Its that time of the month again where I escape to blog writing in an effort to ignore whoever it is outside my flat who's blasting Happy Hardcore out of their car stereo. Don't make me come out there...
Velocity 2x: Shoot, Switch, Repeat, Defeat.
The stern-faced woman and her lizard... thing friend are telling you stuff about stuff whilst you not-R-Type and 2D platform your way through some fairly decent levels for medals. Its a compelling mix that confused me to begin with. The two main play styles seemed to jar with one another til the incentive for medals took over. When it's good, its greatly addictive and grabbing a gold medal for speed on some of the levels is outright challenging.
Its a shame maxing the levels out becomes so necessary, though. It really started to bog me down and progress became a crawl until I frankly, jacked it in. I like this game when there's a flow to it. Sadly, that flow derails at the 40-odd level mark when the game offers more roadblocks and labyrinths that completely took the wind out me. Its nice that it came to PS Plus because otherwise this game would've passed me by. It surprised me more than I expected it to but didn't hold it together for the final push.
Transistor: USB Buster Sword
I regret not playing this sooner. It has such a cohesive sense of style and manages to sew together its story beats and combat tightly. I also regret not playing it right for the first couple of hours. I came to it having barely played more than the demo of Bastion but made the incorrect assumption that the turn-based combat was an either/or. So I played it as a straight-forward action game and only used the emergency turns.
Once I realised the errors of my ways and settled on a pretty decent, but interchangeable load-out, the game was a comfortable breeze. I may go back for the Recursion for the longer I spend away from it the less likely that is to happen.
I liked the way the story was presented and it was well acted in a really stylish environment. I can't think of a thing in that game that didn't fit although I've heard a couple of friends didn't get on with the turn-based combat. Not through how it was presented but in how it compared to Bastion's one-size fits all approach. They felt that there was a right way to play Transistor whereas you could settle on a number of different weapons for Bastion.
I should probably play Bastion to discover if that's true. Coming to this first means I've avoided that possibility. Good job, Super Giant. I look forward to your future endeavors.
Valiant Hearts: Cartoon Violence (and spoilers...)
As this puzzle-oriented educational tool was nearing its final act I sensed a definite shift in tone from grim to outright bleak. The harsh, relentless industrial machine of death kept rolling on but the characters on this journey still offered hope. There were some legitimate narrative surprises in this game which offered some light gameplay to tie the story together.
It all came undone for me at the final QTE section which, frankly, didn't need to be there. I get that the pay-off is neat and then is followed by a gut-punching conclusion but Karl's going to wind up siding with the Nazis in 20 years after his son's death to the Spanish flu causes him to seek solace in National Socialism. Also, chlorine did a number on him so he shouldn't have even got that far.
At least that's how I would've ended it. The written material gets used to great effect as the Great War still gets overshadowed in schools by World War II and its slightly more good vs evil narrative. The first foray into grand-scale, worldwide conflict just seemed like an inconvenience to all that developed into a 5 year tragedy which led to the rise of fascism in Europe. I hope Ubisoft keeps faith with projects like this and Grow Home.
DmC Definitive Edition: Growing up is Hard to Do
This was a lot of fun. I'll confess this is my first venture into Capcom's franchise so offense wasn't caused when they switched development to Ninja Theory. If anything, I'm amazed those guys managed this. They've always been known for their production values but haven't quite pulled it together when it comes to gameplay.
Its just so tight and responsive and my mashy tendencies are somewhat cooled by a number of great weapons that are fun to switch between. The core of it is just so spot on so it's a shame the boss fights don't live up to the spectacle of the series past. I was stunned when I managed to spam my way through the final two bosses and felt like I hadn't had to work for victory.
On paper, a coming of age story for Dante could've worked but, aside from learning one life lesson, he still comes off as a childish wanker. I'm okay with the demons degenerating into foul-mouthed beasts. That fits. Learning that humanity needs to be saved and then grabbing a handful of arse because, "Oh, that Dante..." doesn't sit well with me. Obviously growing up doesn't happen overnight but I expect more than just a cursory switch. Plus Vergil's idea had a point.
Despite this, I'm still coming back to it. The combat's too right and too up-front to ignore and it actively makes me curious about the older games. Not a fan of Vergil's abilities though. If Ninja Theory get the opportunity to make another one of these I'll be interested. If not then at least they got this one under their belts. They might not rival Platinum when it comes to the character action market but they seem like great imposters that could, with time, provide them with competition and us with more great games.
The Wrap Up
So, that was March and a quarter of the gaming year is in the bag and 9 games are chalked off my backlog. As I looked at what remained I made a crucial decision.
Prepare to Die.
Now, I've had Demon's and Dark Souls on my backlog for a while now and have not got deep enough for either to really hook me. With 90% of my PSN friends list playing Bloodborne and the remastered edition of Dark Souls II arriving at Easter, I began a new save on Dark Souls. The intention is to work through the three existing titles before taking on the new Victorian nightmare.
The first hurdle's already been cleared. After beating a threatening looking Knight in Undead Parish it seemed to click so my intention is to press on and on until Jesus Belmont succeeds. Yes, I named him so in honour of the Christian corpse run pioneer. I will continue such naming conventions throughout the series. I've already settled on Tupac Belmont for Demon's Souls.
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