What Games Are You Playing?

Tales of Graces f

After a grand total of 20 minutes, I'm not entirely sure I like this game. I just can't get to grips with the combat, it's really weird. For one, you don't seem to directly control the character, you just select a target and the guy seems to move towards the enemy, but if you are blocking you can kind of sidestep? It seems really weird, and I'm not so keen. That and I have no idea how to attack effectively. It tells me to move the stick in different directions, but despite doing that, I still don't seem to be racking up combos. I feel like I'm just sitting there waggling the stick and pressing X, it feels like there's no strategy to to it. All that and I don't like how they chuck every system and the kitchen sink at you in the very first area, and it all kind of washed over me, and it left me feeling rather confused by the whole thing, and I haven't even left the starting area. Exactly the same thing put me off playing the SAO game too. It's a large reason why I dislike real time JRPGs, they seem so complex. When I'm playing Pokemon or Persona, I just pick a move and it works, I don't have to keep track of twenty things whilst waggling a stick about and still losing. I'm not ready to write it off just yet, but it's not giving me a brilliant first impression, honestly.
 
IncendiaryLemon said:
Tales of Graces f

After a grand total of 20 minutes, I'm not entirely sure I like this game. I just can't get to grips with the combat, it's really weird. For one, you don't seem to directly control the character, you just select a target and the guy seems to move towards the enemy, but if you are blocking you can kind of sidestep? It seems really weird, and I'm not so keen. That and I have no idea how to attack effectively. It tells me to move the stick in different directions, but despite doing that, I still don't seem to be racking up combos. I feel like I'm just sitting there waggling the stick and pressing X, it feels like there's no strategy to to it. All that and I don't like how they chuck every system and the kitchen sink at you in the very first area, and it all kind of washed over me, and it left me feeling rather confused by the whole thing, and I haven't even left the starting area. Exactly the same thing put me off playing the SAO game too. It's a large reason why I dislike real time JRPGs, they seem so complex. When I'm playing Pokemon or Persona, I just pick a move and it works, I don't have to keep track of twenty things whilst waggling a stick about and still losing. I'm not ready to write it off just yet, but it's not giving me a brilliant first impression, honestly.
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But the linear motion battle system is ace! I agree it's a little difficult to get to grips with initially though. (There should also be a free run button at some point, so you can hold that down rather than being locked to your target).

Dive into the config (if they've let you yet) and change the character control to manual rather than "semi-auto". You should also be able to set up your team mates to attack what you're attacking to help rack up a combo, so block while they're attacking to regain CP (or whatever it is), then start attacking when they have to break off.

There is a lot of mashing in tales, but once you've mapped some of your favorite attacks to the stick directions, it can be quite satisfying pulling them off in a combo.
 
It's been a while since I played a Tales game, but I seem to recall the combat system working as a kind of side scrolling brawler with the option to "circle" your opponent (maybe it's more like a 2.5D arena fighting game). I also seem to recall finding that "cheap" tactics like hit and run to the rear tended to work better than going toe-to-toe with enemies. I think it might also be one of those systems that improves as you gain more abilities and thus more options for dealing with opponents. It's possible I'm not remembering quite right though.

I'm not sure I ever really got into the battle system in a Tales game, I suppose I learned to tolerate them but I don't recall ever feeling like I had an especially enjoyable battle. Saying that, I've only played a couple of Tales games so maybe I just played the wrong ones or played them at the wrong time.
 
Lutga said:
Oh same, I was definitely into Age of Empires too - I poured hours into the first two games - the campaign modes especially. They were just so well put together.

And I always had a free pass to play the games as a kid too as they were 'historical' so my parents figured I was at least learning something from them.
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She of Empires was so good. It's a shame AoE 3 was such a disappointment. I used the same history excuse when I played, too lol.

These kind of a Civilisation based strategy games are so much fun to play, especially if you can get a friend to buy it and play network games.


Lutga said:
I've started playing Amnesia (the otome game) as I noticed it was free on PS Plus a little while back - it seems to have more multiple choice options than most VNs I've played in the past, so pretty engaging so far.
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Nice. I bought it on Steam a few months back and only finished one route. It was pretty interesting, since the amnesia story is done to death in Japanese games... I also bought Hatoful Boyfriend. Which was a hoot.
 
So I've decided to see how far I can get by just mashing X and Up on the L Stick :p

My only issue is now I appear to be getting hit a lot. I'm just never really sure when the best time to dodge is because I'm too busy mashing X! I'll soon see if I can get the hang of this...
 
Jatz said:
Nice. I bought it on Steam a few months back and only finished one route. It was pretty interesting, since the amnesia story is done to death in Japanese games... I also bought Hatoful Boyfriend. Which was a hoot.
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Well if you're both going to talk about Amnesia at the very least I need to know which routes you are doing/did :3

(Kent is the only correct answer.)

R
 
Kent's route is the one I enjoyed the most when I played Amnesia a few months ago <3

I have thrown myself back into the world of Skyrim, it looks really lovely on the PS4. Already spent 35 hours just exploring the places again lol
 
Rui said:
Well if you're both going to talk about Amnesia at the very least I need to know which routes you are doing/did :3

(Kent is the only correct answer.)

R
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Well... I guess Kento is my favourite too! I've actually only played Shin's route. I like how he's level headed. My guess is Kento will be the same. I really can't get over how all these dudes look like they bought all their clothes from Hot Topic. Unfortunately, Kento seems to love buckles the most. XD

I'll probably go back to playing it, soon enough, so I'll comment back with my undying love for Kento.

Rena Ryuugu said:
I have thrown myself back into the world of Skyrim, it looks really lovely on the PS4. Already spent 35 hours just exploring the places again lol
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Woooh! Elder Scrolls! I probably dislike Skyrim the most out of any Elder Scrolls game, but it's still really fun (and better than most RPGs). Always good how you can explore and do whatever you want for 35 hours and not get anywhere lol.

What kind of class are you playing as?
 
Possibly not directly related to Amnesia the game, but I still hold up Planescape: Torment as a great example of using an amnesiac protagonist to tell some pretty incredible stories. I suppose Planescape: Torment is pretty old now, but I do think that there's still potential to use the idea well.
 
I tried playing Tales of Graces F a while ago, and gave up pretty quickly for the same reasons as IL. As I recall I was slaughtered in the very first battle. Since there is some advice floating around here I think I'll give it another go, assuming I can find my PS3 pad. :rolleyes:

I was playing Xcom 2 for the last few weeks, mostly thanks to Smeelia's post about the game and how the time limit was not as big an issue as many have made out. I would have to agree with that, I found the time limit (when it was even present) to be quite generous and I never had any problems finishing my objectives in time. I didn't even need to change my play style, I just did what I always did in the first game and was fine. It's as good a game as the first one and I consider it to be money well spent.
 
So, in a bid to not give up so easily on Graces, I gave it a proper go today, and I actually had a lot of fun this time. I played for about 4 hours, and got to the end of the childhood portion of the game. I took a little time to get used to how the battle system works and once you get used to it, it's pretty straight forward. I still don't have the total hang of it, I seem to take far more hits than my AI companions in any given battle so I keep a good stock of Apple Gel on hand, but other than that, I think I have the handle on attacking, even if my dodging isn't quite up to snuff. Story seems pretty alright so far, and is fairly fun, although I haven't gotten to the meat of it yet. I refuse to believe Sophie is actually dead, otherwise it would make setting up her whole amnesia thing totally pointless.
 
I've never really "got" the Tales games, I played through Vesperia on the xbox 360 and thought it was pretty decent but haven't got on with any of the others I have tried. I'll probably still buy the next one because I'm weak, but I'll probably not finish it like all the others (except Vesparia).
 
BanzaiJedi said:
I was playing Xcom 2 for the last few weeks, mostly thanks to Smeelia's post about the game and how the time limit was not as big an issue as many have made out. I would have to agree with that, I found the time limit (when it was even present) to be quite generous and I never had any problems finishing my objectives in time. I didn't even need to change my play style, I just did what I always did in the first game and was fine. It's as good a game as the first one and I consider it to be money well spent.
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Related to the time limits, something that I'm not sure I mentioned is that the "Doom Counter" has it's own little countdown once it's filled so you actually get 20 days (might be 14 on the higher difficulty, I forget) from the first time it is filled to set it back. You then get however many days were left on the counter last time or 7 days, whichever is higher, each time it fills from then on. It fills up to around 6 points fairly quickly but it's not too difficult to control from then on (even on Legendary).

Maybe having experience from the first game helps with the timers, since you might be more confident being aggressive and have a better idea about how fast you can go. It'd be easy to be overly cautious and miss out. Bad luck can also slow you down, I once had to blow a hole in a building and put my Specialist into a less than safe position just to hack an objective on the last turn because we'd spent too long missing shots in the early turns. That was a fun mission though, things going wrong can often lead to the most fun missions (although sometimes it's just annoying).

I'm mostly still playing XCOM 2 myself. I'm now on my third playthrough and I've been playing on Legendary difficulty, which is an interesting experience. The biggest change is that everything on the campaign level takes longer, so construction and research progress is slow, upgrades cost a bit more, soldier advancement is slower and injuries last longer. The downside is that the early game, where you can only do so much to affect outcomes, is drawn out a bit until you can build some decent equipment and train some soldiers. On the plus side, the mid game period where you have a decent squad that aren't overpowered is also longer. Enemy advancement is slowed a bit too, so you might fight stronger enemies with weaker weapons for a little while but the overall difficulty curve is still fairly close to other difficulties.

I do seem to have had substantially more issues with bugs in this playthrough though. I'd imagine it's a coincidence but it can be quite frustrating and I'm glad that I didn't decide to turn the "Ironman" option on. Most aren't game breaking (at least one that prevents you from targetting enemies could arguably be) but they can make things more difficult by injuring soldiers (and injuries are a bigger issue on Legendary). Loading times aren't always fast (and get longer the further into the campaign you go), so I tend towards ignoring the issues but I wouldn't want to play the whole campaign without the option to load.

Oddly enough, I don't seem to have had the bug that I did have in previous playthroughs where advancement in research and such would occasionally reset by a few days (which seemed to have something to do with the clock losing track while moving accross the map). I didn't run into many bugs in the other two playthroughs I've done.

Issues aside, I am still generally enjoying the game. The higher difficulty means that each action is more important and it can lead to some fun situations where you need to try an elaborate plan to try to salvage things (as above). The early game can be a little less fun since luck can be a bigger factor (soldiers taking 90% to hit shots seem to miss around 60% of the time and you can never count on more than minimum damage) but it does encourage you to make full use of the abilities of your squad and makes every victory feel satisfying. I do also like that it encourages trying out different things, I never used to buy soldiers but getting high level and available soldiers can be rewarding (especially when most of your soldiers are going to be out injured for a month). Explosives are also significantly more useful and pretty much anything with a guaranteed hit is extremely useful. I suppose each difficulty can almost work as a whole different experience, which is quite a good way to use them.
 
Jatz said:
Woooh! Elder Scrolls! I probably dislike Skyrim the most out of any Elder Scrolls game, but it's still really fun (and better than most RPGs). Always good how you can explore and do whatever you want for 35 hours and not get anywhere lol.

What kind of class are you playing as?
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I went with a Breton this time around, specialising in Two Handed Weapons, Archery, Heavy Armour and a dash of magic/werewolf.
 
I have to admit, I'm tempted to pick up Skyrim for the PS4. This despite (or because of?) the fact that I played the original release for hundreds of hours across some six characters (there are probably still a few things I haven't done/seen, although maybe not too many). I'm not sure what it is about these games that makes me want to play them so much, I'm not sure I want to know.

I do hope they bring back Unarmed skill for the next Elder Scrolls game though, you can kind of get by with Heavy Armour and Enchanting but it's not ideal. Unarmoured would also be nice, since it goes well with Unarmed.
 
Lutga said:
Yup, Kent looks like he's walked straight out of Trinity Blood or Trigun or something with that coat.
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He does. I hope the romance sequence involves unbuckling all 1000 of them. :p

Rena Ryuugu said:
I went with a Breton this time around, specialising in Two Handed Weapons, Archery, Heavy Armour and a dash of magic/werewolf.
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Nice. That's a pretty big range you've got covered haha. I never used werewolf or two handed weapons in my two play throughs, so I'll have to remember that. How strong is the Werewolf? Do NPCs attack you?

Smeelia said:
I have to admit, I'm tempted to pick up Skyrim for the PS4. This despite (or because of?) the fact that I played the original release for hundreds of hours across some six characters (there are probably still a few things I haven't done/seen, although maybe not too many). I'm not sure what it is about these games that makes me want to play them so much, I'm not sure I want to know.

I do hope they bring back Unarmed skill for the next Elder Scrolls game though, you can kind of get by with Heavy Armour and Enchanting but it's not ideal. Unarmoured would also be nice, since it goes well with Unarmed.
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I've always loved these games for the multitude of play styles it promotes (even if Skyrim is the most limited of the series). No two games and characters are ever the same, and coupled with the bugs, you experience lots of crazy moments too.

I hope they bring back repair and add more branching quest paths. It's ridiculous how linear the dungeons are in Skyrim. Although, judging by Fallout 4, the game will probably limit things even further. :(
 
I recall the Werewolf form being surprisingly vulnerable if you're not careful but quite strong as well, I'm pretty sure most NPCs go hostile. The Dawnguard expansion added a Perk tree that makes Werewolf a bit more fun and viable (also, potentially disgusting). Speaking of Dawnguard, that's a potentially good path to follow if you're using Archery since you can get a nifty Crossbow (and there's also at least one interesting Bow).

The bugs and randomness can be good fun. I think Oblivion and Morrowind had some particularly good oddities (especially when characters are saying their more random idle dialogue).

Out of interest, why would you want repair back? I don't recall it really adding anything to the game but I suppose you don't have to repair fists (or, at least, that's covered by Restoration).
 
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