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The Duel – Test Drive II: falling off cliffs

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There are some genres of game that have progressed beyond all recognition.  With driving games, very early examples retain some of their charm, particularly those that use the template of a relatively static road and moving car such as Chase HQ or Outrun - have you noticed how when you steer in Outrun, you are steering to avoid your car drifting to the side of the screen?

When developers tried to progress beyond this, the games have aged less well.  Test Drive II is technically quite impressive for the Mega Drive, with a seemingly polygonal road winding around in front of your car.  This is made all the more impressive when you get to sections with one side of the road bordered by a cliff, which moves and rotates correctly.



But it is horrible to play today.  The framerate is low enough to cause headaches and the controls are floaty and imprecise, making it very difficult to avoid traffic or falling off a cliff.  The other cars approach in discrete steps, making it difficult to judge when to pull out and when to brake.

Despite this, I completed the first section of the game, before running out of petrol just past the end point (since I didn't realise you had to stop).


That represented only two penalties - one cliff dive and one headlong crash into a stupid van that appeared from nowhere.  I was feeling quite pleased with myself.  That didn't last long.


Destiny – Suros Regime

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This blog is rapidly turning into a Destiny Diary. At the moment I'm not really playing anything else (except PMG Ghost Recon & Borderlands Pre Sequel on local co-op).

After pushing my luck & gaming Mon to Thu last week, the boss put her foot down & said no to gaming on Friday so I could not continue the Raid effort.

It's a shame that the Raid resets every Tuesday, the time pressure to complete the raid in a week is just too much & difficult to commit. So for now I'm out of any future raids until I've upgraded my weapons & armour.

Xur arrived on Friday & had an exotic assault rifle Suros Regime to sell. Because you can only equip one exotic weapon at any time I wanted that to be the primary weapon. I've got a legendary scout rifle but I'm a 'Spray & Pray' type of player so Assault Rifle is perfect for me.

I could do with a nice legendary sniper rifle to complete my arsenal and I've also got my exotic bounty to complete for Bad Juju. I completed the 25/25 strike missions yesterday & then had to run around the tower speaking to the gunsmith, vanguards & even Xur. Now the last section of my bounty needs me to play the crucible and get 10.000 points :(

Sad face because I don't really enjoy PvP, I suck at multi-player but maybe by forcing me to play via the bounty I might enjoy the experience.

So Destiny targets for next week is to try & complete the exotic bounty. Collect enough ascendant energy/shards to continue upgrading weapons & armour to advance to level 29.

Metrico: completed!

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I did indeed decide to finish this off one evening, only to find that the coloured light sections lasted for about five minutes.  Once I realised that the rest of the game was commute-compatible, I left it until I was next on a train.

The final levels were tricky, but not impossible.  The most difficult one was right near the end, where you had to jump over a platform rather than landing on it in order to ensure victory - and then shoot towards a wall then jump onto a platform that would rise once your shots reached the creature you generated by landing.

And then the ending, where you are again presented with two doors, and I just couldn't work out what to do to get either to open.  The pie chart didn't help, either.


I spent ages on the train trying to get the doors to settle down - but everything I did seemed to reset the world to the initial state.  I tried standing still, and the world got more fuzzy, but every now and again it reset.  I jumped, I shot, I tilted the console, I tried to reset the level, and nothing worked.

Of course, nothing was going to work.  I imagine you've seen where I'm going with this.  In order for the yellow door to appear, you are meant to not do anything for a couple of minutes.  Sitting on a train which was moving meant that I couldn't get that to happen.

So, once again, played at home and completed.  I am getting a bit annoyed at Vita games being unplayable on a commute.

Destiny – Jump, Jump a little higher !!

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A mixture of old & a couple of new raiders inc Hakk managed to take down the Templar with ease yesterday before we ventured through the Labyrinth, I was just waiting for a fire-breathing dragon to appear & Gandolf to shout 'You shall not pass".

Then there is an annoying jumping a chasm section which took me forever to do, stupid annoying kept on failing to make the last jump.

We managed to loot some chests along the way but I did not get anything decent, other players were rewarded with 'Patience & Time' Sniper Rifle & 'Hawkmoon' Handgun.

Arriving at the last fight we gave it a few attempts but truthfully by then we were tired & called it a night.

Hopefully this evening we can tackle the final boss & complete the Vault of Glass.

Ico: give your trust to me

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More than once every two months?  Oops.

So, a recap.  I have managed to lead Yorda to the main gate, from where we should be able to escape.  However, her mother - or at least someone pretending to be - has appeared, and closed the gate in front of us.  I have battled many shadow beasts, and worked out that the most effective way of doing this is to go and stand by the portal they drag Yorda off to whenever they capture her.  In fact, the combat, which previously annoyed me and I felt wasn't needed in the game, isn't much of an issue any more, although its presence still worried me and stops me spending too long when exploring.  If you leave Yorda for too long, the shadows come back, and then it's a race back to save her.

After the gate shut, I traversed through a number of stunning locations - including one with a huge windmill which I had to climb - until I was able to run along the castle walls to the East Tower.  In this tower were a number of large circular windows, and I quickly worked out that the aim was to open each of these by lighting torches underneath them.  Working out what I had to do was the easy part; working out how to do it took a lot longer.  I had to pull Yorda through the doorways and around the walkways, finally finding myself out the back of the tower with some stunning views across the chasm to freedom.  I managed to finally open all the windows, sending a beam of light across to the main gate, causing half of it to light up.  A pretty big indication that I need to do the same on the other side.

Getting to the other side was pretty difficult though.  Much of the effort was spent around a huge waterfall area, where I had to jump on and off a turning waterwheel in order to close the sluice gate.  Yorda was no use at all during this part, with her slow running and refusal to jump up to ledges even with me extending my hand down to her - the game couldn't position her correctly.

I managed to get through this section, playing basketball on the way, and am now at 'the watertower', which appears to be named after a very small ornamental part of the level.  I think once I'm cleared of this, I'll be able to go to the West Tower and make the main gate open up again ... but that may take a while.