schenksmill

2015-09-17

Game Ramblings #7 – Omega Quintet

Genre: JRPG
Platform: PS4

Progress

Roughly 25 hours of story
All available side quests up to that point
Shelved in favor of other games, gameplay fun but repetitive

Omega Quintet can best be described as an idol JRPG. Per the story, you are putting together a Japanese idol group in order to save the world (or at least the city you’re in), and fighting lots of monsters in doing so. You hit all the JRPG/anime stereotypes, but the lighthearted story and interactions, and pretty solid game mechanics make this an overall solid experience for PS4 gamers looking for a new JRPG to fill that niche.

What I Liked

The battle system itself was pretty fun. It takes the time/turn-based gameplay of a game like Final Fantasy 10, and adds some range and AoE mechanics that add a lot of depth. Moves can be single target, horizontal or vertical line AoE, or circular range AoE, so finding the right moves and right target to maximize full party damage adds some interesting quirks to the battle system. In addition, the full party can engage in combo mechanics for particularly large damage. On top of that there is a pretty nice elemental system for additional damage bonuses, with the addition of individual weapon types per-character that act as elements. Overall the battle system takes some well established gameplay from other games, and adds a lot of potential depth possibilities to really round out the battle situations.

The characters and interactions between them are also fun. For the most part the game doesn’t take itself very seriously, so a lot of the dialogue ends up being pretty light hearted. However, for the type of slice-of-life in a post apocalyptic world that the game takes place in, it adds a very non-serious tone that I feel fit the game well.

What I Didn’t Like

Missable side quests bug me in most games. In this case, the side quests are time limited, but not always in the most obvious way. My tendency ended up being to crunch on side quests until I finished them all, while avoiding story triggers that I knew about. In some cases, missing the side quests meant missing moves that aid overworld navigation and interaction, blocking some additional treasures that would otherwise be available in hidden spots. It didn’t end up penalizing me particularly much, but I prefer games that allow side quests to be done at leisure, particularly when they can have long-term negative consequences in the game.

What I Was Indifferent To

Overall the individual zones were pretty average. The world consists of a 2D world map, then a bunch of smaller 3D zones with more or less linear paths. As the game progresses, different environmental interactions open up the areas a bit more, but the maps still tend towards being pretty compact, with usually 3-5 enemy types per environment.

Side quests also tended towards being just kill x monsters, collect y items, etc. Overall they were simple objectives, but to some extent felt necessary for character growth to at least be grinding them out a bit. They provided for the bulk of easy points for gear purchases and upgrades throughout the game, so doing side quests was beneficial enough to worry about keeping them completed, but didn’t add much to the experience.

2015-07-23

Game Ramblings #6 – Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA F 2nd

More Info from Sega

Genre: Rhythm
Platform: Playstation Vita (Also available for PS3)

Progress

Full Completion Normal/Hard, all but 2 songs Extreme difficulty
Completion of all available song DLC at the time of playthrough

Project Diva is very obviously a game concentrated around the Japanese Vocaloid characters and music. However, underneath the surface, there’s a really strong music rhythm game to be had. There’s a large variety of content to run through, a nice range of difficulties, and a lot of side-activities for completionists to run through. If you’re fine with the very much anime-styled experience to be had with this, it’s one of the better rhythm games I’ve seen on a a portable system of late.

What I Liked

Overall the rhythm gameplay was pretty well put together. The core actions are all button presses, but there’s a mix of straight symbol/d-pad presses, combination symbol/d-pad at the same time (Ex: X + D-Pad down), as well as hold variants typical of the genre. On the Vita, there is also screen swipes with the inclusion of the front touchscreen. By the time I got into the extreme difficulty, I was playing a lot of thumb gymnastics trying to keep up with the pace of symbols coming in. The nice thing about this is that the presses follow the music very closely, so growing familiarity with the songs increases the effectiveness of play throughs, even on top of simply getting better at recognizing the patterns coming in.

On top of that, there is a lot of flexibility in how the game is played, both cosmetically and functionally. Song modifiers can be set before a song is played to increase the difficulty (Ex: random direction of symbols moving onto the screen), or to help clear tough songs (Ex: touch screen swipes can now be activated with the shoulder buttons). This gives another nice layer of modification even on top of the set of difficulties available. As a cosmetic incentive, the animated characters in each music video can be cosmetically changed, from simple things like hats, to completely different outfits. This plays into some of the completionist goals, where certain unlockables can only be obtained by playing songs with specific conditions of all of the above.

Indifferent, but Neat

The completionist aspect moves beyond just cosmetic changes. Each character can be interacted with within a customizable room, where you can give them gifts and interactable objects, growing relationships. I didn’t see anything to this beyond a handful of trophies, but it adds another layer of something to do for completionists to chase after.

What I Didn’t Like

The touch screen swiping was pretty poor. However, I chalk this up more to the system than to the game’s implementation. Over time, the typical touch screen finger grime would build up, and I’d start missing swipe inputs. Knowing about this to clean the screen before songs is fine, but hitting that tipping point mid-song tended to be frustrating as hell.

Extreme difficulty is also pretty appropriately named. While most of it was pretty much tuned to the rhythm of the song, some of the later songs were very clearly chosen to be absurd. Double press 16th notes wrapping around the button mapping felt next to impossible on the long travel, small buttons of the Vita. I suspect the PS3 controller would have felt better with its easier button presses, but the later songs on Extreme often times felt unfair to try to get through.

2015-06-11

Game Ramblings #5 – Thoughts on DiRT: Rally Early Access

More Info From Codemasters
Purchase on Steam

Info:

Genre: Simulation Racing
Platform: PC – Steam Early Access
Twitch VODs: Youtube Playlist

Progress

11 Hours play time
Cups played in 3 vehicle classes
As far as I know all content current as of last play through (May 10th)
Have not yet played recently released Pike’s Peak content

From a high level, this feels like old Codemasters to me. This is more Colin McRae than it is DiRT, and while that comes with some significant added complexity, to me it’s a nice change of pace. While it is an Early Access title, the content available so far (rally cups in 4 main environments with recently added Pikes Peak, as well as 6 vehicle classes with multiple cars in each) is already a really good look at what the type of content will be for the final release. For how early it is, it does have some problems that I will outline below, but I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t worth purchasing already.

What I Like

The driving feels decidedly more simulation than the last handful of DiRT games. Even with some assists turned on, when I screw up my line, chances are I’m going off the track, often time to my doom. In that sense, the physics sim being used in this game definitely feels like it’s on the right track. There’s enough assists and tuning options for people to turn down their play to be safer, but allow those interested in the full simulation experience to really push their times to the limit.

Each race feels like the result is purely based on how strong I am doing, and my often times place low on the results definitely follows when I’m being reckless. As I played more and started picking up on the feel of the cars, my times became better and more consistent. Although I wasn’t placing podiums often, I was definitely getting closer, and it felt good to see that improvement as I was going along.

As a side note, I went in expecting widescreen support to be good due to past Codemasters titles, but it’s always pleasant to see unusual aspect ratios be well supported in simulation games. I’m currently playing the game in 3440×1440, and had no problems at all with the game in the 21:9 aspect.

What I Don’t Like

Right now, the steering wheel support feels, for lack of a better term, slightly off. I’m currently using a Logitech G27, and I’ve not yet been able to shake the feeling that the game was tuned for controllers in early access. The basic problem for me is that my wheel feels like it has a huge dead zone, then once I’m past there is incredibly sensitive. What this often does is has me basically not steering at all, then accidentally overcompensating until I get into a wheel lock situation. There’s been some mention of this in blog posts from Codemasters, so I’m relatively confident that it will be fixed, but it was somewhat of a damper as I played through the game so far.

Also, given how early the game is, there was a lot of repetition of content. I’m currently waiting for more larger content patches until I jump back in for further thoughts to avoid burning out, but that is a consideration on whether or not to wait for a more complete release.