deKay

Dishonoured (PS3)

Posted on 22/06/2015 Written by deKay

Several years ago, I played a demo of this at the Eurogamer Expo. It reminded me a lot of Bioshock, which I loved, and gameplay wise sat halfway between that and Assassin’s Creed, which I also love. I knew I was going to have to buy it.

For various reasons, I never got round to it. Then, a little while back, it got added to PS+ and I thought I’d finally give it a go.

And it’s been fantastic. I love the slightly steampunk, slightly Fallout apocalypse setting. The powers are great, especially Blink and the rat summon. The story is interesting and the characters are well above average. I’m really enjoying it.

At first, I struggled with trying to stay stealthy. I’m not a fan of hide and seek games, despite my love for Assassin’s Creed, so staying in the shadows and taking out enemies in a non-violent manner was difficult. I’d heard if you kill too many people, you end up with the bad ending, so I didn’t want to aim for that. Once I’d been told that really, the bad ending isn’t really bad and the good ending isn’t really good (they’re both just different viewpoints or something – I’m not that close to know for sure yet), I stopped worrying when I got spotted and just took out the bad (or good?) guys whichever way. Sure, I tried stealth and hiding, but if it went wrong? Who cares.

With that little revelation, I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Game.

Apart from the TallBoys. I don’t seem to be able to hurt them at all, even when shooting their oil tanks, supposedly a weak spot. Ah well, I can just skip past most of them with Blink instead, which is actually more fun.

Another thing I’ve been enjoying is the variety in missions. In particular, the one where you have to get up Dunwall Tower and take down the Lord Regent (I chose to upend him via propaganda, rather than slitting his throat) – lots of great areas in that level. Also, the mission at the house party. That was fantastic – eavesdropping and exploring to find out which of the three Lady Boyles was the one you needed to off, then tailing her to the bathroom and knifing her behind closed doors. And then running away. Awesome.

I’m closing in on the end now, having just returned to the Hounds Pit after some… unpleasantness.

Mega Man X2 (Wii U): COMPLETED!

Posted on 13/06/2015 Written by deKay

It’s taken a while to finish this off, but not because it was especially difficult or long – more because I’ve been playing it sporadically and in short one or two level bursts.

Unsurprisingly, it’s a lot like Mega Man X. And better than Mega Man 7. I was a bit frustrated that there’s a certain point in the game that you reach (the final robot master before the Sigma levels) where, if you haven’t managed to retrieve all the parts for Zero, you can never return and get them. Of course, I didn’t even know they existed until it was too late. As it turns out, collecting them makes a fight with Zero later on a lot easier, but I beat him first time anyway.

Still, I could return to earlier levels and get all of X’s upgrades, which was good.

The final Sigma levels were pretty easy, and the bosses – which like usual seemed impossible at first – ended up far easier to beat than most other Mega Man games, especially the final Sigma boss itself.

Was it better than X, though? I don’t think so. Better than 7? Yes, certainly. In fact, lets wheel out the order and extend it.

X>X2>6>4>7>5>3>2>1. There. Fact.

Colour Zen Kids (Wii U): COMPLETED!

Posted on 12/06/2015 Written by deKay

Look. Just because it says “Kids” in the title, that doesn’t mean it’s just for kids. Was “Toilet Kids” just for kids? No. Was “Virtua Fighter Kids” just for kids? No. MC Kids? Survival Kids? Kid ‘n’ Play Make My Video? Of course not. So shut your mouth.

The aim of the game is to get rid of all the shapes that are on the screen. You do this by making two shapes of the same colour touch, which floods the background with that colour absorbing all the other shapes of that colour. Finish off with the colour the screen border is, and you win! Even kids can do it. Not that it’s for kids. Despite my daughter having already completed it. Shush.

Splatoon (Wii U): COMPLETED!

Posted on 30/05/2015 Written by deKay

Following the “test fire” event, which was less a demo and more a server stress test, my opinion of Splatoon went from “Oh, that looks nice” to “OMGNEED”. I’m not a big fan of online shooters, but this was different. Shooting the opposition was a secondary task, as the aim is to paint as much territory as possible. Although most players seemed to forget this and treated the game as a deathmatch. Anyway, the way it played out was much more appealing to me than I originally expected, and so when the game was released yesterday, I bought it.

Sadly, this coincided with my internet connection breaking, only to run at dial-up speeds. Online play, the main point of the game, was off. Bah.

Instead, I set about playing the single player mode. I wasn’t expecting much as the effort and focus in the game is clearly online play, but I was pleasantly surprised. It’s a fun, clever and varied, with some great boss fights. Especially the final one – he’s fantastic.

It was a bit easy (bar that last boss), and sadly quite short – although it was made a little longer as I replayed all the levels to find the hidden scrolls on each – but it was well worth playing. Now I just need my broadband sorting out so I can play the main bit of the game!

Exed Exes (PSP): COMPLETED!

Posted on 22/05/2015 Written by deKay

OK, so technically it’s on the Vita, and really it’s an arcade game (it’s on Capcom Classics Reloaded), but since it’s a download for the PSP I’m classing it as a PSP game. I think that’s in line with my usual logic for the likes of the Wii U Virtual Console. Not that it really matters. As an aside, the game looks pretty poor on the Vita screen, regardless of screen size option. I don’t think PSP games look very good on the Vita generally, but a game that’s resized to fit one screen then that is resized to fit on another? Horrible. The text on the menus and options are barely readable.

The reason I bought Capcom Classics Reloaded is because it’s cheap, and the reason I chose Exed Exes to play is because I’ve not played it before (although I think I have the Famicom version), it looks like Xevious, and Retro Gamer did a feature on shoot-em ups this months and I fancied a go on one.

Oh my god should I have not bothered.

Exed Exes is TERRIBLE. I know it’s about 30 years old and I know I’m not a massive fan of the genre, but still. It’s tedious. It’s repetitive. There’s no variation in the enemies or the landscape. The music is an awful dirge. The enemies are uninspired and take far too many hits to destroy. The bosses are all virtually identical, just progressively larger, and are basically simple symmetrical shapes with gun turrets on top. It’s really hard. It’s sooooo slooooow. The power-ups don’t affect your weapon in any real way (you shoot three bullets instead of two, but the power doesn’t increase so it makes no difference) and the smart bombs only damage enemy bullets, not enemies.

And it’s so, so boring. After four stages I wanted to claw my own skin off, but I stuck with it for all 16 and after the final fanfare and a load of bonus points, stage 17 started – which was just stage 1 again. No. I’ve had enough.

Then I started Vulgus and it’s the same damn game only with crap metal baddies instead of crap insect baddies. OFF!