What are you currently playing? V4

[Explorer of Time]

I finished the original Doom for the first time a couple days ago, accidentally coinciding with its 30th anniversary. It was quite fun and most of the game still holds up thirty years later. I played on the easiest difficulty since I couldn't switch difficulties mid-episode, but I did pistol start every map. I'm now playing through the first three episodes on the medium difficulty next, but without pistol starting. I don't plan to ever move on to Ultra-Violence or Nightmare difficulty because I don't play FPS games for the challenge; real time non-strategy games like Doom are what I play when I want to turn my brain off and play something easy.

However, the Thy Flesh Consumed expansion episode wasn't as well-designed as the base game's three episodes, and had a couple very bad levels. I pretty much had to resort to cheats to beat E4M6 because it was so convoluted to explore the level and most of the floors damaged you, and the environmental storytelling of E1-E3 I enjoyed was just gone. I don't intend to replay E4 anytime soon.

 

[Cherrim]

Updating again! Here's what I'm playing this week:

• Final Fantasy XIV - Did ex trials tonight with the static... it was our last night playing together for the year since we always take a big break around the holidays. Excited to get back to p12s prog in the new year \o/ Still have to do the christmas event but i suspect i'm not gonna be playing much over the holidays.
• Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair - Replaying this on Switch since I have the game out from the library. Not sure if I'll get to replaying the third one while I have it because this time around I feel like I can only take so much of the fanservice.
• Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky - Up to chapter 13 here! I think I need to buckle down and progress in this before I run out of time at the end of the month since it's my final game along game of the year.
• WarioWare: Get It Together - Got this from the library too so my brother and I have something to play together :D

 

[Fleurdelis]

Currently on FFXIV, made a character on another data centre to play with a friend... trying to piece together the same glam I have on my main data centre... only to realize I had to go through the Ivalice alliance raids wahoo............ that was no bueno but I had no other choice 😔

 

[The Mega Champion]

I finally finished Great Ace Attorney Chronicles last night and got it's Platinum trophy. I'll be completely honest... this might be the BEST Ace Attorney game I've played since SoJ (although honestly that might be a little biased on my end since I love Apollo Justice). Story is great (and get's REALLY good in the final 3 cases of the game), great character development for all characters and just great overall honestly. The final three cases of the game (in GAA2 I mean) are probably the best 3 final cases I've probably played in the entire series and I REALLY loved how multiple cases through the games were connected to each other. I haven't seen this since the initial trilogy of Ace Attorney games. Does this effect my overall list of games I played this year? Probably not (in fact I'd say it doesn't at all) but god damn. Potentially the best Ace Attorney game(s) I've ever played.

Next up for me... upgraded port time? I really don't know how to describe it honestly lol. It's Sonic Colors Ultimate. Really short game though so I might be posting in here again in the next week or two lol

 

[IssactheTimberWolf]

Downloaded Palia on my switch and am addicted to it

 

[Fleurdelis]

Currently on FFXIV, made a character on another data centre to play with a friend... trying to piece together the same glam I have on my main data centre... only to realize I had to go through the Ivalice alliance raids wahoo............ that was no bueno but I had no other choice 😔

Update on that glam obtained together with Setsuna, now the real game can begin 😌

 

[Setsuna]

Update on that glam obtained together with Setsuna, now the real game can begin 😌

Spoiler:

Hehehe...

I've been summoned so I may as well come share with the class! I'm off my Metroidvania kick after finishing Zero Mission and AM2R (the only two 2D metroid games I've never played before) and a friend recently got me thinking about the Mario and Luigi games! I've been trying to shred through my list of 3DS games I never got around to playing so it was an excuse to try out the 3DS remake of Superstar Saga, revisit Partners in Time, and play the 3DS remake of Bowser's Inside Story! I started playing Dream Team yesterday and I'll be playing Paper Jam after that. I've also started Layton's Mystery Journey: Katrielle and the Millionaire's Conspiracy, but I'm a few episodes in and it still hasn't hooked me. I'll either be finishing it fairly slowly, or probably drop it before the year ends.

Besides that, us FFXIV players know we're never done playing the game so I finally got around to unlocking Memoria Misera Extreme and we did some runs of that today. I've come back to my island sanctuary every day since I'm trying to level it up to complete the Dawntrail outfit I'm planning, and practicing Red Mage in my daily roulettes. I might get around to starting the Hildibrand quests sometime, as I think I've only done the first couple or so. You guys are all talking about your P9S and P12S but I'm just hoping to get my static back around in the new year to finish O12S.

I've been trying to plan what's next, and I'll likely start the new year with both DLCs for Pokemon Violet. I'll find some other stuff I've been meaning to play to fill the time!

 

[Explorer of Time]

I finished Wolfenstein 3D today. It's interesting to see the origins of the first-person shooter genre, but it doesn't hold up the same way Doom does. There are only five non-boss enemies, and all except the dogs are hitscan enemies that you can't dodge, only kill before they shoot you. There are only three guns, which differ only in their rate of fire, making everything else useless once you get the Chaingun. The levels are also pointlessly labyrinthine even though the game is at its best in more wide-open maps, and the levels use only a handful of textures that get old really fast.

And the music is just... bad. Like, the very first track in the game is a terrible, slow paced sad-sounding song that absolutely does not fit the action-focused gameplay at all, and feels more appropriate for a game over screen if anything. Most of the in-game songs aren't much better, and a few levels even play that awful title screen song too. The game had the same composer as Doom, which had a soundtrack I loved, but Wolf3D's music was bad enough that I don't want to ever listen to any of it again, so I am quite dissapointed.

If you're interested in early FPS games but are more interested in having fun than learning about the genre's history, skip this and play Doom. If you want to kill a ton of Nazis, skip this and play the newer Wolfenstein games, or any WW2 shooter that isn't this one.

 

[Explorer of Time]

I finished Doom 2. The gameplay felt more like an expansion pack to Doom 1, but Doom 1 was an amazing game that still holds up so I'm not exactly complaining. It's harder than Doom 1 so I had to drop down to I'm Too Young To Die again, but I'm still pistol starting every map. The Super Shotgun makes Cacodemons and other high-HP demons like the Barons of Hell much more fun to fight, and most of the new demons are great. I say "most" because the Pain Elemental is an exception, it's super irritating to fight because of the way it spawns Lost Souls so frequently, and those Lost Souls get in the way of killing the Pain Elemental. Especially if you're using the Rocket Launcher, where they can charge towards you and get hit with the rocket while you're in the rocket's splash damage radius.

 

[Explorer of Time]

I finished Final Doom. TNT: Evilution was quite fun, and had some interesting maps, but I take back what I said about "most" monsters being great. The chaingunner zombie is extremely irritating when not used carefully. Apart from that, though, it was a very fun mapset for Doom 2.

The Plutonia Experiment, however, wasn't nearly as good. I prefer playing on ITYTD with pistol starts, and the maps were poorly balanced for lower difficulties, with several having no difference in monster placement in any difficulty setting, and the maps overused chaingunners as much as Evilution did. That being said, Plutonia also had a weirdly bizarre aversion to placing chaingun ammo anywhere other than from the chaingunner zombies it placed, which was irritating since I couldn't use the chaingun as much as I wanted. It also was poorly balanced for pistol starts, and I had to play Map 21: Slayer without pistol starting since the combination of the poor beginning equipment, no difference in monsters from the highest difficulty, and enemies attacking you right from the start made it way too difficult to pistol start. The second secret level was also quite difficult because it had the same monsters as the highest difficulty, so I had to save scum a lot, but I did beat it without cheating or non-pistol-starting.

(I also cheated my way through the two Icon of Sin fights by shutting down their monster-spawning with the console since I hated the Icon of Sin's battle in Doom 2 and have no desire to fight it again.)

 

[The Mega Champion]

I finished Sonic Colors Ultimate last night. It's not that I didn't enjoy re-experiencing the game... I did. It's just... I don't know... I still feel like the game hasn't aged well at all. The game is still too short (IMO) and they fixed everything but the cutscenes and they way those cutscenes looked... yikes. Also... I once again had some 'freezing' moments in the game. In other words... the game would 'freeze' for a couple of seconds before returning to normal. It wasn't as bad as what I experienced in Balan... but it hasn't happened since Balan and I'm running the game on my PS5 (technically an external HD connected to my PS5 but still). So... yeah... 😬

Oh well I guess. Next up... Life is Strange True Colors. Considering I have all other Life is Strange Platinums... I think you know where this one is going lol

 

[Explorer of Time]

I tried getting into Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War II, but it's just not my thing, which is a disappointment since I loved the first Dawn of War. The skirmishes aren't really fun for me without basebuilding, and the campaign feels more like an action-RPG than a strategy game, which isn't really what I was looking for right now. (The fact that the campaign was exclusively played as the Space Marines, my least favorite faction, did not help matters.)

 

[V3locityvort3x]

I've been playing quite a bit of games lately mostly eldin ring Terraria and pokemon violet.

 

[Explorer of Time]

I finished Doom 64. Overall, the graphics were better, but the balance was off and the game was much easier than Doom 2. I didn't pistol start the main campaign because of the Demon Keys for the final level, but I pistol started the Lost Levels and they were just as easy. The Unmaker was quite overpowered even without the Demon Keys and, though I won't miss the chaingunner enemies, the game really could've used some Revenants and a few Archviles to up the challenge, as the rest of Doom's arsenal doesn't quite match up to the Super Shotgun.

 

[Nah]

Lately it's mostly been Lords of the Fallen and the Demon's Souls remake. My PS5 is what's had my interest atm.
Also have played a little S/V and Mass Effect too.

 

[Zeostar]

Final Fantasy 5.

I shall see if I like this. I'm much warmer to Dragon Quest.

 

[giradialkia]

I've been bouncing between Scarlet and Baldur's Gate. I finished the Indigo Disk DLC and finally have a new competitive team I'm happy with without resorting to the new legends/paradoxes we have access to.

Also enjoying Baldur's Gate. Finally breached level 5 and starting to get a good flow with my characters. It took a while! A few failed combats were really grinding me down.

 

[Sheep]

I picked up Little Noah a few days ago! Was initially attracted to the game because of its adorable Bravely Default-like chibi style but am finding it a lot to play too. Haven't played many roguelites and am enjoying this one ~

 

[bobandbill]

Mix of SV DLC and older Pokemon games... in playing the 'transfer stuff to home' game. Which also required some rescuing of my 3ds as files on my SD card got corrupted badly so nothing would boot! Luckily I could reformat and use a backup I had. Been redownloading stuff gradually.

Also gotten into Risk of Rain 2 with a couple friends (playing online). Laggy at times but good fun overall.

Will do the splatfest next weekend, and aiming to get back into ToTK during the week and maybe finish off the Gerudo dungeon I had just entered when I last played, then do general exploration and finish off shrines/lightroots/the actual dang game. I have a backlog awaiting me.

 

[The Mega Champion]

I finished Life is Strange: True Colors last night. Honestly... it's probably the Life is Strange I had the most fun playing. I'm not sure why to be completely honest with you. It might be because the main theme is a 'mystery' or 'finding the truth' and I like that kind of thing I guess (considering I like Ace Attorney and Danganronpa). I know that was also a theme in the first Life is Strange but it felt like more of a 'side' story? I guess? Where the 'power' was the main theme and the ramifications of using it (since it was time travel). I don't know it's just me obviously. It also had the funniest thing that legit got me to laugh the hardest I've laughed in quite a long time with the LARP part and it's RPG-like turn-based like mini-game (totally not inspired by Final Fantasy since Square publishes Life is Strange I'm sure /sarcasm). I just really loved that part honestly and it was the hardest I laughed in a game in quite a long time. So... for me personally... it probably was my favorite of the Life is Strange franchise. But this is just me personally. The franchise is either loved or despised and you'll get different answers from different people. It is what it is I guess. At least I got another Platinum out of it lol.

I'm not sure if the franchise will continue or not either. I'd love for there to be more Life is Strange games... but again that's just me. We'll see I guess.

Next up for me... I'm finally getting around to playing Tales of Arise for myself. Another game with some... mixed stuff. To say the least. It also has DLC now as well. So... there's really no excuse for me not to play the DLC as well. Which means... it'll likely be a 100 hour experience for me. Oh goodie...