Apr 2, 2012 7:50 PM
April Gaming Update
Just finished:
- Mass Effect 3 - Dispite all of the negative backlash with Bioware's ending of it's third and possibly final game to it's epic space adventure, I thought the ending that they choose at least is not THAT absolutely horrible dispite some big flaws and leaving just as many questions as answers but it's doable (if you've seen the anime movie: End of Evangelion, it's kind of like that one, eh, sort of). Sure I personally thought it was a little laughable that the fate of the entire Milky Way galaxy all came down to either choosing "Option A" or "Option B" (also a third option if you maxed your war efforts but didn't get up to that yet) and both choices equal to the same fate of Sheppard no matter what choices you made or how you played. The only thing I could see in the upcoming future is an after-story arc to whatever happened with all of your surviving team members, allies and crew and possibly based on what the ending choice was. Also after finishing you can't techically go fly around with the Normandy anymore although they were nice of taking you back to start of the 2nd to last story mission before the final invasion. Speaking of that mission, it's end boss was seriously not fun and I think I died 10 times before I got into the groove of things to take it down and not only that but you are forced to bring in one specific charactor to the battle, that's lame. Reguarding the rest of the game I thought it was a lot more fast paced than what was brought in Mass Effect 1 & 2 and more felt like an action shooter than a stratigic action RPG which is a good thing. Most of the missions were fun to play through and haldly any of it seemed lame or boring but I kind of wished it didn't have all of those fetch quests to raise your war forces. Plus no more shitty planet mining is a plus! Overall it's a real buy worthy game, however only play it if you have at least played through the 2nd game (on your same current system) becuase only playing the 3rd will miss out on a lot of story elements and plot points and plus all of your game choices do carryover (albeit not your custom face but Bioware is working on fixing that). Playing through ME1 isn't mandatory but there is a DLC pack that lets you make important decisions of the 1st to carry to the 2nd. I mainly played through as a renegade for both ME2 and ME3 and definately wouldn't mind going full paragon for both. Live long and prosper Sheppard.
- Journey - For all of the 1.7 hours I went for my 1st playthrough I still think it is very well worth it. There isn't too much exploring and for most of the parts you just go from point A to point B but the I really love all of the cloth-like graphics for the enviroments and the game engine really showcases some very artistic visuals, even for a 550+ MB download. After the 1st stage you get a random online buddy to travel and help with but I mostly ignored other players with me. There's also power orbs to collect that increase your "scarf power" and some ancient art to find but once you are done you are practially done but it's still worth replaying, there's even a trophy that you get if you play it after 7 days. Definately a buyworthy download for the $15 it's worth.
Also playing:
- Tales of Graces F - I definately enjoy all of the Tales game series just as much as any of the Final Fantasies and hell I even thought the last US Tales release, Vesperia, was shit-tons more fun to play than FFXIII. Now even though this game is an HD enhanced version of a Wii title it somewhat seems like this was made by the Tales "B-Team". First off the first 3 or 4 hours are brutally boring becuase you control kid versions of some of the main charactors and the battle system is very weak but it somewhat acts as a tutorial to get used to the game's systems. There is no overworld to explore and you mainly travel on specific routes and a lot of times you may see another path to travel but the game will just block you not to go there. After you "grow up" then it gets much more interesting where battles now involve "B-Arts" that act as special and power moves for high damage beatdowns. Like in Vesperia you can have up to 4 members and you only control one charactor while the others are AI controled although you can switch between them. Again being originally a Wii title the graphics can be decent looking in someplaces out just downright ugly in others. The voice acting is only available in English (for now) but it is decently voiced and scripted by the average anime dubbing standards and the Tales series are known for some really great anime cutscenes but the ones I've seen so far and even it's opening didn't impress me one bit, plus the original opening song is also redone in English. I haven't played too much into it's story, maybe only about 6 hours worth and so far it isn't all that bad but it could be much better although it's somewhat too early to tell. Long time Tales fans should give it a shot at least but there's better games worth playing out there.
And plenty of other games on the back burner: Twisted Metal, Jak and Daxter Collection, Soul Calibur V, Dark Souls, Skyrim
Games to buy this month:
- No major titles this time although I wouldn't mind checking out the Witcher 2 for XB360 one of these days but definately not right now. There are a couple downloadable games I wouldn't mind checking out: the long overdue indie platformer "FEZ" finally comes out 04/13 on XB Arcade (and for only $10!) while the all female cartoon fighter "Skullgirls" comes out 04/11 for XB Arcade (and PSN in the future)
- Mass Effect 3 - Dispite all of the negative backlash with Bioware's ending of it's third and possibly final game to it's epic space adventure, I thought the ending that they choose at least is not THAT absolutely horrible dispite some big flaws and leaving just as many questions as answers but it's doable (if you've seen the anime movie: End of Evangelion, it's kind of like that one, eh, sort of). Sure I personally thought it was a little laughable that the fate of the entire Milky Way galaxy all came down to either choosing "Option A" or "Option B" (also a third option if you maxed your war efforts but didn't get up to that yet) and both choices equal to the same fate of Sheppard no matter what choices you made or how you played. The only thing I could see in the upcoming future is an after-story arc to whatever happened with all of your surviving team members, allies and crew and possibly based on what the ending choice was. Also after finishing you can't techically go fly around with the Normandy anymore although they were nice of taking you back to start of the 2nd to last story mission before the final invasion. Speaking of that mission, it's end boss was seriously not fun and I think I died 10 times before I got into the groove of things to take it down and not only that but you are forced to bring in one specific charactor to the battle, that's lame. Reguarding the rest of the game I thought it was a lot more fast paced than what was brought in Mass Effect 1 & 2 and more felt like an action shooter than a stratigic action RPG which is a good thing. Most of the missions were fun to play through and haldly any of it seemed lame or boring but I kind of wished it didn't have all of those fetch quests to raise your war forces. Plus no more shitty planet mining is a plus! Overall it's a real buy worthy game, however only play it if you have at least played through the 2nd game (on your same current system) becuase only playing the 3rd will miss out on a lot of story elements and plot points and plus all of your game choices do carryover (albeit not your custom face but Bioware is working on fixing that). Playing through ME1 isn't mandatory but there is a DLC pack that lets you make important decisions of the 1st to carry to the 2nd. I mainly played through as a renegade for both ME2 and ME3 and definately wouldn't mind going full paragon for both. Live long and prosper Sheppard.
- Journey - For all of the 1.7 hours I went for my 1st playthrough I still think it is very well worth it. There isn't too much exploring and for most of the parts you just go from point A to point B but the I really love all of the cloth-like graphics for the enviroments and the game engine really showcases some very artistic visuals, even for a 550+ MB download. After the 1st stage you get a random online buddy to travel and help with but I mostly ignored other players with me. There's also power orbs to collect that increase your "scarf power" and some ancient art to find but once you are done you are practially done but it's still worth replaying, there's even a trophy that you get if you play it after 7 days. Definately a buyworthy download for the $15 it's worth.
Also playing:
- Tales of Graces F - I definately enjoy all of the Tales game series just as much as any of the Final Fantasies and hell I even thought the last US Tales release, Vesperia, was shit-tons more fun to play than FFXIII. Now even though this game is an HD enhanced version of a Wii title it somewhat seems like this was made by the Tales "B-Team". First off the first 3 or 4 hours are brutally boring becuase you control kid versions of some of the main charactors and the battle system is very weak but it somewhat acts as a tutorial to get used to the game's systems. There is no overworld to explore and you mainly travel on specific routes and a lot of times you may see another path to travel but the game will just block you not to go there. After you "grow up" then it gets much more interesting where battles now involve "B-Arts" that act as special and power moves for high damage beatdowns. Like in Vesperia you can have up to 4 members and you only control one charactor while the others are AI controled although you can switch between them. Again being originally a Wii title the graphics can be decent looking in someplaces out just downright ugly in others. The voice acting is only available in English (for now) but it is decently voiced and scripted by the average anime dubbing standards and the Tales series are known for some really great anime cutscenes but the ones I've seen so far and even it's opening didn't impress me one bit, plus the original opening song is also redone in English. I haven't played too much into it's story, maybe only about 6 hours worth and so far it isn't all that bad but it could be much better although it's somewhat too early to tell. Long time Tales fans should give it a shot at least but there's better games worth playing out there.
And plenty of other games on the back burner: Twisted Metal, Jak and Daxter Collection, Soul Calibur V, Dark Souls, Skyrim
Games to buy this month:
- No major titles this time although I wouldn't mind checking out the Witcher 2 for XB360 one of these days but definately not right now. There are a couple downloadable games I wouldn't mind checking out: the long overdue indie platformer "FEZ" finally comes out 04/13 on XB Arcade (and for only $10!) while the all female cartoon fighter "Skullgirls" comes out 04/11 for XB Arcade (and PSN in the future)
Posted by
GodHandGuts
| Apr 2, 2012 7:50 PM |
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