What game are you playing?

[DavidW]

Has anyone played any of the incarnations of Witcher?

I played all three.

Here are my impressions:

The Witcher: very rewarding when played correctly.  That is you have to spend time finding books on the monsters and then ACTUALLY READING the books.  And then preparing the potions and oils in advance which also involves meditation.  But if you do all that the bosses are significantly easier.  If you don't do that and hack and slash then the game is very difficult and frustrating.  Later in the game it can be annoying wandering around talking to everyone in the known universe trying to progress but given no direction.  So this is a challenging game.  There is no handholding, and as a result most people that start with the idea that they should experience the full trilogy just give up on this game and sometimes the franchise as a whole.  btw at launch it was pretty hard to run.  The controls with mashing the mouse button have not aged well.  Verdict: a cult classic but you still might want to skip it.

The Witcher 2: cdpr tried to make a game to release on both console and pc.  The result was a good pc game and a mediocre console port.  The controls are just too clunky and complex for a controller imo.  It is not as difficult to get into as the first game, but for some reason I never liked this game.  But if my description of the first one puts you off, maybe start here.  For some reason the tutorial is just awful and tries to get you to master all the mechanics at once which you absolutely do not need to do since most will not be unlocked until later.  Verdict: decent rpg, and not frustrating as long as you use quen frequently.  This game is good on the pc, I would still avoid it on console.

Witcher 3: is my favorite game of all time.  It is funny how far superior it is to the first two.  It has a taste of needing to do your research to be effective against monsters like in Witcher 1 but you can do it on the fly.  It is an open world game, where the first two are linear.  All the side quests are fantastic, featuring better writing than any other rpg out there and all the quests intersect in interesting ways.  Completing side quests and making dialogue choices have meaningful consequences to future quests and the world that you can't predict.  However, the main quest is "the princess is in another castle" repeated a million times, and is far weaker than the main quests in the previous games and the impressive expansion packs.  Verdict: if you play any of the three, just play this one.  You don't really need the story for the first two games, in fact it follows the books more anyway!  Also the game of the year edition of the Witcher 3 took me 150 hours to beat, which is greater than the first two combined.  Verdict: if you love single player rpgs, THIS IS IT.  Love it or hate it, you just to have play it.  Else you will be missing out on the most influential games of last gen.

So I rank them as Witcher 3 >> Witcher 1 > Witcher 2.

I recommend immediately playing the third one and then if you like it, then go back to the previous ones or read the short stories and novels.

[LKB]

Thanks DavidW, that's very helpful info. 

[greg]

"if you love single player rpgs, THIS IS IT."

It's certainly on my list of games to play, might be a couple of years before I get to it, though. The gameplay looks like a selling point.
Probably why I haven't tried it yet is due to the length mostly, but also the feeling about non-Japanese RPGs in general- that they just lack the charisma/charm/quirkiness. Not that I've played a ton of them, just from what I've played and my impression of other games that's how it seems to me.


Edit: and it's also the charcter designs. People look so ugly in Western RPGs. Might seem trivial, but if you can have some good looking ladies (or guys, for the ladies) that have a likeable personality, then memories of that game will stick because you will fantasize about meeting the characters years later. It becomes a little bit more than just a short-lived experience, that way.
(Not saying that's the only way, of course, to get it to stick in your mind, but it is one effective way).

[DavidW]

But Greg, these witches are so beautiful!

[LKB]

That one on the left... reminds me of one of my exes. 

[greg]

But Greg, these witches bog are so beautiful!

Omg, they should be marked NSFW, this level of arousal while in office should be illegal.

[DavidW]

Yeah who is your waifu now?

[greg]

Yeah who is your waifu now?

For game characters, probably a three-way tie between Honoka and Nyotengu from Dead or Alive and Tifa from FF7R, nah... a three-way tie between those lovely witches.

The middle one must be Pyramid Head's wife, or sister.... or sister-wife? Or in drag?
Pyramid Head, didn't know you were so fine with facenet covering and stomach arm! 
Heeeeeeeeeheeeeeeeeeee (heavy panting noises)

[greg]

I envy people who can just give up easily and let things go, must be nice. How do you do that? No, really, that's a serious question, I need to learn how to.

Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker was an enjoyable game, some parts in the beginning can be hard at first but not too bad once you get the hang of them.

I am currently near the end. There are two missions near the end I just finished which turned out to be the most miserable gaming experience I've ever had, and there are some bad ones. The game goes from moderate difficulty to extremely insane and unfair expectations. You have to perform at peak performance for 30-60 minutes straight AND hope the random stuff that you have no control over doesn't kill you.

What is even the point of playing a game if it's going to shatter your nerves and cause the most extreme rage you feel in your life? Why can't they just leave their game at moderate difficulty, instead of having an extreme difficulty spike right before you finish?

(One explanation I read is that the game was originally balanced around playing co-op, and if you play single player then stuff is going to take a really long time to complete, would explain everything tbh... but they lacked the foresight of balancing around the inevitable of people playing single player, years later, when there is no one online to play with)

If you research about the game's difficulty before playing, what you find will be misleading. Google the actual mission and boss names and you'll read people saying how awful they were designed.
Was considering one day playing the extra features after completing it, because the gameplay is quite enjoyable, but now I hate this game so much that I never will.

[greg]

On another note, did anyone hear about that story about porn involving Tifa from FF7 being played at an Italian Senate meeting? Someone hacked into their system and streamed a video, hilarious stuff.



Speaking of that....
FF7 part 2 was announced yesterday, "FF7 Rebirth."
There will be three parts:
Remake
Rebirth
?


Rebirth comes out winter next year, FF16 comes out summer next year.
(though i could see small delays happening)

I am very glad they decided on three parts, it's the perfect plan IMO, exactly what I've wanted since part 1.

[DavidW]

Rebirth comes out winter next year, FF16 comes out summer next year.

Well I know what I'm doing for most of 2023 then! (being repeatedly killed by Tonberry on two separate titles)

[greg]

Well I know what I'm doing for most of 2023 then! (being repeatedly killed by Tonberry on two separate titles)

[greg]

If anyone knows about the site howlongtobeat.com, you might want to not take it too seriously.

Example, MGS: Peace Walker is the worst offender yet for time estimations that I've seen. People voted as taking 18 hours on average to complete the main story. I've probably played 50 hours and am currently stuck at the last boss (Metal Gear Zeke). I will probably have to grind another day or two now, because this thing is one-shotting me 40 minutes in a fight, with no way to avoid it.

But sometimes the site works- Final Fantasy 7 Remake, averaged at 33 hours? That's about how long it took me, without any guide, so totally accurate.

I just don't know what to trust any more with researching time frames and what people say about difficulty. This is possibly the most difficult game I've ever played, up there with the Metroid games, yet I read online beforehand so I would know, and people say it's one of the easiest Metal Gear Solid games. Wtf!?

If I would have known it was this difficult and time consuming, I would have skipped it. But doing research confirming it's okay, and then not finding how out long and difficult it really is until like 30 hours into the game has seriously destroyed my week. I play games to relax, not to rage. And it wouldn't be a problem if I didn't have the compulsion to finish everything that I start, that's exactly why I research beforehand, to avoid that scenario, yet still I get to experience this wonderful problem.

[greg]

Ok, maybe dumb that I'm posting so much about this game, but just finished Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker.

To summarize what is wrong with that game: they didn't rebalance the boss HP to be reasonable, because the game was originally balanced around multiplayer and not really meant to be played solo. When boss fights are difficult enough to demand sustained perfection, they should be short. However, the bosses often take 30-40+ minutes to complete, rather than a typical 5-10 minutes. This ends up being extremely exhausting and not fun at all.

Now, I'm about to start Metal Gear Solid 4. The plan is to play all of the canon games in the series (MGS 1-5, Peace Walker, and Rising:Revengeance). (but will skip the old Metal Gear games for now)

Playing them from here:

[greg]

Anyone play the Devil May Cry series?

I'm really interested in playing the whole series, perhaps within the next year or so, but knowing that they are difficult games (1 and 3 moreso than the rest), I might have to change my strategize for playing in order to enjoy them without hating them. One thing that might help a lot is the fact that they are all quite short games, so taking breaks might be okay.

[greg]

There is a premade tierlist for ranking Final Fantasy games, so made one just now.
https://tiermaker.com/create/final-fantasy-main-series-5297

(though wish it included FF7R and Type 0)

[DavidW]

The 7 remake is not on the list, I guess it needs to be updated.  I consider the remake to be a completely separate game from the original, unlike say the 10 remaster.

[greg]

The 7 remake is not on the list, I guess it needs to be updated.  I consider the remake to be a completely separate game from the original, unlike say the 10 remaster.

Oh, it is indeed.
Though... kind of a new category. I've heard the term "re-quel" used.
I'm glad that it isn't just a remake of the original, all the new stuff they added is great IMO, expanding the world more is only a good thing. More is more!
(a big reason why 14 and 11 are in my top two is simply because of the expansive worlds that both have)

Btw, my guess on the name of part 3: Rewrite!

[drogulus]

     I shoot monsters. It's what I do. I play old school PC games like Quake 3 Arena, UT2003 and games in the Serious Sam franchise.

     

     Serious Sam has some of the stupidest comic monsters ever. You're doing them a favor to kill them.

     Recently I got the HD update for the earliest games in the series, the First/Second Encounter.

     

     That's pretty cool for a game released 20 years ago.

     

[greg]

I totally missed out on those games, but from that era, the original Half-Life and Postal 2 are my favorite FPS's.