What Are You Playing Currently?

/falls down all the stairs
I am legitimately playing Elder Scrolls Online. ^^

Reliving Final Fantasy X through the HD remaster. It brought back quite a few memories.

^ Dat Auron.

TheMagician wrote:Reliving Final Fantasy X through the HD remaster. It brought back quite a few memories.

I went to the local game store to buy the FFX/FFX-2 HD Remaster, but... they were already sold out! D:
I've ordered the game now, but apparently they're having some kind of problem with new deliveries, which means I'll have to wait quite a bit longer (maybe I should just have cancelled my order and looked for the game elsewhere)...
<edit>

I have the game now, but I'm gonna finish my Xenogears replay first. ^^

In the meanwhile, I've made some progress in my Xenogears replay; I'm currently in Kislev - D Block.
I've noticed some people think this part of the game drags on for too long, but I love it.
<edit>

I'm now in Shevat. Babel Tower wasn't so bad... it helps that I managed to make all the difficult jumps on the first try. 8]

Replaying Xenogears too.

I've noticed some people think this part of the game drags on for too long, but I love it.
<edit>

I'm now in Shevat. Babel Tower wasn't so bad... it helps that I managed to make all the difficult jumps on the first try.

Actually, it does "drag" a bit in the sense that you have to go through about 2 hours of cutscenes (from my notes, it really is blatant how longer this part is) in the exact same city, and this is not counting exploring and random battles and battling. You don't spend that amount of time in the same place before Kislev/Nortune. In fact, the entire part from the beginning of the game to the Yggdrasil's loss is about 4 hours long in term of cutscenes. The time you spend in Nortune alone is half of this so it's not an impression that you spend way too much time in a single location.
But I didn't dislike my time in Kislev either. Those Midgar vibes and all that...

As for Babel Tower, I always thought people were vastly exaggerating about the jumping nightmare it supposedly is (it's not close to be the worse dungeon of the game in my book, hell no...). It's not THAT bad. And the atmosphere and music are excellent so...
Plus, you get to Shevat and it's like a reward. I don't know if it's because of the music or the fact that Shevat is a city in the skies but this part always felt refreshing to me until you have to defend it against Solaris..

I'm playing FF6 a bit also. And Skyrim which I enjoy more than before (I just love the amount of lore... and I watched some parts of Oblivion and Morrowind and damn, I could also play those despite the fact they look a bit creepy/stiff). I also downloaded the demo version of Fez and Journey on the PSN. Damn, I need to buy those entirely. They're so relaxing and the music is awesome (Journey is also eyeporn, what a beauty). Also, I noticed that you can now play Tearaway on the PS3.

RadicalDreamer wrote:As for Babel Tower, I always thought people were vastly exaggerating about the jumping nightmare it supposedly is (it's not close to be the worse dungeon of the game in my book, hell no...). It's not THAT bad. And the atmosphere and music are excellent so...
Plus, you get to Shevat and it's like a reward. I don't know if it's because of the music or the fact that Shevat is a city in the skies but this part always felt refreshing to me until you have to defend it against Solaris..

Well, I was expecting a jumping nightmare, because I screwed those jumps up so many times in my previous playthroughs of the game. Except then I was using an emulator and just savestated prior to each jump. Obviously this isn't possible when playing the game "for real" on the PS3.

But I came up with a plan; when I reached Babel Tower on the PS3, I loaded up Xenogears on my emulator, used the debug room to get me to Babel Tower and... yes, I practiced each jump on my emulator, then switched back to my PS3 and performed the same jumps which I had just practiced a couple of times on the emulator. I kept switching between my PS3 and the emulator for all of the jumps and got through Babel Tower playing like that. xD
[size=85](I still think the swinging rope near the very beginning is the worst offender, I messed it up many times on the emulator and I'm grateful I pulled it off on the first try on the PS3)[/size]

I've reached disc 2 by now and yesterday I defeated

Spoiler:

Today I get to deal with the game's only truly challenging boss fight which remains on disc 2

Spoiler:

<edit>

Grrrr...! That took me several tries. This and the previously mentioned Mahanon challenge makes me wish you could skip cutscenes...  :dead3:

<edit #2>

Xenogears replay finished! Ah, it feels good to have finally played it again. ^^
Total game time at last savepoint: 71+ hours. Wow, I don't think any of my previous playthroughs took that much time. I might have gone a bit overboard with getting each character the best possible equipment at all possible times.

Anyway, now that I'm done with my Xenogears replay, I'm gonna start playing the FFX/X-2 HD Remaster! :]

Currently, looking to go through all of Shadow Hearts starting sometime this week for nostalgia's sake since replaying all of Xenosaga;

and finishing 'em all, is making me crave more good ol' times.

Other than that, possibly starting LOZ:Minish Cap.

mysticnocturne wrote:Currently, looking to go through all of Shadow Hearts starting sometime this week for nostalgia's sake since replaying all of Xenosaga;

and finishing 'em all, is making me crave more good ol' times.

Ah, Shadow Hearts is a lovely series. Xenosaga and Shadow Hearts share several voice actors, but the most hilarious one must be Cherenkov/Joachim. When I first heard Cherenkov's voice, I immediately recognized his voice and couldn't help but think he was gonna say something like "No evil-doer can stand against my rippling muscles!"

:zimlol:

I'm still playing FFX HD, now at the end of the game and slowly getting started on all the post-game content.

I've also bought myself a new game; Beyond: Two Souls. I already finished it, but there are still some endings I haven't seen yet.

So now I'm alternating between FFX HD and Beyond: Two Souls. ^^

I've been replaying Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Red Rescue Team because what a good game. I also got the FFX/X-2 remaster and I played a little bit of it but I've become too lazy to charge my Vita at the moment. XD Finally, I'm at the final boss of Bravely Default but once again I'm too lazy to beat it.

Backing up a few steps, Joachim was the high point of my Shadow Hearts 2 playthrough. I went to great lengths to complete the curry tower thing. ^^;



I'm actually still playing ESO, myself. ^^ I bought Bravely Default and tried to start it, but getting to a spot where I can play it with the sound on is tricky.

Lately, I resumed playing Assassin's Creed 4 and The Last of Us.
I wasn't sure liking AC4 (first time I play a AC game too) because I think the gameplay is a bit too much restrictive and... do they really need to tell me where everything is on the map ? There is no fun knowing where every item is. But oh well, the completionist in me at least have fun trying to get everything. And I find the parts where you can fail running after people and have to do it again kinda annoying.
But I got used to it and once the game made a captain in control of her ship (well his... but I don't give much of a crap about the main male character *the story is pretty meh/unclear right about now too... I'm just enjoying being a pirate in the Caribbeans* so... it's my ship yo), well... I guess it got better. I like playing dumb mini-games too lol. How amusing... I have the time of my life reading books in Skyrim and playing checkers in AC4. I'm not sure I'm doing video games right sometimes, lol (and I don't care).
The Last of Us frustrates me because it's now my first encounter alone with a hord of zombies and I keep getting eaten. I don't know, I tried to sneak behind one but it didn't work and I got all the others on me.

I am currently playing the PSP remake of the good ol' Tactics Ogre. It is awesome all around, would recommend to anyone.

Details:

- Color palette got updated, nicely narrated and animated intro and intermissions between chapters to better keep track of all the politicking events got added, glorious portrait art for everyone, spiffy video effects for weather and spells and all that stuff;

- Job system got a rehaul; if you are a fan of the previous one maybe not all of the changes will be to your taste (every class available for generic characters got either merged with its opposite gender counterpart or recieved newly drawn and animated sprites in case it didn't have one, for example; yay for gender equality, nay for class distinctions), but I personally found it fun and interesting; the main feature of the game's spellcasting - everyone starting with 0 mp at the beggining of any battle - is still there though, so don't worry overmuch;

- Text in both speech bubbles and game database got cleaned up (and in a much less irritating manner than, say, the FFT remake); there are some places where it still doesn't really make sense and some characters change their behavior a bit too abruptly and I've even found a typo, but overall all plot-related things became much better; (and there are even some additions in the form of new cutscenes showcasing some important scenes that previously happened off-screen and just some brand-new characters and plotlines alltogether);

All in all, this thing gets a glowing recommendation from me. If you are into things akin to FFT, this game could spruce up your days very nicely even if you didn't play its previous releases on either snes or playstation.

I decided to blow on the dust covering my Wii and plug it again.

I'm replaying Xenoblade. With everyone going crazy (positive and negative, there is wank and hype, from different sides... as I knew would happen) about Xenocross, I thought I might revisit the game and see if I would like it better the second time. It made me laugh a bit that the Wii remembers the last time I touched the game. Early 2012. Level 86 or something, around 150 hours or more. And my sister got that one save from September 2011 (she didn't play much, stuff like this or FF12 are boring to her), when the game got released in Europe. I was scared the game would look too ugly on my recent HD TV but it's surprisingly fine (Xenogears, on another hand *cries*, damn you technology). Now, I don't know if the game is going to give me headaches/eye pains in the first ten hours again. I hope not. I still don't know if I was the only one suffering from that or if this was the game's fault.

I wanted to see if I could enjoy it better if I played it differently. Meaning, leave all the quests for the endgame except for the time limited ones. But I think the game wasn't made to be enjoyed like that, unfortunately. What the point in doing the side quests at the end if you're overlevelled as hell (it's the same reason the new game + option sucks) ? It's no fun. But doing all the sidequests as you play slow down the pacing of the story A LOT and can get tiresome too. Not sure what to do. It's all or nothing with this game, it seems.

Also, I gave myself a pointless but kinda amusing rule : I'm going to leave half of the chests unopened. That way, I'll forget about them for a while, then come back... and this will be like Easter Day... or most RPGs with chests to find (I wish Takahashi could just... get traditional chests back in Xenocross).
Also, I stand on my initial opinion about the soundtrack. Area/town/usual battle music are nothing special to me. They do the job but... calling those some of the best in any jRPGs ? Really ? And this one song sounding like Maria's theme near the beginning... well, let's say I prefer Maria's theme to this day.

Honestly, I think the best tracks are mostly from the cutscenes (and since it's a big game and different tracks are used for them, you don't necessarily remember all of them at the end of the game... except for the main theme... and yes, it's beautiful and one of the best track of the game, praise Yoko Shimomura).

There are just a few area/battle tracks I consider worth remembering (from my memory, Valak during the day, Mechanical Rythm, one of the tracks from Agniratha... and the one from Nopon village is kinda cute... oh yeah... and Unfinished Battle for a battle song).

I'll never understand people's popular love for the normal battle songs. Or the colonies'. Or prefering Valak mountain theme during the night. Or finding the Marsh an amazingly beautiful place (Macalania from FF10 looked better... and tons of areas in Okami too *the Marsh felt slightly cellshaded to me, thus my comparaison*). I have other examples. Overall, I feel like what I liked and disliked in this game differ A LOT from what is most popular in the fandom (for the record, I enjoyed the High Entia Tomb for the atmosphere, gameplay and reminding me of some place in Shevat... and it seems like nobody cared about it because it was a small dungeon ).

Another thing I'm looking at is the animation. My main gripe with Xenocross's models right now is the lack of emotions on the characters' face in, what seems to be, major cutscenes. Xenoblade seems to have different kind of cutscenes... some more animated than others. Let's hope Xenocross ends up being like that too in the final version, at least.

I've been playing Ever17 lately. I started out playing it slowly but like with the rest of Uchikoshi's work I have been sucked in. I'm currently working on getting my third ending.

Played a bit more of Xenoblade. Not even past 10 hours and/or past

Spoiler:

. It's like I'm beginning to feel some sort of fatigue already  :blank2: . This soon in the game. 2/3 years after my first time. And yeah, I tried less sidequests this time. But it makes the next areas really difficult to go through. Like, "instant death difficult, please, come back later". How could people exactly rush this game ? Unless mindless grinding is their idea of fun (grinding feels more like work than fun... I did tons of it on Valkyrie Profile 2's third chapter to get unique powerful weapons... cool reward but... never again). It's no better than dull quests to me. Au contraire. At least, the dull quest gives you a shallow reason for beating the crap out of monsters.

The first time I played Xenoblade, I did almost all the quests as soon as I found them. Can't help it, I want to see all the things games have to offer when I first play them (especially if they are expensive... Xenoblade was). And let me tell you I never understood why it was said they made you over-levelled... because I did struggle against certain main story bosses while doing every quest. So, yeah... people who rushed through the game and finished it in 50 hours or so are a mystery to me. And the beginning of Xenoblade especially feels like something we're meant to spend hours on, questing/building bonds in the colony and between your characters... until there is almost nothing left available at this point of the story. Why ? Because of

Spoiler:

Did the same with Dragon Quest 8 and FF12 and I can't replay both either. I wish I could erase those games from my memory because they seem to immediately get duller on a second playthought instead of getting better. All also share the similitaries of having lackluster/simple stories and characters too. It's fine the first time you play... but once you know everything... replay value is kinda lost, storywise. I consider that Xenoblade is slightly better than those 2 about story replay value though (of course, previous Xeno games were far more rewarding when it came to that, but Xenoblade has it a tiny little bit too).

Ah yeah, another thought I didn't share last time but... it's really weird seeing Dickson being all

Spoiler:

Also, I managed to mess up the first heart to heart between Shulk and Fiora. Exactly like I did last time  :zimlol: . Welp, karma is karma. Partly messed up the one with Reyn and Shulk about their friendship (yeah, because I don't care to remember the bad times... you got to be best buddies after that ? My bad... or not... still don't care to remember, Reyn).

Also, I did say that I was positively surprised by the graphics on my HD TV. But the truth is... of course it makes the game uglier. But it's not too bothersome, I guess (well, the aliasing could end up feeling painful to my eyes... not that the game didn't have aliasing already on my old non hd tv). Looking at the demo for Xenocross now, it really does seem nextgen compared to Blade. It looks smoother. The visuals and the characters. And the jumping/falling animation from Cross is good. The one from Blade is... hilariously inexistent.

Now, something that's bothering me. I chose to play in japanese this time. This is cool, I like the voices... but I wish I could understand what the hell they are saying post battle (plus, I love the japanese language... I'll probably never have the time to learn it the way I learned english... sigh). Come to think of it, I probably only understood what they're saying in the english VA because I know the language. I used to think this game had subtitles during post battle chats for french gamers (there are subtitles when the characters get chatty during battles in FF10)... but apparently not. Kinda sucks.

Last comment for now... I didn't remembering being so frustrated with the camera (but maybe I ended up not caring anymore after hours and hours of playing the game). It's kinda bad.

Edit : I think I realized what makes the game a bit tedious/irritating for me to replay. Maybe it's not so much the sidequests after all that frustrate me. I think it's more the maps' ridiculously large size that is the problem. And wow, this makes me realize Takahashi probably recognized this since Xenocross will allow you to run faster... and of course use mechs (maybe there will be other vehicles but from what we saw in the trailers, mechs seem to do everything *fight, fly, change into motorcycles...*).

.: Currently playing Front Mission 3 for Alisa's story route.

I've picked up a copy of Viscera Cleanup Detail on steam early access. It's... I don't have words, you need to see the awesome for yourself.

Got myself a copy of Shadowrun returns. Fell out of life for several days. The best description I can think of is: it is like NWN, but for Shadowrun.

Highly recommend it even if you didn't even read the TVTropes page on the subject once.

I beat Ever17 quite some time ago and I recently started playing Growlanser: Wayfarer of Time. It seems like it's gonna be fun.

I had to make a pause with Xenoblade. I'm making my way

Spoiler:

So, I downloaded and played some demos on PS3 instead (because I don't have money but I want to discover and play other things) :

- The Unfinished Swan : it feels like a pretty nostalgic game... like old tales we were told during childhood. In a way, It slightly reminded me of the King and the Mokingbird animated french movie... especially as you enter the castle area. And the paintball gameplay is so simple but so effective. You become really eager to figure out your surrounding.
- Brothers, a Tale of Two Sons : no lines/dialogues, a very simple premise, 2 characters you can control at the same time (which can be a bit confusing at times... wonder if another player can join because it would work well)... there is a charm to it. I ended up being curious about the rest of the game when the demo ended. Title is kind of dumb, though.
- Beyond Good and Evil HD : gawd. Need.To.Buy.This.Jewel. Amazing classic, it really seems to be. That is all. It's quite funny and has varied characters (from the main female character to the supporting cast). I also like taking pictures of animals (kind of reminds me this one Pokemon game I never bought but always played in the toy shop, back when I was a kid).
- Rayman 3 HD : Lots of people seems to think the Rayman series stopped being relevant with 2 (on PS1). But the demo to this seemed kinda fun (and Murphy made me laugh at times... though I guess he may have been viewed as obnoxious by some). Sure, it doesn't seem to be dark like Rayman 2 but... I still enjoyed it.
- Warp : very fun game. The cute little alien also sounds like Wall-E. But he isn't as... harmless. Seriously, it's kinda gross how he warps into bodies to make them explode. Beware the cute ones, as they say. I find the game kinda cool.
- Limbo : I heard it's a praised indie game. Well, the demo showed me nice little things (despite the fact that you can die in really dumb ways... like pushing a trap out of the way but still falling into it because the character moves so fast) but I'm a bit luckwarm about it. Maybe playing the full game feels more rewarding or something.
- From Dust : I remember mixed reviews about this. But I enjoyed the stuff I played and saw. It's unique and pretty. Some stuff could get frustrating, I admit... but I guess it adds a bit of challenge.
- The Walking Dead : I got the entire first episode as the demo. Kinda cool. I sure can't wait to play the rest. It's really great (you get attached easily) and force you to make tough choices. Love Lee (the main character... who is black) and Clementine (is she asian or is it just me ?).
- The Wolf Among Us : this one only let you play until the first fight ends. But the story seems interesting. It's like a darker Once Upon a Time or something.
- Beyond : Two Souls : I want to play the full game because I find it impressive at times. I heard the plot wasn't that great at the end of the day and many enjoy to mock David Cage... but despite the popularity of cinematic games, no one really pushes the concept as far as he does and Beyond is visually breathtaking. It can't escape the uncanny valley curse (that's how things are with photorealistic 3D for now) but I can't help feeling impressed and a bit freaked out sometimes (in a positive way). Some parts felt like controlling actors rather than 3D models.
- Flower : Well, it's kind of relaxing and frustrating at the same time ("I missed that flower again, ugh"). I think I enjoy it but probably less than Journey. Didn't try Flow yet.
- Papo & Yo : I'm in love with this one. It's a very personal and creative journey. Main character is a black kid (probably brasilian, based on the scenery and the developer's name) chasing after a young girl in the city. At some point, he will meet a monster (and I think this is basically the duo that reflects the author/developer's issues with his father). I only saw its shadow in the demo. The soundtrack is ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL and evolves as you play.
- Black Knight Sword : it's one of Suda51's games apparently. And whoa... it kinda shows. The guy is crazy. In a good way. It's a macabre and theatrical sidescrolling game with a narrator. It's glorious. And it has cats to collect. Don't ask.
- Monkey Island 2 HD/Remake : Well, it's one of the glorious point and click LucasArt games of yesterday that involved Tim Schafer. Of course, I want to fully play it. And I can't for now  :frown3: .
- Eufloria : seems kind of simplistic at first but then, I really enjoyed sending my seedlings to WAR. That's right, gardening in space is brutal !
- Sine Mora : I'm not sure what the game is worth. I'm not familiar with this type of game so I'm sure there is far better elsewhere. But the art direction/charadesign is so amazing and it pretty much caught my interest when the game was first announced years ago ! Kinda wish it was a jRPG instead lol. That said, I don't dislike those type of games, especially not with such great art. That said... are the characters all speaking russian ? Or is this a made up language ?

Played the demos for Back to the Future, Giana Sisters Twisted Dreams, PixelJunk Shooter, a bad and insulting Uncharted rip off (that was said to have no violence at all in it and based only on solving mysteries, I'm cool with games that rely on other things than shooting stuff... but this game is just bad... and no, I'm not talking about the arab Uncharted rip off *which is pretty bad too, I heard... though I appreciate that people from the middle east try to make games, it's pretty rare*), UNO, Deathmatch Village, Castle of Illusions, Earthworm Jim and others I may have forgotten... but I ended up erasing them (either because it was bad or wasn't for me or figured the demo took too much space for games that I would better enjoy in the full version later *like the 2 last games I mentionned*).

Playing all those demos and thinking about the space left... it made me realize (even more) how unfair modern gaming is. You apparently can't get more than 2 PSN accounts linked to PS3s. Does that mean people will be screwed after their second PS3 kick the bucket ? Also, can I uninstall downloaded/bought games without worrying I'll have to buy them again ? I'm unsure.
Limitations seem so unnecessary and dishonest. I'm not buying via the PSN mainly because I lack the money... but honestly... I don't trust the system because I don't feel I have control over the games and could be forced one day to buy them again. Back in the days, you had your PS1/PS2, your games and you could play them without worry all you wanted. You didn't need to install games and pray to have space left on your machine either. The only thing you needed was a few memory cards. That's it.

Also, I didn't play the demo or anything... and I don't think it's on PS3 (it's currently on PC) but I've heard of a really promising wRPG game called Divinity : Original Sin. I hope I'm not mistaken. People say it's the way most wRPGs should have gone for years but didn't. From what I could gather, it's an insanely rich RPG. I'd like to try it one day.

I recently preordered 4 video games (what's wrong with me??), and while I did, I picked up Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth. The style was a tad different from the other games, but I'm digging it thus far. I sadly still have 3 RPGs on my Vita I still haven't beaten, but I might move them aside until I beat the Miles Edgeworth game.

I foolishly took part in the Steam summer sale, so I have a few games I added to my backlog, such as Cherry Tree High Comedy Club (which is like Persona 3/4, but without all the fighting) and Septerra Core (which was 99 cents and sounded good, but I think I might have jumped the gun a bit...).

.: Harvest Moon- Tale of Two Towns is so fun at the moment!!!

Jintoki wrote:I recently preordered 4 video games (what's wrong with me??), and while I did, I picked up Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth.  The style was a tad different from the other games, but I'm digging it thus far.  I sadly still have 3 RPGs on my Vita I still haven't beaten, but I might move them aside until I beat the Miles Edgeworth game.

I'm replaying the first three games. I almost finished the first (last case with Ema).
I didn't like Investigation that much (despite liking Edgeworth, Franciska and Gumshoe a lot). I thought the main series with Phoenix was funnier overall (and I play for the funny moments and references). I even enjoyed Apollo Justice better (while I heard it's the most disliked game in the series). I guess the writers weren't the same.
By the way, I saw the chara-designer of the first trilogy at Japan Expo a few weeks ago. He even drew something (I have the picture on my phone but I can't link anything to my computer these days). That was great.

Chrono Trigger on DS <3

I got to play Firefall for the first time yesterday. IMHO, the way the world exploration, setting and quests are set up resembles the next Xeno game we are waiting for quite a bit.