get them back whenever you want (yet so many people don't (I don't understand this thinking at all))) and give it a go one day when you're bored. It's worth a try as it's pretty cool.

And then I spent some money $£¥

Resident Evil 7

   Speaking of bosses... As I played this on Xbox I could've took my own screen shot/ video, but I didn't, so I'm using someone else's as usual (spoiler, unless it's a PC game I always just use google image search (except for that one for Dead Rising 4)).
   So, I'm not a survival horror guy, I played Alone in the dark (I think it was Alone in the dark) when I was a kid and got scared to death. I love horror films but since then I've been worried that I'd be really scared by them. Childish I know. But I figured that 20 years later it was time to make the jump. Honestly though I didn't find this game scary but it was very creepy. Despite the fact I don't normally play survival horror games I still know the idea of what would be coming. It's slow and methodical and all about moments. Most of the time you're walking around with the sense of unease that something could happen at any time but largely doesn't which builds the suspense. Most of the game is about exploring the house to solve puzzles to move on to the next section. The puzzles are not hard but well made, the only problem that could occur from the puzzles would be when turned off and come back to a day later you may forget what the puzzle was you were in the middle of (good jib for guides).
   I do like the story. I have a general understanding of the Resident Evil story without playing any of the games but this wasn't a big thing, or not until the end anyway when Chris Redfield saves you. Whoops, spoilers. You are Ethan (terrible name, bad start) and you are looking for your lost wife Mia (as before). You track her down to a creepy mansion that turns out to be inhabited by some weird redneck cannibal types and as the game goes on they all get morphed in to monsters. There are also 'the molded', the side enemies that appear when you're not fighting a member of the family. I get the point of having these small enemies to give more gameplay but these guys were annoying. They're slow and the only danger they pose is that they drain so many of your bullets (which are in very short supply) while you're killing them. I'd much rather have more enemies that took less to kill. Oh well, Never mind.
   I can't go in to the last third of the story because it will be spoiler central but it transitions well to something else. From a gameplay side it plays well. The shooting is solid and movement is fine. There's not so much action that it needs to be a big thing but it's more than adequate for what it is (that makes it sound bad, it's not supposed to). I very much enjoyed this game and I'm glad I gave this genre a chance after the age of 10. Great, yet another genre of games to play now.

Completed

Mekazoo

Bastion

Sound Shapes

Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon

Pony Island

Undertale

Mighty Morphon' Power Rangers Mega Battle

Batman: A Telltale series

Super Mario run

Ratchet and Clank into the Nexus

Westerado: Double Barreled

R-Type: dimensions

Dead Rising 4

Little Big Planet 3

Ratchet and Clank: The quest for Booty

Rebel Galaxy

Rage

Resident Evil 7

Week 7

   For this week (well, last week now) I really fancied an fps, so I was thinking of buying Sniper Elite 4, which came out last week but I didn't want to spend any money. This gave me 3 choices, all of which were last gen (though tht reallu shoudn't matter (but it does)). Firstly Boderlands: The Pre-Sequel. I think this was the last disk based last gen game I purchased as it came out long after the xbone/ ps4 release, and as that time it wasn't announced to be ported up (although I should've guessed really). I got a couple of hours in but got bored and stopped back then. Option 2, Rage. This was the last game by ID (creators of Doom/ wolfenstein/ quake) before the latest Doom game and quite a departure from their usual fare. It had fairly good reviews, but it was nearly 6 years old and the last game they made was my game of the year last year, which might make this seem hard to match up to. Thirdly, Crysis 3. I've never played any Crysis game, and this one came out right towards the end of the old consoles life cycle. I heard it's real good though. Ultimately I went with Alex Rileys' favourite game.

Rage

      Say it to my face! Rage is a post apocalyptic game where you awaken from some sort of human time capsule thing, I'm not totally sure, the story is pretty poor. Point is, you awake to a ruined world where the locals want you to help them take down 'the authority' (sans Stephanie McMahon) who will want to get their hands on you as a survivor from the past (not sure why). That's about all the story that you need to know. The game takes place in 3 types of areas. Town hubs where you do usual hub world stuff; shop, get missions, race, play a card game the developers invented (though hardly Gwent) and other hubby stuff. The second type is an over-world where you drive around in your armoured car to get from mission to mission which frankly seems extremely unnecessary and possibly just there to add hours on to the game (which I didn't take). The third is where the shooting takes place, a series of small areas that are supposedly different with the likes of a Vault, a distillery, an abandoned city and other post apocalyptic type things, but they all play the same as enclosed areas that are shaped as a big circle that brings you right back to the start after you've gotten to your objective. It's basically a game of 'go to area x, press button x, leave' and repeat. 

   So that's the basics. Elsewhere, it comes on 2 discs (3 if you include multiplayer) and I don't understand why. Granted it's not the only 360 game that came on 2 discs, but this is hardly the size of GTA V. Graphically for a 6 year old last gen game it's very impressive and I suspect that has a lot to do with the 3 discs. As for the driving fps, I find it a very strange combo. I know it's not the only game to have this pairing (Half life 2 amongst them) but it is not well applied here at all. It seems to be there to help you explore the open world, but there isn't anything to see in said open world outside of the missions and some jumps which themselves only seem to be a way to shoehorn in some aheivements/ trophies.
   Now, unpack your 1 meg ps one memory cards because you have to manual save the game. I had to repeat so much because I didn't manualyl save as it's not 1997. At least the file size isn't as big as Crash Bandicoot: Warped, because that took all the space on one card! (that's how file sizes work, right?) On the plus side firing up the 360 reminded me that the controller is unbelievably better than the dual shock 3, which is/ was trash. Also, on 360 you could set your console to play every game inverted so I didn't have to change it every time I booted up a new game. Can't do that on the Xbox One.

Horizon is on the... way. one week to go.

Completed

Mekazoo

Bastion

Sound Shapes

Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon

Pony Island

Undertale

Mighty Morphon' Power Rangers Mega Battle

Batman: A Telltale series

Super Mario run

Ratchet and Clank into the Nexus

Westerado: Double Barreled

R-Type: dimensions

Dead Rising 4

Little Big Planet 3

Ratchet and Clank: The quest for Booty

Rebel Galaxy

Rage

Week 5 & 6

   Well, I thought I was going to get through a bunch on my week off, and now here I am, a week after my week off and I got stuck on one game (mostly), which I'll come to in a bit because I did manage to squeeze some smaller games in between. So firstly

Little Big Planet 3

   Many years ago, when Little Big Planet was 'in' I played the first game, and wasn't a big fan. It was a game based around creation, from as small as character models up to making your own levels. You'd unlock extra things to use to make your levels throughout the single player game which also acted as collectables. This was all very well and good, even though I would never create a level, but it was good to know I could, much like when I downloaded Project Spark then never launched it once. but that's other people's things, Mario Maker seems pretty popular these days. The problem really was that for a 2D platformer, a genre so refined, the game wasn't that good to play. The charters were very floaty (floatey?) and the controls were very loose, sure it had our English 'charm' but without much story to go along with it. 6 years later and now being handled by another studio (albeit also an English studio) and not very much has changed. They added in Hugh Laurie to partner with Stephen Fry as voice actors (that must have confused American 'House' fans more than watching an episode of Teachers) which is a fun nod to Britishness, despite the fact that they are really hitting the wrong age group with this refernce.
   The game though, is the same. After all this time the creation suite has improved massively (or so I've read) but when the game still plays poorly, why would you want to spend so much time making a level for it? The single player itself is very short, about 4 hours, with less than 20 levels and a few boss fights. Not that I'm necessarily against a shorter game if it's made excellently. Sonic the hedgehog 2 is shorter (or similar) and was also a full priced game when it came out and was much, much better like this, the difference there is that Sonic 2 game out 25 years ago, LBP 3 was 3 years ago (also, see Inside for a modern comparison). That is an issue. You may wonder why I played it, well, it was free this month on PS plus and as it's a big name game I thought I'd give it a go. It's not the worst game I've ever played, some sections of the game are very good and it's very charming, but ultimately it's very forgettable. if you too got it free, it's charm should be enough for you to take a peek, save your money though.

 Ratchet and Clank: Quest for Booty

    I Think I might have took this Ratchet and Clank thing too far, it came free with Nexus though so I went for it as a small game to play to break up the big one that's coming up in a couple of paragraphs (or you could just scroll down now I guess). So, I was going to go for Tools of destruction, the first PS3 Ratchet game, but I heard that the series had got clogged up by mini games and gimmicks but quest for booty reset this. It's a condensed version of Ratchet and it was the same fun that Nexus was but with 2 major differences.
   The first difference is that I don't know what the whole long running plot is, I don't know who Talwyn is, how Clank was stolen or any of the call backs that were going on. Obviously that's my fault, but it doesn't help me. The other is that I played it too soon after Nexus. I should've given it a break. It was about 8 months ago I played the rebooted PS4 game, and then Nexus a few weeks ago gave it enough of a break between. This has only been a few weeks though and the game started to drag, it was like how I played Titanfall 2 and Battlefield 1 back to back last year and, even though they are very different types of fps', the end of Battlefield dragged. Point is, it was fun for the 4 hours it lasted, any longer though and I'd have got bored, I think I've blown my enthusiasm for 3D mascot platformers though, and I never even got to Jak.

Rebel Galaxy

   This game is very hard to describe in a picture, so I'll do it with my words, which will be terrible, obviously. You're a free wheeling space ship pilot in an open universe. There is a main story to go through, but this is such a small part of the game. To start with the setting then, the universe is split in to separate solar systems, and each one is procedurally generated (and named, I had an area called 'dong'). They are filled with space stations of different factions, nebula's, scrapyards, asteroid belts, enemy gangs and more. This all leads to making money to better your ship. Yes, this is a Spaceship RPG and it's a very interesting take on an rpg, it's certainly the first game like this I've played.
   In many ways it's an attempt at 'Firefly the game', but without being able to land. You can be good or evil, save ships for rewards or become a pirate yourself. you can mine asteroids, search junkyards, trade between stations where prices change depending on the status of the station, take on contracts and join guilds. Terrible description there, Moving on.
   If you are going through the story, you need to improve your ship along the way. You need to buy the new ships and armour them up. This brings me on to one thing I really appreciate which is when you buy a new ship, turret, some cargo space or whatever and want to improve it, you can get the face value back for the original thing so you're not trying to save up money for something better, you can top yourself up as you go without adding dozens more hours of grinding on to the game. The story is mainly a way to funnel you forward to more difficult solar systems so you can move along faster. As someone who spent a long time in the first solar system, take it from me to not do that. The money you can make there is pennies to what you'll make a few hours later.
   So, how do you play the game then? I'm going to assume that no one but me has played Star Trek legacy and just move past that. Steering is how you'd expect, with many different speed controls. It's the fighting that's more interesting though. You can control your broadside cannons (really fitting in with the pirate atmosphere) or any of the individual turrets, or the loose bombs weapons. This can be as simple or as complicated as you like. I ended up just controlling the cannons and the bombs while the turrets were automatically fired. I tried to do it all, controlling everything and switching like a mad man, but it was too much. I think I made the right decision.
   In summation, this is a very interesting game, I'm not sure that its 'great' but it's definitely good and worth trying. It even has a good soundtrack including AJ Styles' much loved 'No one' song and more heavy southern rock. There's full voice acting too which I didn't expect from an indie game. Try it, go on.

Completed

Mekazoo

Bastion

Sound Shapes

Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon

Pony Island

Undertale

Mighty Morphon' Power Rangers Mega Battle

Batman: A Telltale series

Super Mario run

Ratchet and Clank into the Nexus

Westerado: Double Barreled

R-Type: dimensions

Dead Rising 4

Little Big Planet 3

Ratchet and Clank: The quest for Booty

Rebel Galaxy

Week 4

   What was that about a 3D mascot platformer? I don't remember that.

Westerado: Double Barreled

   You fantastic bastard. Recommended by a friend and sitting in my Steam library for months, as games tend to, I never thought I'd play this game, but it seemed short enough to squeeze it in this week. This is a 16 bit rpg set in the wild west, but with a difference. Sure, there's a world map to explore, quests to take and side activities to take part in like any rpg, but there's also the simple to understand, but difficult to master shooting mechanic. You can only shoot directly in front of where your character is standing but you have to reload and cock your weapon before every shot. This works both on foot and on horse back.
   The main difference to the classics of it's genre here and this game is that instead of levelling up your character, you get an additional part of the description for the man who killed your family (don't worry, that's not a spoiler (well, it might be if you don't want to know what happens in the first 30 seconds of the game)) as you are out for vengeance. I'm not sure if at the end of all the missions you get a location for him because I just ran in to him in the world and took him down.
   The map is very interesting with different types of areas and hidden locations to explore. There are branching storylines that can add replayablity (which the game encourages by letting you unlock another character to play through after you finish), Hats to collect, poker to play and other interesting little things to see (just like in all 16 bit rpgs). Hell, my guy became such a bad ass that bandits started running away when I came near them (I still showed no mercy though, obviously). The only problem I have is that the last 10 minutes of the game, after you find the killer when you have to tare through all his cronies to take him down which is a long shooting section that you can't get wrong or you have to start it over again.
   Don't worry about that negative though, this is a fantastic twist and call back to classic games that we all loved as a kid. Play it

   So, after this I wanted a game to play in the background while watching something, so I tried Oddworld again, but decided I'm stuck and game up, So swapped to 'shootsumi', which is a space style shooter (think R-type) but with small 10 second levels and everything is fish based (yeah, good name, I know), but I'm terrible at these games and you don't get infinite lives so I couldn't get very far. So then. to keep with space shooters but a change in perspective I swapped to hyper void. A behind view space shooter. It started well but the difficulty shot up, very fast and it became clear that I would never finish this game, so I gave up. If there is one thing I learned doing these game rushes over the years (and there really is only one)it's that I shouldn't force my way through games I don't enjoy. videogames are maid for entertainment and if I'm not enjoying it then I should stop. So, speaking of R-Type...

R Type: Dimensions

   Now, obviously I could never finish this game properly, how could anyone? seriously? These side on (or top down in the case of Truxton, a Mega drive clssic) space shooters were made to eat your change in arcades and are infamously extremely difficult. This game includes R type 1 and 2 with revamped graphics (although you can switch back to the old at any time (which actually looks better anyway)). Now, you can play it the proper way, with 3 lives, but I couldn't even finish the first level, so that wasn't going to happen. However, there's an infinite mode where you constantly respawn over and over, which is how I could play it. Problem is, this really feels like cheating. Granted, I'd never have done it any other way but you can essentially compete these levels by not pressing anything until you get to the bosses, and when you get there you don't need any thought as you can't really die, you just respwan a second later in the exact same place. I still did try and play it as best I could though, but that's not saying much with my average 30 deaths per level approximately (levels are about 7-8 mins long...). I wasn't going to put this on my completed games list, but my xbox achievements say I've finished it, and who m I to argue with Microsoft?

Dead Rising 4

   So, I plugged my Kinect back in so I'm able to get photos (yes, I actually took this one) and videos off my Xbox, which means I have also got this:

   Exciting I know. So, back in 2006 everybody loved the first Dead Rising, and the sequel as well. Dead Rising 3 then came out as an Xbox One launch exclusive, which got away with being very average because of the general lack of competition for console release games (that said, it was the same year as GTA 5, the last of us, Tomb Raider and many more modern classics, but they were all last gen). So it was time for them to kick this franchise up the arse and bring the glory back from the original. they bought back Frank West (the protagonist from the original) and the shopping centre and went for it.
   So, I enjoyed it largely, it's fun to play with a decent story, there's the weapons to find and build, survivors to rescue, side missions to complete and more collectibles than a Ubsioft open world (well, maybe not, that would be insane). If you liked the original then you will like this one too. It's not without problems though. A lot of the weapon blue prints are locked away and you have to search the map for loads of separate keys, which is a pain in the arse. A lot of the interesting boss battles from the original against maniacs are gone as well, which is a shame. The returning shopping centre is pretty disappointing too as it only makes up about a quarter of the map, and you can only get in to it from one location. The outside world really isn't as interesting as it is inside and in my opinion, I think the centre should probably have took up about three quarters of the map.
   There are improvements on the original though. For one the game auto saves, you don't have to keep going to the toilet to save the game (I went to the loo in the first game more often that I do irl, which is a lot).When you rescue a survivor now you don't have to escort them back to the safe house, they can make their own way. There is also no time limit, which was annoying in the first couple of games where it was nearly impossible to do everything in one game, however, this opportunity was wasted here as there is no continue option when you finish the game, sure you can skip back to the penultimate chapter but you've missed a lot of progress and have to repeat a lot of the already completed tasks. I'm not saying it has to make storyline sense to be able to continue at the end, but let us do it anyway.
   A late top tip for this game, during the week I played it (about 2 months after its original release), there was a ridiculously sized 7 gb update, but, it did add on loads of street fighter outfits for your character, like M. Bison, a hot Cammy outfit for Frank West as you can see above, a muscle bound Zangief costume that allowed me to see the finale of the game from a super buff outfit, and more. That's on top of all the street fighter gear that already cones in the game. I know Capcoms big thing is Street fighter, it's one of the biggest franchises in all of gaming, and I do love me some Street fighter 2, but who actually wants a T-Hawk Costume?

Completed

Mekazoo

Bastion

Sound Shapes

Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon

Pony Island

Undertale

Mighty Morphon' Power Rangers Mega Battle

Batman: A Telltale series

Super Mario run

Ratchet and Clank into the Nexus

Westerado: Double Barreled

R-Type: dimensions

Dead Rising 4

Week 3

   I think I have an addiction to an out-dated game genre brewing. That will come up later. My attempt to not pay for any games during this ended pre maturely, all of this weeks games were paid for over the last week or two, never mind, moving on.

Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers Mega Battle

   The side scrolling brawler has never been my favourite genre. Not the 'classics' (I use inverted commas as I don't class them as such (cause they're super over rated)) like Streets of Rage, Golden Axe and such, or the late 00's revival with the likes of Scott Pilgrim and Castle Crashers. But the bizarre 20+ year old licence of something I loved as a kid sold me. Interestingly, you may think that this is to advertise the upcoming movie but they all look like the originals, not the characters from the trailer and certainly not like a fleet of multi coloured Iron Men. Also, I love how it's only based on the original series' from when I was a kid, none of these newer ones that obviously can't live up to the heights of the classic. This game was clearly aimed at me and my type with the age of both the franchise and genre (though not the genre for me, obvs).
   On to the game. It plays fine, it's got all the things you'd expect and it works. Thankfully, it's a lot easier than some of the earlier games of it's type (mmpr the movie (on mega drive (the better version)) of course included) because I always found them difficult, but you can turn it up to hard if you insist, but be warned, the save points are far apart. The game is aimed at a multi player crowd so could make for a fun party game. Obviously when the first Zord battle came up, I was very excited, but what a let down. Each has 2 rounds, the first a point and shoot mini game that would have been a lot better with a light gun (though no Virtua cop of course), then the second a simple combo game (though no Parapa the rapper of course). It's very simple for the end of a level which is a bit of a let down.
   Ultimately this is a great homage to Might Morphin' power rangers with the classic character models, the ability to morph, the story of turning the evil Green ranger good, the battles with Goldar, Rita and Zedd which is all realised with beautiful graphics and a great art style. Of this genre of game, it's fantastic, so long as you were a fan of the show as a child (Wow, there was a lot of unknown words in that spellcheck; 'Multi' 'Zord' 'Virtua' 'Goldar'...).

Batman: The Telltale Series

 

   Remember when everybody loved Telltale's walking dead? In case you don't Telltale games are animated stories where you pick from conversational options to tailor the story the way you want it with small bits of game play put in. The famous issue is they haven't improved their game engine that was outdated 5 years ago. To be fair, it's all about the story though, and this is a good one. It's an interesting change of the Batman story with Bruce's dad a secret crime lord and Two face running for Mayor. Those changes and others keep the story fresh and unpredictable which is necessary for a such a well known story. I don't want to go too deep in to the plot so as to spoil it as that's basically the whole thing but it is worth looking in to for yourselves.
   On the negative side, yes, the game engine is bad but I've already mentioned that and is well publicised already, but as long as you know that going in then it's bearable. The other problems are classic Telltale issues that I'd forgotten about since it was a long time ago that Walking dead season 2 came out (the last Telltale game I played). Over use of quick time events and some conversations where no mater what you pick you say the wrong thing. These can frustrate but as long as you're in to the story you'll work through.

Super Mario Run

   Nintendo made a big deal about making phone games a few months ago when they made a deal with apple (I think it was apple) and no we can all feast on the fruits of their labour. A constant runner game where you control the jumps by simply tapping the screen but it actually has levels in it. I know this has been done before, notably with Rayman but this is the first of it's type I've played personally. The levels are wonderfully designed for this game style, which is the point really, but still has to be commended, even though it must be said that all Mario games have well designed levels.
   The problem with having those well designed levels seems to have meant that there are very few of them and the main game is over very fast. the designers have added in a large series of collectable coins, an online challenge for racing other people to get the most coins and also some weird kingdom making thing. These are all commendable for extending the game, but as I've said many times, I don't like playing games over and over for collectables, but many people out there will like it, and that's fine. The online runs lead on to the other problem. The game always has to stay connected so you can compare your scores against those of your friends and be able to do an online run at any time. This is a huge data drain for your phone (well, it is for mine) and it's constant updates take up a lot of storage.
   To summarise, it's a fun little game but Nintendo need to figure out the finer points of making mobile games, but this is hopefully just the beginning of a beautiful relationship.

Ratchet and Clank into the Nexus

   Not a great picture I know. This is where my new addiction may be coming in at 3d mascot platformers. Rewind a year or so and see what I wrote about last years Ratchet and clank and you'll see many mentions of who I never played any of these games throughout the ps2 and ps3 life cycles because I'm an idiot. So, after loving last years re-imagining of the original game I wanted to play an older one to see what's up. So, I decided upon the last ps3 game, as it seems to be the most stand alone of them all. There clearly is a lot of lore that I'm missing but it's not all intertwined like the Internet tells me the others are (or so the internet tells me). Getting back to what I was saying about the action platformers is that upon booting  my ps3 up for the first time since The stick of truth came out, it turned out that I had loads of them that were never played. I've got all the Jak hd collection, Sly Thieves in time, Ratchet tools of destruction as well as quest for booty, which came free with nexus (not bad for £5). So there might suddenly be a lot of these turning up on here, which I hadn't planned on.
   Talking of other things that aren't related to the game, What's with the PS3 menu? It's awful. No wonder I went all in on the 360 over the PS3, what a terrible menu, store and online system. The other, the dual shock 3. Back when I got my first dual shock for PS1, it seemed like an amazing piece of hardware, but 10 years later when the PS3 came out it was outdated and now, some 20 years later, it's awful. It's so weird to hold, so small and let's not start on the length of the charging cable. Thank god they made a nice new controller now, although not the charging cable. What game was this again?
   Obviously I'm very new to this 15 year old series so I can't discuss back story or new ideas on the series, but I can say that it's terrific. It's very close to being as good as the one my beloved game from last year and was left to wonder how I could have missed this series for so long. Obviously it doesn't look as good as last years which takes away some of the brightness and the game doesn't really pop from a looks perspective. The gameplay is very similar to the one last year, only dropping a little of the speed (well, not dropping I guess as this was out first, but you get my point) and the little Clank gravity switching platforming segments are fantastic. The weapon choices are fun again (as is apparently always the case in Ratchet games) but towards the end there was so many you had to swap between two pages of weapons, which was a bit excessive for me (or they could've just made a bigger weapon wheel). It had all the great collecting elements, weapon upgrades and levelling up that made me love the last years game. The only issue I have is that you can't fully level up and collect everything without playing through twice, but fortunately it doesn't impact the game as a whole.
   I can really see myself going back to play more of the older ones, as well as Sly and Jak. I lost time playing this game which rarely happens to me, but Ratchet and Clank: into the Nexus really took me in.

   Just on a side note, I've gotten really stuck on Oddworld thanks to some bad controls (or that's the excuse I'm going with), so not sure what the situation there is.


Completed

Mekazoo

Bastion

Sound Shapes

Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon

Pony Island

Undertale

Mighty Morphon' Power Rangers Mega Battle

Batman: A Telltale series

Super Mario run

Ratchet and Clank into the Nexus

Underway

Oddworld New n' Tasty

Week 2

   A varied week of games, a lot tried, many completed, many more gave up on, so lets begin.

Far Cry 3 Blood Dragon

   I love far cry and this stand alone dlc (yes, I'm counting this, I make my own rules) is well regarded by many. I didn't play it at it's time of release (not sure why) and it is a last gen game (I'm trying to play more of these games that i missed) that recently came to games with gold. As you may know, Far cry 4 has came out on current gen platforms since this (hence the number 3), which has led this to be, unfortunately, outdated. At least that's how it seemed to me. I like the base idea of the 80's action film set up of the game but I didn't think it followed through with the idea as well as it could've done.
   The open word exists, but was largely empty except for some angry animals and a few classic Far cry towers, hey can safely be skipped through unless you want some weapon bonuses, there seems not to be much point. As I hinted, it plays fine, but not as good as Far cry 4, which is a disappointment, it seems like I might really have enjoyed it had I played it when it came out, but I didn't, so here we are.

Pony Island

   This is an interesting game that gained a lot of interest about a year ago, so naturally I just played it now. It's a PC only game, but that's really the only place that this game will work. The gameplay is simple, largely simple puzzles and simple runner mini games. The story is where it's at. i don't want to give away too much as that's the whole idea of the game. I can say that the game play is quite forgettable, the runner gets annoying at times and the thought did pass hat this whole game was a way to put out a bad game, but that is a very negative way to look at it, so pretty standard for me, but you never know... Still interesting though and definitely worth playing.

   Okay, this is the point at which I tried a bunch of games and got either stuck or bored. So, first I played Furi, an action boss rush game, which was a weird choice for me what with my dislike of bosses and all, so I got frustrated at that quickly and quit. Then I tried Invisible Inc, a turn based strategy game along the lines of xcom, except that it's way more difficult, so I quit. Galak-Z was next, a Rogue like (look it up yourselves) space shooter. It's an interesting idea of flying a defender style ship (not realy but kinda) around a maze on missions. Couldn't get in to it though so I quit. Then there was colour guardians, which is some kind of kids lane changing runner game, it was trash. I hope no poor child ever gets subjected to it, so I quit.

   So, I dusted off the Wii u, for maybe the last time (Switch dependent) to play Sonic and the lost world, a game that I Couldn't believe that I hadn't played before as it hits both the Sonic and Wii U exclusive points that I'd pick it up for, but I didn't remember playing it. So, I spent £25(ish) on buying it, loaded it up and turned out I have a finished save file, and as I'm the only person to have owned this console, it must've been me that has played it through and I had just forgot. So, I played the first few levels, and then yeah, I remembered it, despite the fact that the youtube videos didn't remind me of it at all. i think i have memory issues.

   So then I moved on to another game I didn't really like, but still played a good chunk of it...

Oddworld New n' Tasty

   Abe's odyssey is another game I never played due to not getting a ps1 until very late due to the bloody Saturn (pretty sure I've mentioned that before). Point is that this is a remake of that game and I've been interested in a while since it came to PS plus, and it was time to jump in. One issue though, it has aged terribly. As many of you may know it's a puzzle platformer but as you may also know, or remember I guess is that the jump from 16 bit consoles to 64 was a bad one for platformers. Sure, it's still a 2D one but it does not control well, though I don't really understand why that can't have been fixed here in the remake (but it hasn't).
   The ideas of the game and the look are all good, it's the bad gameplay that really lets it down. I want to enjoy it, it's got a lot to like but it really is tough to get through certain sections that need tight control, which there isn't. I'll probably continue with it, I'm sure over the next 10 weeks I can slowly work my way through it on the side, I'll see.

Undertale

   Another cult hit on Steam, this time from 2015, but again one where I can't really discuss the story without spoiling it. It's a simple 8/ 16 bit rpg but with expanded systems. It has a talking mechanic during battles that is interesting, a bullet hell style defence system where you have to move your heart to protect yourself as well as timed attacks. But that's not the main point of this game, it's in the story and in the world. The world is intricately filled with interesting characters and funny little bits as well as hidden items around the world.
   As for the story, it's filled with branching paths, different playstyles and an array of enemies. Be warned though, the 'true' ending only comes if you don't kill anyone for the whole game. I wish I knew that 5 minutes in to the game. It's hard to advertise this game without giving away a bunch of spoilers, all I can say is that it's worth it. It's often on a Steam sale for a couple of quid and can be finished in around 6 hours (at least that's how long it took me) but multiple playthroughs are encouraged if you want to get more hours out of it. Top tip though, if you get the flowey ending, make sure you reload it after it crashes, there's more, I nearly missed it.

Completed

Mekazoo

Bastion

Sound Shapes

Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon

Pony Island

Undertale

Underway

Oddworld New n' Tasty