What game are you wasting time on?

[Clockwork Knight]

There's one huge reason why Mega Man 2 is considered both more enjoyable, and easier to play, than Mega Man 1: No Clay Man.

This is something Capcom should have noticed and acted upon. Instead they brought him back for pretty much every sequel IIRC.

They did notice, his successors aren't nearly as difficult. The problem wasn't the concept of the goop robot, but requiring you to memorize a long pattern and attack tiny weak spot that is exposed for 0.1 seconds.

The bullshit was still there in MM2 with the last Wily fight though (edit: and the barrier boss before it, called Boobeam Trap but who calls it that)

All in all, it's a good game, just don't expect it to be as difficult as the first one.

Try hard mode. I played the japanese cart as a kid and I had a bad time. Which probably means a good time for someone who liked MM1's difficulty.

http://megaman.wikia.com/wiki/Mega_Man_2

Version differences

• There is no difficulty select in the Japanese version of the game. There is a Normal mode and a Difficult mode in the English versions, in which Difficult is the original Japanese mode and Normal is an easier mode in which Mega Man's attacks cause twice the damage against bosses and enemies' HP amounts are halved. The difficulty select is only available in the American, European, and Australian NES, and mobile phone ports of the game.

• In the Mega Man Anniversary Collection version, the "Normal" difficulty is treated like the Difficult mode of the original English version. The "Easy" difficulty, however, is not the same as the Normal mode of the original English version. Differences in the Easy difficulty of Mega Man Anniversary Collection's version include halved damage taken, enemies being removed from stages, and less hits required to kill enemies than the Difficult mode of the original version (although more hits are required to kill enemies than the Normal mode of the original version).

 

[No Great Name]

All in all, it's a good game, just don't expect it to be as difficult as the first one.

Try hard mode. I played the japanese cart as a kid and I had a bad time. Which probably means a good time for someone who liked MM1's difficulty.

I know about the difficulty differences and even made a note of it in my review. I've never played the game on Easy mode because I started on Difficult mode since the beginning and everything I've said about the game is based on that difficulty level.

 

[agentorange]

It's not just the milkman stuff you're missing out on, it's also the theater stuff and the neon velvet stuff.

On the upside you're also missing the meat circus, so you got that going for you.

I think they drastically changed the meat circus at some point with a patch, because I had a far easier time with it when I replayed the game on PC than the first time I played the game back on the Xbox. But yeah, quitting at the fish boss means missing out on the best content in the game, including the kaiju city stomping section taking place immediately after said boss fight.

 

[Swampy_Merkin]

Been playing Cultist Simulator hard-core for the past couple weeks although for the past week I've been wondering why. It's just an elaborate game of solitaire with Lovecraftian themes with rules that you figure out as you go along.

My progress is stuck at a high level, but I refuse to google it, so I'm now just using it as a mindless way of getting caught up on various podcasts until I stumble across the solution.

It's not a bad time, just a kind of pointless time unless you have some good shit to listen to.

 

[Leechmonger]

Like Aquaria

I put about 6 or so hours into Aquaria almost a decade ago. Is it worth playing to completion? From what I remember it was extremely linear, but maybe it became more of Metroidvania later.

The biggest downside to one-man projects is that there's no one to oversee them. This is what producers are really for: To know when to let creators run loose, and when to rein them in.

Have you played La Mulana? That game is weapons-grade dev autism.

 

[someone else]

EDIT: Just watched the no damage video. It's impressive how you can exploit Quickman's pattern like that, but I can't get the image of the dude's hair out of my head.

I just remembered that USA version Megaman 2 lets you do twice the damage of Japanese's Rockman 2.
The game was made easier for foreigners and the Quickman battle is supposed to last much longer.
I suppose you have to replay the game on USA hard difficulty now instead of USA normal if you playing on it.
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/981300-mega-man-10/53885435

That Quickman video appears to be on easy, there was a longer Japanese perfect video.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Like Aquaria

I put about 6 or so hours into Aquaria almost a decade ago. Is it worth playing to completion? From what I remember it was extremely linear, but maybe it became more of Metroidvania later.

As I said, the game is on-rails linear until you reach the "Open Waters" maps. From there you have access to about a dozen or so seperate maps, but you'll soon realize that your progress is hindered by obstacles that require more forms than Song and Energy. At this point you can follow three seperate paths to get three different forms (and the game isn't picky about what order you get them in) but you'll need all of them to progress in the game later.

The Metroidvania aspects feel more natural in Aquaria than many other such games. Instead of constantly having platforms out of reach or dashing abilities to allow you to navigate through treacherous paths, you'll be confronted by strong currents that push you back or the inky blackness of the Abyss that requires a light source, just to give a couple of examples.

Finally you'll need a basic background in music to complete a puzzle later on. I'm serious. This is probably one of the few times the devs screwed up with Aquaria.

The biggest downside to one-man projects is that there's no one to oversee them. This is what producers are really for: To know when to let creators run loose, and when to rein them in.

Have you played La Mulana? That game is weapons-grade dev autism.

Yes, I have. Yes, I agree.

 

[Kitchen Utensil]

Infra Arcana
Trying to get into Roguelikes and this is the only one I really like so far, even though I absolutely suck at it. Love the minimalistic tiles, the sounds and the theme. The game oozes atmosphere. UI and controls are really intuitive and the gameplay is interesting without being too complex or overwhelming. Awesome game.

Dragon's Dogma
Started a solo BBI challenge run a few days ago. Just beat the Gazer as a level 18 Assassin. Still love the game; one of the few modern classics that combines my favourite aspects of rpgs and action games.

 

[No Great Name]

EDIT: Just watched the no damage video. It's impressive how you can exploit Quickman's pattern like that, but I can't get the image of the dude's hair out of my head.

I just remembered that USA version Megaman 2 lets you do twice the damage of Japanese's Rockman 2.
The game was made easier for foreigners and the Quickman battle is supposed to last much longer.
I suppose you have to replay the game on USA hard difficulty now instead of USA normal if you playing on it.
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/981300-mega-man-10/53885435

That Quickman video appears to be on easy, there was a longer Japanese perfect video.

I replied earlier to Clockwork Knight that I played on Difficult mode. I have no idea just how easy the game is on the Easy difficulty because I've never played it.

 

[Azalin]

Finished Prey the spiritual successor to SS games that Bioshock series wished they were,pretty good game,good graphics,ok music,voice acting and story and pretty good gameplay for the most part,although it isn't really a horror game.There are some negatives of course,the last act is not that good and the guy that though that infinitely respawning enemies is a good idea must be really special and by special I mean completely retarded.Still recommended if you want a modern take on SS.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

I know about the difficulty differences and even made a note of it in my review.

I opened it on a tab and was planning to read it, I swear.

Are you sure you want to close 100 tabs?

Someday I will.

 

[Great Deceiver]

Dead Space. This survival horror game from 10 years ago is much more atmospheric than anything released since. Gameplay is fairly popamole, but there's some tension and it looks brilliant. The HUD remains unsurpassed to this day, a masterclass in design. Great game.

Of course, EA managed to slave-drive the development team into oblivion and introduce shit like microtransactions into the sequels.

Still, the first one is still eminently worth playing. Preferably in the dark, with headphones. Since it's such an old game, it runs flawlessly at 4k60 on toasters. Still looks great with good use of stencil shadows and no overuse of shit lazy techniques like bump mapping or bloom. Some of the creatures are pretty nasty. Definitely recommended.

 

[flyingjohn]

So lets'go through a journey to get gorky 17 to run on windows 7!

-Normal running the game on hardware render er results in crashes and invisible units
-Software render er results in slow ugly graphics and choppy audio

-Gog recommends deleting a file from the main folder
Result:Game menu invisible
-Gog forums recommends applying and deleting codecs
Result:Game audio is insane and the main menu is stuck to my units now

-Steam forums recommends using voodoo
Result:It fucking works finally.

Nice job gog.

So for anybody wondering:
1. Go to this site: http://www.dege.freeweb.hu/ and download latest dgVoodo version.
2. Unpack it and open dgVoodooSetup.exe
3. Go to DirectX section. Unselect all but Behavior boxes. Select VRAM = 128MB. Select your screen resolution. Set MSAA 8x (idk but it works for me).
4. Press Apply, then OK.
5. Go to MS folder (in dgVoodoo folder), and copy the three dll files.
6. Paste them to your Gorky17 folder.
7. Run game and select dgVoodoo/Direct3D HAL, hardware zoom option makes no difference for me.

Enjoy "smooth and beautiful" graphics!

If you don't want to have streched image go to General tab in dgVoodoo setup. Then find "Scaling mode" menu and choose: "Stretched, 4:3 Aspect ratio". Next go to DirectX tab and select "unforced" form resolution menu. Hit apply, and then copy files from MS folder and paste them into Gorky 17 folder.

 

[groundhog]

So lets'go through a journey to get gorky 17 to run on windows 7!...

Getting Gorky 17 to work certainly brings back memories, so thanks for posting this!

In case it helps anyone, I'll add what worked for me when playing the GOG version back in 2015:

Many people seem to experience problems getting this game to work, so I've put together this little guide that hopefully may(!) get this game working for you.

For reference I tested the game on the following 4 PCs:

- Windows XP (32-bit) laptop, Athlon single-core, Radeon 1150 xpress graphics card
- Windows XP (32-bit) desktop, Athlon single-core, GeForce 7800GTX graphics card
- Windows 7 (64-bit) laptop, Intel i3, Intel HD3000 graphics (integrated)
- Windows 7 (64-bit) desktop, Intel P3420 dual-core, GeForce GTX 650 Ti graphics card

Each time you double-click on the Gorky icon to start the game, a pop-up box appears giving you the choice between:

- Software Renderer
- Primary Display Driver
- 'Name of your graphics card'

(N.B. I always ticked the box to 'Disable hardware zoom')

Selecting 'Primary Display Driver' or 'Name of your graphics card' caused problems on all my PCs - mainly invisible characters and/or characters disappearing behind scenery.

So, I recommend choosing 'Software Renderer'. (The game was made in 1998 and has very low system requirements, so your PC should easily cope with this mode - my old laptop ran it fine.)

HOWEVER - 'Software Renderer' caused sound problems on all my PCs - garbled voices, lagging sound, and even crashes. The good news is there are (keeping fingers crossed!) simple solutions that worked on all my systems.

Windows 7:
1.) Right-click on 'Gorky 17' desktop icon and then select 'Properties'.
2.) Click on 'Compatibility' tab and change compatibility mode from 'Windows 95' to 'Windows XP (Service Pack 3)'.
3.) Ensure that 'Run this program as administrator' is selected and then click 'OK' button to close the panel.

Windows XP:
1.) Open 'Control Panel' and select 'Sounds and Audio Devices'
2.) Select 'Audio' tab - in 'Sound Playback' click on the 'Advanced' button
3.) Select 'Performance' tab - move 'Hardware Acceleration' slider to 'None'
4.) Click 'OK' button to close (remember to change this back to its original setting after you have finished the game)

Obviously I can't guarantee these will work for you, but it may be worth giving them a go.

Best of luck!

 

[Joni Odin von Hassenstein]

Right now, besides PoE II, I'm mostly playing "The Council".

I discovered it in some thread here in the Codex (I think it was the "upcoming RPG's"-thread in GRPGD), and it's pretty cool!
Actually, it kinda has just the setting I've been waiting for a long time.
After the first episode it goes a bit downhill with many more or less annoying puzzles etc., but if you're fond of adventures with some basic RPG mechanics (and don't expect tier 1 super prestigious AAA PS:T) this still is great fun.

 

[Mojobeard]

Playing Borderlands 2 with a couple of buddies. Mania Krieg is immensely fun, even though it's very self destructive with 4 players (as he's the only one that can take self damage, on top of being the melee class in a shooter).

I kind of forgot how much they wank to the characters of the first game; reminds me of a PnP game where the DM let's his characters do all the work, and you're just there as the muscle. These characters being wet noodles in terms of personality doesn't help. For a game that's trying to be self aware, it's oblivious to all of this. Roland especially keeps jawing on and on, and when he dies, the others keep going on about him. And he's the hero and everything revolves around him.
And of course the next objective isn't indicated, or way opened, or whatever, before these people shut their mouths, so you just stand there like a good boy.
The DLCs are such an improvement to this, that it's like playing a whole different game.

Since the loot is shitty, without grinding at least, we're considering using Cheat Engine to buff the tables a bit. You basically need to get at least a couple of good weapons and a shield every two or three levels. Class mod and relic every five-ish.
Class mods especially are frustrating for certain characters like my Krieg, who needs a purple "Slab". First RNG is to even get a class mod, second is a 1/10 chance for it to be the correct type, third is a 0.09% drop chance for purple. It might just not ever drop, so you're forced to play one of the more conservative trees, which eats the fun out of the character.
It's even agony to get weapons for even two out of four players sometimes for entire dungeons. There's also already been instances where the only good weapons everyone had were RPGs, so we just rushed in and second winded ourselves up every other minute. Or maybe I'm having fun with a ridiculously good shotgun, but everyone else needs to stay back and play popamole with their sniper rifles.

Other than that, it's still one of the best, if not the best, story focused co-op FPSses. When it's fun, it's really fun.

 

[FreshCorpse]

Playing Majora's Mask in Project64. I played it when it came out but I don't think I ever completed it and certainly can't remember much of it.

I just cleared dungeon 1 (out of 4) so bit early for any deep thoughts but I recently finished Portal 2 and Majora's dungeons play a lot better than that in terms of puzzle gameplay. No pointless massive rooms to traverse and puzzles actually interact with each other as opposed to being completely atomised in their individual rooms. The only problem so far is that most of the side quests seem to be boxed off if you don't have the dungeon items (bow, bombs, etc) from the dungeons.

Playing it in an emulator is brilliant. Running in 1080p with no fog really improves a lot of these early 3D games.

Slow printing text does my nut in, though.

At some point soon I want to dig in to JA2 1.13 as I'm well up for a tactical game but a bit wary of going in to that one blind.

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

Hexen: my savegame got corrupted (again) halfway through the second hub. Maybe I'll have to resort to a less faithful port for this one.

 

[someone else]

I completed Starbound, initially pleased by the game, I have to force myself to finished it. Terraria is much better.

 

[mbv123]

Playing the old Combat Mission games (Beyond Overlord) and even though I'm absolutely terrible, I'm having fun.

 

[Gregz]

Wizardry 8
Dune Wars mod for Civ IV

 

[Vikt0rZ]

yakuza 0 it's not terrible

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Playing Sudeki.
I like it. I find it to be quite endearing little game with a good first impression...but fuck me they dropped the ball with how they managed the game structure and party, especially late game.
Ok, so you have a merchant system where merchants give different prices for different resources and an emphasis on backtracking...and for most of the game you are stuck on a linear path.
Ok, so the game really pushes this thing about the 4 heroes who will save the world...and for most of the game you have a split party, controlling 1 or 2 characters, and for the final boss

Spoiler

you only fight as Tal instead of the whole party against Heigou, what the fuck why?! What's the point in investing in the other members of the party then? Hell, why even have a party? That's fucking bullshit.

If it weren't for such idiotic design choices the game would have been so much better. I get that they tried to copy JRPGs, but not even in JRPGs they split the party or railroad the player as much as Sudeki does, and JRPGs are pretty linear compared to western CRPGs.

Spoiler

Also, Nico > Buki. The lack of R34 is just sad

 

[Gregz]

Freeman: Guerrilla Warfare

There's a lot of potential here, but it's still in early access and pretty buggy.

Imagine Mount & Blade meets JA2 meets ARMA.

 

[slymer]

Dead Cells - fun game, but i'm not very good so I keep playing the same 3 or 4 levels over and over again. I even have a hard time with the 1st boss unless I have an OP weapon.

Bard's Tale remaster - I think i'm about halfway through. Starting to get a little burnt out.