Tale

My birthday was yesterday. Went to work, went out to eat, went for a walk in the dark. That's how it goes. Signed up for a writing group today. I didn't know there was one so close.

That damn hover thing didn't even show up until DLC. The Mako was necessary for the main game.

I regret to say I'm going to miss the launch. Between Nier, Horizon, and Torment I simply don't have time for it. Given how big a fan I am of the last two I'll certainly buy it at launch, but I won't be playing for another month or two.

It certainly did, just not heavily. The gun upgrade system existed in its form because of the microtransactions in MP. The game had total parity between single player and the multiplayer horde mode. They basically farmed out all of the combat to the MP team. It's why single player has no collectors, no mercenaries, no thugs, no Krogan, not even wildlife. It's only Reapers, Geth, and Cerberus in neatly organized armies. And not even any battlefields where two groups fight, because that wouldn't be in MP either. It seems like the only actual mechanics the single player team were responsible are the awful awful boss fights.

Anything's possible. I'm not one to completely dismiss something. Otherwise I'd never have played Dragon Age: Origins or ME2. And I loved those two. Even Inquisition had enough redeeming qualities that I can say it was worthwhile. Heck, I enjoyed a second playthrough of Dragon Age 2 not too long ago. I'm not optimistic, but I'm also not inclined to think that one terrible game means all others will terrible.

I'm still waiting for impressions from people who thought ME3 was a dumpster fire. Not really interested in the opinions of people who thought the ending was a-okay and game systems built for microtransaction laden horde modes are great for single player.

Finished my first round of Nier Automata at around 18 hours. Trying to decide if I should continue with the second round or play some Horizon instead and come back later. I don't feel I've got the meat of the game yet, though.

I started by playing Nier first since I loved the first one. I'm getting some strong Metal Gear Rising vibes from the gameplay, though it's more forgiving on Normal than I remember that one being. Complete with enemies giving a visible cue before attacking and dodges not being able to cancel out of many attacks. But then a successful dodge leads into a powerful counter. It also feels a lot more open than MGR did. That game was about as linear as they get, but this has some modest open world elements to it. And it looks like you should be able to teleport around and revisit old areas with no problem. It even stole some Dark Souls mechanics, too. No auto-save, instead only saving at the warp points. If you die, you end up back at that point, losing stuff, and have to go get your corpse to get it back.

Horizon Zero Dawn arrived yesterday and Nier Automata is arriving today. I'm super hyped. Might finally end my anime binge for some games.

Anyone out there know lots about hot sauce? Trying to get into it. Grabbed a bottle of Cholula a few weeks back only to find out that's probably the weakest stuff. And recently grabbed a bottle of Louisiana. That's doing only a little better. Both are delicious, but I'd like something that's a bit harder on me. I can slather a slice of pizza and only end up finding the residual heat to be mildly annoying. But I don't want to go crazy, just looking to graduate.

So long as it fixes PST's problem of dying too much making the final dungeon a piece of work... I like how it handled dying to the first real combat sequence so much that I didn't reload my save. But am still worried about heading down that path.

So it's true to PST, then.

Super nice, even. Can't even click on the full size map to move there, IIRC.

How is Jack? I keep wanting to reroll because Nano feels a bit boring, but then I would lose mind reading which is awesome. What tide is everyone getting? I'm finding it way too easy to slip into blue just by asking questions. Wish I got more silver.

If they can keep it difficult into late game, it can be a real treasure.

Are we there yet?

I'm playing babysit my dad's dogs one of whom still isn't properly housetrained. I am not very good at this game. Less times for games, more time for Netflix though.

The third game's the one with the crossdressers, right? That's all I remember.

That's because you're a quitter. I played them all and they were all imminently forgettable.

I love the phrase "Moon Logic Puzzle." It's so evocative of just how nonsensical it all is. But this specific example named a trope entry that I'm not sure how it's different. http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SolveTheSoupCans Anyway, I don't think there's a lot to say. Someone either thought they were being witty or they rushed something together with the only criteria being that it should be hard. I imagine the early days of playtesting played no little part in the whole affair. Get stuck, ask Jim, and if you think it's a real problem, well, they can always call the tip line.

If it's that short, maybe I should finally knock it out this weekend.

Fate Stay/Night Up to just starting the final part, Heaven's Feel. Overall it's been a fairly typical high school boy that all the girls like gets magical powers and fights type of story, but there's a few interesting ideas in it that keep me engaged. The Unlimited Blade Works route in particular was exceptional, despite the groanworthy attempts at analyzing relatively simple life philosophies. But you pretty much have to be numb to that to even enjoy these stories aimed at teenage/young adult demographics. Negativity out of the way, I have enjoyed it. Sure, there's it's issues with dissecting philosophies that aren't even worth dissecting and the whole thing where , but the characters are fun and their conflicts provide tension and emotional resolutions.

Useless spam sucks. Whether it's e-mail, phone, forums, or the release and genre lists at a online stores. It's annoying and it makes it harder to notice actual worthwhile games. Valve's discovery updates have done nothing to help this, they revolve entirely around the UI and their joke of a tag system.

When was this?

Root Double The After route was pretty interesting, but overwhelmed with cliffhangers. The Before route that supposedly answers this stuff is a lot less interesting.