Battle of the Backlog

[Legend]

Other M isn't really a metroidvania. All the doors randomly lock and unlock so that you can only go down the path they intended. I've been very very limited in being able to revisit areas.

[kitler53]

Other M isn't really a metroidvania. All the doors randomly lock and unlock so that you can only go down the path they intended. I've been very very limited in being able to revisit areas.

even the biggest Nintendo fans I know all acknowledge that other M is a terrible game.  just give up already. 

[Legend]

even the biggest Nintendo fans I know all acknowledge that other M is a terrible game.  just give up already.

It's not at all as bad as I expected. It's not great either, but coming from a 2D metroid perspective it's fine.

edt: it stopped locking all the doors finally, but all I can do is collect things I previously couldn't.

[Legend]

Finished Other M.

Pretty ok. Had plenty of baffling elements but also plenty of good elements. Ignoring the story I think it's not as good as Super Metroid but not bad either. The biggest gameplay issues were how much it held your hand, the in game justifications for why you couldn't do things, and the random moments that'd be near impossible without a guide.

Spoiler for Hidden:

<br>Samus does not have permission to use power bombs. Whole game you keep seeing things that&#39;d be nice to use power bombs on. Finally at one point she says screw permission and activates all of her suit&#39;s features. For some reason power bombs are still not allowed however. Then in within a matter of minutes you&#39;re fighting a boss and at one specific point the game requires you to use a power bomb, but it never indicates this feature has been unlocked. No cutscene, no voice line, etc., even though literally every other time Samus enabled a new power it had a mini cutscene and opened the menu to show you.<br><br><br>Locking doors was also really frustrating. The game has only a hint of metroidvania. Primarily it is just a linear game that weaves around like a web. If this was hidden with in game reasons like explosions changing the ship it could be pretty acceptable like a soulsborne. Instead it&#39;s purely just doors turning red when the game wants you to take a different path. Even post credits this is continuing.<br>

I could understand hating the story from the perspective of "not my metroid" since it presents Samus in a pretty poor/stupid fashion a lot of times. Her primary characterization is that she gives her commanding officer a thumbs down lol. It was stupid the first time yet the whole plot revolves around it!

Ignoring the downgrade in characterization however, it's fine. It has a few good story beats and reminded me of Knack.


7/10

[the-pi-guy]

I've been jumping between different games, which is weird. Ive been feeling indecisive lately.

I have played a bit more the Witness. I don't think I will finish it, but I plan to keep playing until I get burned out.  

Was wanting to play Dark Souls.  So I tried some more.  For some reason, I can't get into it.

The game just feels so unresponsive. Running feels super slow. If you heal, all other input stops while you're doing that, for what feels like a solid 2 seconds. Which feels like a lot for an action RPG.  

It feels much less responsive than Demons Souls (PS3 or PS5)

I decided to try Dark Souls 2, just to see how it feels. And it feels so much better. Running actually feels running. You can apparently still move while you're healing. I've only played for like 30 minutes, but I'm already more interested than I was in 9 hours of Dark Souls.

It doesn't make any sense to me. I haven't heard any major complaints. And most people tend to say that Dark Souls 2 is by far the worst.  

Is this an issue from the Remastered version, or is there a weird bug playing on PS5?

[the-pi-guy]

I'm having such a hard time getting into Dark Souls.

Bloodborne felt enjoyable from the first moment. Demon's Souls took a few hours to really get into.
But I've put 15 hours into Dark Souls so far, and I feel like I'm only now starting to get into it.  Starting to. It still feels like a big step down from the other two games.

I kind of feel like Dark Souls is a bit more unfair compared to the others. Enemies will occasionally make these impossible kind of glitchy jumps that are often unavoidable.

Level design is pretty cool. Kind of neat how easy it is to get between like 5 different areas.
The ragdoll physics seem really over the top though. They'll occasionally jump up if you bump into them.

[the-pi-guy]

At this point, I am very much getting into Dark Souls. My feelings have been rising pretty consistently today. It's not going to beat Demon's Souls or Bloodborne for me, but it's definitely a great game. Just today I have beaten 4 bosses, which was more than I had total prior.

What I will say though is that while the mechanics are nearly identical to Demon's Souls, there are some "emergent" differences. All the buttons basically do the same thing, there are some slight differences. Dodging feels slower, movement in general is a good bit slower in Dark Souls.  

I don't know the exact way to say it. But while the controller mapping is the same, there are some subtle differences and the game to me feels more geared towards defensive strategies. In large part using the shield.  It feels like they went from Demon's Souls and tried to make the shield more useful, but at the same time not too useful. Any kind of shield use is basically tied to stamina, the same thing that dodging and attacking are from. It feels set up so that you rely on the shield, but not too much.  

If you block an attack, you lose a massive amount of stamina, generally correlated with the amount of health you would have lost otherwise.
If you hold up your shield, then your stamina returns incredibly slowly.

I think this is basically the same as in Demon's Souls, but I think that game was more versatile in playing, and the shield use felt less irritating.  

At this point, I feel a lot better about getting through it.


And I really like the connectedness of the map.  I am pretty sure there are some points in the map, where you are like 30 seconds away from 4 different levels, and it's not because they're small levels or anything.  

[Dr. Pezus]

Really getting into Red Dead 2 again. Such a good game. Annoying in parts though, like driving wagons and you hit a tree or a stone.

[the-pi-guy]

At this point I'm probably like 75% done with Dark Souls.

Not much has changed.

Great level design. Like 90% of the levels themselves are good. A couple of weirdly bad levels. But the interconnectness is still great. There are a good number of places where you can go in 4 or so directions and end up in wildly different levels.  It's not open world, but it's not quite linear either.
 
Kind of janky controls relative to the other Souls games.

One annoyance, when you're locked into an enemy and you try to roll in a specific direction, it often doesn't seem to do that. I very often end up rolling in the opposite direction of where the stick is going and it's a bit weird.  

Like I said before healing takes like a solid 4 seconds, very different from either Demons Souls or Bloodborne.

It kind of feels like a big portion of the challenge with Dark Souls is the clunky controls.  Bloodborne and Demons Souls felt more about figuring out the enemy.

I'm looking forward to getting to Dark Souls 2 soonish....

[the-pi-guy]

I've put 76 hours into Dark Souls...

I've had a hard time getting into it.
Almost done. Have to beat 3 bosses yet. 2 of them are pretty close though.

[the-pi-guy]

I think I'm going to wait on some of the big games next year. 

I want to get through some of my backlog first.
Dark Souls 1 - 3
Sekiro
Mass Effect 1 - 3

And I think I want to have a return with Uncharted soon.

And I am thinking I want to get the platinum for Dark Souls, but that's going to be quite the investment.    

[Legend]

I think I'm going to wait on some of the big games next year.  

I want to get through some of my backlog first.
Dark Souls 1 - 3
Sekiro
Mass Effect 1 - 3

And I think I want to have a return with Uncharted soon.

And I am thinking I want to get the platinum for Dark Souls, but that's going to be quite the investment.  

Have you never played Mass Effect before?

[the-pi-guy]

Have you never played Mass Effect before?

Nope.  

[kitler53]

Nope.  

nor i.

i think i may pick up the remasters in a year or so when i can pick them up for under $20.

[Legend]

Nope.  

nor i.

i think i may pick up the remasters in a year or so when i can pick them up for under $20.

Don't know how well they aged, but 2 and 3 are goat.