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  1. - Top - End - #271
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    ElfRogueGirl

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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Just beat the third route of Star Fox 1 on the SNES classic! The game is incredibly difficult, but the difficulty comes from technical limitations more than from the game mechanics. The constant lag and slowdown is extremely aggravating.

  2. - Top - End - #272
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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    So I noticed that Persona 4: the Golden was released on Steam right on my birthday and I have picked it up, and as I basically hold up the original as 'the good JRPG' I thought I should at least try it.

    And wow. Like, it runs fine, I can run it on decent settings at ~40FPS or low settings at 60 with no issues, anything actually in-engine is completely smooth and the simulation ruins at the correct speed. But those cutscenes, no matter what I do they seem to cap at 55FPS with the audio pausing about once a second, although apparently this is a bug and happens on pretty much any system? It's a shame, as the game is still great fun to play (the old routine, make friends, summon magical playing cards, destroy playing card to summon monster) and still my favourite JRPG' story by far. But I'm kind of wary to go on because I know more anime-style cutscenes got added in this version, and they're just unpleasant to watch now compared to in engine stuff.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Zelphas View Post
    So here I am, trapped in my laboratory, trying to create a Mechabeast that's powerful enough to take down the howling horde outside my door, but also won't join them once it realizes what I've done...twentieth time's the charm, right?
    Quote Originally Posted by Lord Raziere View Post
    How about a Jovian Uplift stuck in a Case morph? it makes so little sense.

  3. - Top - End - #273
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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Quote Originally Posted by Anteros View Post
    Actually creating smart AI is supposedly easier. The problem is creating AI that doesn't completely demolish the player while still challenging them.

    The problem with difficulty sliders is that for a lot of games increased difficulty=numbers bloat. Making me tediously shoot a boss 500 times while they 1 shot me might be technically more difficult, but it's not in a satisfying way. Compared to something like Sekiro that's fine tuned to be difficult but satisfying when you master it, I much prefer the latter.
    I think that varies on game type; for games with a real-time component it can be fairly easy to make an obnoxiously hard ai by exploiting the ai's faster reaction times and ability to micro; ofc that's not really making a smarter ai, it's making a faster one. For turn-based strategy and such it's still quite hard to make good ai's. Pausable RTS (eg paradox games) tend to also be hard for ai, the pausing and speed adjustments prevent ai from abusing its reaction time.
    A neat custom class for 3.5 system
    http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=94616

    A good set of benchmarks for PF/3.5
    https://rpgwillikers.wordpress.com/2...y-the-numbers/

    An alternate craft point system I made for 3.5
    http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showt...t-Point-system

  4. - Top - End - #274
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    Man_Over_Game's Avatar

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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Quote Originally Posted by Anteros View Post
    Actually creating smart AI is supposedly easier. The problem is creating AI that doesn't completely demolish the player while still challenging them.

    The problem with difficulty sliders is that for a lot of games increased difficulty=numbers bloat. Making me tediously shoot a boss 500 times while they 1 shot me might be technically more difficult, but it's not in a satisfying way. Compared to something like Sekiro that's fine tuned to be difficult but satisfying when you master it, I much prefer the latter.
    There's a third option, which is what Diablo 3 did: Add bloat in the form of interactive, negative mechanics.

    For example, hunger in your cities based on overpopulation is doubled, water on this planet is acidic and melts your boats at 1 HP per round (manageable by just improving your boat techs to have more HP), Neutral cities have been manipulated by religious zeal and become increasingly hostile to you each round, Pylons have an odd polarity here and cannot be built outside the radius of another Pylon.

    The idea is that you cannot win just by being good, but you have to win by being good against this specific problem. The AI can roughly stay the same, even predictable, but that doesn't mean your chances of defeating them are good or boring.

    That does give me an interesting idea of a game, one where the AI is incredibly predictable and easy to maneuver around, but the difficulty increases by environmental effects that makes adjusting for the enemy's actions increasingly painful.
    Last edited by Man_Over_Game; 2020-06-18 at 08:59 AM.
    Quote Originally Posted by KOLE View Post
    MOG, design a darn RPG system. Seriously, the amount of ideas I’ve gleaned from your posts has been valuable. You’re a gem of the community here.

    5th Edition Homebrewery
    Prestige Options, changing primary attributes to open a world of new multiclassing.
    Adrenaline Surge, fitting Short Rests into combat to fix bosses/Short Rest Classes.
    Pain, using Exhaustion to make tactical martial combatants.
    Fate Sorcery, lucky winner of the 5e D&D Subclass Contest VII!

  5. - Top - End - #275
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    Quote Originally Posted by Cespenar View Post
    I don't know how being unafraid to be unfair is somehow a positive thing, but okay.
    Obviously, it would have been best to have smart AI. But if the AI is gonna be stupid anyway, then being unfair at least makes it challenging. And I relish that challenge.

    Your mileage might vary, naturally.

    Quote Originally Posted by Man_Over_Game View Post
    There's a third option, which is what Diablo 3 did: Add bloat in the form of interactive, negative mechanics.
    I don't think you meant Diablo 3 here.
    Many thanks to Assassin 89 for this avatar!

  6. - Top - End - #276
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    Quote Originally Posted by Narkis View Post
    I don't think you meant Diablo 3 here.
    When D3 first came out, the randomly generated bosses scaled off of difficulty by adding more and more punishing mechanics.

    For example:

    Creating pools of acid wherever the boss walked.
    Randomly firing telegraphed mortar blasts near players.
    Randomly generating walls that disappeared after a brief moment of time towards the players.
    Arcane tether sentries slowly circled in place and lasered any player that touched a beam.
    Frost bombs randomly spawned to explode after a brief timer.
    The boss occasionally teleports without warning.


    There's a bunch more. They started with 1 of those above. Then as you increased the difficulty, the bosses added another. And then another. Until eventually you're dodging frost novas, mortar blasts, while being trapped inside of the boss's maze of walls.


    Conceptually, it was fine, since you could tell exactly what powers the boss had when he entered on-screen. Realistically, some combinations were problematic (acid pools + walls = death) but they scripted it so that certain combos couldn't be generated together eventually.
    Last edited by Man_Over_Game; 2020-06-18 at 11:56 AM.
    Quote Originally Posted by KOLE View Post
    MOG, design a darn RPG system. Seriously, the amount of ideas I’ve gleaned from your posts has been valuable. You’re a gem of the community here.

    5th Edition Homebrewery
    Prestige Options, changing primary attributes to open a world of new multiclassing.
    Adrenaline Surge, fitting Short Rests into combat to fix bosses/Short Rest Classes.
    Pain, using Exhaustion to make tactical martial combatants.
    Fate Sorcery, lucky winner of the 5e D&D Subclass Contest VII!

  7. - Top - End - #277
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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Quote Originally Posted by Man_Over_Game View Post
    When D3 first came out, the randomly generated bosses scaled off of difficulty by adding more and more punishing mechanics.

    For example:

    Creating pools of acid wherever the boss walked.
    Randomly firing telegraphed mortar blasts near players.
    Randomly generating walls that disappeared after a brief moment of time towards the players.
    Arcane tether sentries slowly circled in place and lasered any player that touched a beam.
    Frost bombs randomly spawned to explode after a brief timer.
    The boss occasionally teleports without warning.


    There's a bunch more. They started with 1 of those above. Then as you increased the difficulty, the bosses added another. And then another. Until eventually you're dodging frost novas, mortar blasts, while being trapped inside of the boss's maze of walls.


    Conceptually, it was fine, since you could tell exactly what powers the boss had when he entered on-screen. Realistically, some combinations were problematic (acid pools + walls = death) but they scripted it so that certain combos couldn't be generated together eventually.
    I see. I have played Diablo 3, yes. The confusion was because I didn't realise your "acidic water melting boats" example was theoretical.
    Many thanks to Assassin 89 for this avatar!

  8. - Top - End - #278
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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Quote Originally Posted by Narkis View Post
    I see. I have played Diablo 3, yes. The confusion was because I didn't realise your "acidic water melting boats" example was theoretical.
    Sorry, the original context was on turn-based strategy games, and how difficulty meters are incredibly hard to implement without just artificially buffing the numbers on your AI. My thought process is, if you want the game harder, but can't make the AI smarter, and don't want the same things you're doing to be effective in every game, make YOUR game harder by adding more and more demands and things to worry about. Individually, they're easy to address, but anyone that's played FTL knows that multiple problems at once is so much worse.
    Borderlands 3 started doing something similar.

    "Floor is Lava" Standing still in combat spawns a lava pool under your feet.
    "Big Kick Energy" Guns how have increased damage and massively increased recoil.
    "Pool Party" Killing an enemy has a chance of spawning 3 elemental pools near their corpse.

    There are some issues with the balance of the difficulty levels besides that, but the implementation of the random effects is really good.
    Last edited by Man_Over_Game; 2020-06-18 at 12:55 PM.
    Quote Originally Posted by KOLE View Post
    MOG, design a darn RPG system. Seriously, the amount of ideas I’ve gleaned from your posts has been valuable. You’re a gem of the community here.

    5th Edition Homebrewery
    Prestige Options, changing primary attributes to open a world of new multiclassing.
    Adrenaline Surge, fitting Short Rests into combat to fix bosses/Short Rest Classes.
    Pain, using Exhaustion to make tactical martial combatants.
    Fate Sorcery, lucky winner of the 5e D&D Subclass Contest VII!

  9. - Top - End - #279
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    BlackDragon

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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Quote Originally Posted by Anonymouswizard View Post
    But those cutscenes, no matter what I do they seem to cap at 55FPS with the audio pausing about once a second, although apparently this is a bug and happens on pretty much any system?
    I just started playing the game and haven't had any such issues? All the cartoon cutscenes seem as smooth as the in-engine stuff.

    Speaking of which, I really don't know what I was expecting of this game, but it definitely wasn't *that*. I'm about an hour and a half in, I've had a grand total of one combat (which lasted about four rounds and I never saw my opponent) and a few dozen dialogue choices, and I was seriously beginning to wonder why people call this out as a fantastic game--then it gave reality a quick peck on the cheek and departed on the SS Insane for the back side of Neptune. Still hasn't been much more in the way of gameplay, but I am definitely fascinated to find out where the heck *this* tale is going...

  10. - Top - End - #280
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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Quote Originally Posted by factotum View Post
    I just started playing the game and haven't had any such issues? All the cartoon cutscenes seem as smooth as the in-engine stuff.

    Speaking of which, I really don't know what I was expecting of this game, but it definitely wasn't *that*. I'm about an hour and a half in, I've had a grand total of one combat (which lasted about four rounds and I never saw my opponent) and a few dozen dialogue choices, and I was seriously beginning to wonder why people call this out as a fantastic game--then it gave reality a quick peck on the cheek and departed on the SS Insane for the back side of Neptune. Still hasn't been much more in the way of gameplay, but I am definitely fascinated to find out where the heck *this* tale is going...
    It seems to be a problem on anything that doesn't have specs way above the recommended. Just search for 'Persona 4 Golden cutscene lag' on Google and you'll see what I mean, apparently very widespread.

    You need to get about 3-4 hours in until the gameplay really picks up. The first three hours have no Dungeon Crawling, no Social Links, and about three combats (the one you mentioned, the actual tutorial fight against mooks, and the 'if you don't play right you're in for pain' fight instance #1 right on it's heels at about the two hour mark. Although if you're playing on Normal and listen to Teddie it's easy, and I maintain that even in the original version the first legitimately hard boss fight is the fourth/fifth (depending on if you count fight #3 as a boss).

    The basic advice is to cover your weaknesses as beast you can, don't forget to bring buff and debuff skills, and physical skills are completely worth the percentage of HP they take.

    Oh, and the plot starts to make sense, kind of, eventually. I'm not sure, spent too much time eating Beef Bowls and trying to friend with everybody to pay much attention to it.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Zelphas View Post
    So here I am, trapped in my laboratory, trying to create a Mechabeast that's powerful enough to take down the howling horde outside my door, but also won't join them once it realizes what I've done...twentieth time's the charm, right?
    Quote Originally Posted by Lord Raziere View Post
    How about a Jovian Uplift stuck in a Case morph? it makes so little sense.

  11. - Top - End - #281
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    BlackDragon

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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    It says having the game installed on an SSD is often a fix for the lag, and I did that (have a 1Tb SSD that my OS and all games are installed on), so that might be why I haven't encountered it.

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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Quote Originally Posted by factotum View Post
    It says having the game installed on an SSD is often a fix for the lag, and I did that (have a 1Tb SSD that my OS and all games are installed on), so that might be why I haven't encountered it.
    Nope, don't even have a hard disk in my laptop, only an SSD.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Zelphas View Post
    So here I am, trapped in my laboratory, trying to create a Mechabeast that's powerful enough to take down the howling horde outside my door, but also won't join them once it realizes what I've done...twentieth time's the charm, right?
    Quote Originally Posted by Lord Raziere View Post
    How about a Jovian Uplift stuck in a Case morph? it makes so little sense.

  13. - Top - End - #283
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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Finished my first run through Persona 5 Royal. I say first run because I know I'll eventually be back to 100% the thing. Managed to max out my social stats and get 16 of the 23 Confidants done. Got all the extra content and generally enjoyed it. A few minor gripes.

    - Maybe it's just lack of memory but I feel like Persona 3 and 4 were a little more forgiving with their time. The middle part of the main game of Persona 5 really doesn't offer a lot of time between going to Mementos and all the scripted stuff. The trip to Hawaii could have been a lot of fun if it weren't such a short trip that was 100% scripted. Following that with a week dedicated to totally manufactured drama with Morgana and Haru and then slapping a deadline onto you and then exams really killed the momentum for me. I was warned that that segment of the game was a "run killer" and I can totally understand why. I hope in future installments that they open up the time management a little more. Not because I just want to 100% a game on the first run but there's just so much to do! 120 hours of content and a lot of time spent agonizing over every choice.

    - Mementos was dull and that's with the Royal content. A bunch of empty hallways with battles you can just skip if you're high enough level. I found it was pretty much impossible to not be overleveled and increasing the difficulty in JRPGs, this one is no exception, just means beefier enemies. Which is...no thanks. It would have been cool if Confidants and their Ranks were more important, providing rooms and other content to the wanna be roguelike Mementos wanted to be.

    - They really dropped the ball in boss fights for most of the game. When I fought Kamoshida I thought sending a teammate to distract him for more damage and stuff was a clever concept and I was hoping they'd expand on that as your team expanded. More tactical bosses where you actually have to use the whole team to strategically beat them would have been great. Using the whole team but in different theaters would have made things a lot more varied and interesting. There were glimpses of what could have been here and there, and while I found most of the boss fights to be really easy, I still enjoyed the bulk of them. The Royal Boss fight was a great way to finish things and Shido's boss fight was really fun.

    - I felt in 4 especially that I was encouraged to explore a really quaint small town. Persona 5 slaps you into Tokyo and it all just kinda felt small after I got quick travel. The locations were all the same and I really wondered what the point was of putting it in one of the largest cities on the planet other than it made sense given the over-all plot. It did nothing for actual game play. You explored a few single streets and...that was that. I'm not saying it should have been more open world but I was really excited that you actually had to use the subway in the start of the game and I'd have loved to have seen more dependence on actually needing to know where you were going and how to get there. I guess others might find that tedious but if you cut the areas of Tokyo you have and more involvement on the places along the way...dunno. Just feel like more could have been done that making every place a self contained diorama rather than a more fleshed out world.

    - Too many dang elements. Fire, Ice, Lightning, Wind, Gun, Almighty, Curse, Bless, Nuke, Psychic. That was just a lot to juggle and I don't really feel like Almighty, Psychic or Nuke added a whole lot or really made any damn sense in the wider mythological context of the setting. 4 only had 7 and that felt well enough.

    - The guns were a neat idea but they just became sort of a gimmick by late game. Using actual attacks were almost always more viable than using guns considering the damage they did. Between Charge/Concentrate and a massive number of late game enemies either resisting or outright being immune to gun damage...I never really felt like I was obligated to use them. Persona 5 has a ton of mechanics between it's quasi-stealth elements to its double moves to its positioning and dealing with Persona. The gun felt slick and inventive at first, the idea that you had a limited but powerful attack to unleash was neat. Then having a whole character involved in souping up guns as a Confidant was further fodder to making guns really cool. They just sorta weren't by the end.

    - Persona 5 is a JRPG at it's core and while a great many JRPGs have bucked the need, Persona 5 still has a dedicated heal character. Two...sorta. Makoto can be a viable heal/buffer but that's at the cost of her being a damage dealer. I get each character has a set role and while I adore Morgana, it'd have been nice to have a reason to switch things out. I ran with Ann, Ryuji, Morgana and the main character from level 1 to level 99 with no real desire or need to switch things out except was I was absolutely required to for story reasons. I'm hoping to change that up in my second playthrough. Maybe spending the time making Makoto a healer/buffer and using Yusuke and someone else. This goes double for Akechi and Kasumi. They're with you for such a short period of time I really don't see the need to use them except when I was absolutely required to. By the time you're using them the main character should already have a wide variety of Persona with Curse/Bless attacks rendering either of them redundant let alone both.


    It's not all gripes though. The plot of the game was enjoyable. I liked it more, from what I can recall of 3 and 4, than those two titles. I loved the cast and while I feel a few of the later game options such as politician and reporter were kind of weak, the over all number of people you encounter are really interesting. I don't, and again the time between them is the reason, remember such a varied cast of people with such a varied depth of traumas and dramas in 3 or 4 as there were in 5. I never felt like the story came to a grinding halt even with the Morgana stuff and while that was the one major story beat that I disliked, it wasn't even close to making everything else around it less enjoyable. I found myself coming to care for the characters a great deal. Ryuji was the perfect, in my opinion, opening to the story and Ann to follow up after you get a little further in was a good one two punch. They balance each other well and make a really firm and fast intro to the over all mood. I'm honestly going to miss all of those goofballs as I move on to another game.

    Which seems to be Xenoblade Chronicles. Another JRPG with an insanely long playtime.

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    So I almost beat Shadow Chie on Hard. The first time I had the game freeze while grinding up Slime to level 3 and so never got to the boss, while the second time I was two thirds of the way through before my Laptop lost power.

    Must say that it's kind of annoying for the first real boss fight to be immune to Phys, because especially at this point it's hard to soak the 12SP needed to use a debuff skill. On the other hand mixing in Guards, normal attacks when Green Wall is up, and going for an All Out Attack whenever she's actually weak to Garu does wonders.

    Not a huge fan of the changes to Shuffle Time. It wasn't exactly hard to pick the card you wanted before, but now it's just a case of 'pick from static face up cards'. It just feels like it takes too long for a simple 'which of these X do you want?'
    Snazzy avatar (now back! ) by Honest Tiefling.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Zelphas View Post
    So here I am, trapped in my laboratory, trying to create a Mechabeast that's powerful enough to take down the howling horde outside my door, but also won't join them once it realizes what I've done...twentieth time's the charm, right?
    Quote Originally Posted by Lord Raziere View Post
    How about a Jovian Uplift stuck in a Case morph? it makes so little sense.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Anonymouswizard View Post
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    Not a huge fan of the changes to Shuffle Time. It wasn't exactly hard to pick the card you wanted before, but now it's just a case of 'pick from static face up cards'. It just feels like it takes too long for a simple 'which of these X do you want?'
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    I assume you're comparing shuffle time to that of 3? The trick in 4 isn't just getting the one you want, though that's how it goes early on. Later on you get different cards that allow you to pick more (often at some cost, such as removing a random card or reducing other rewards), and the trick is to chain cards in such a a way that you can clear the entire board, which gives some bonuses.
    Jasnah avatar by Zea Mays

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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Quote Originally Posted by DeTess View Post
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    I assume you're comparing shuffle time to that of 3? The trick in 4 isn't just getting the one you want, though that's how it goes early on. Later on you get different cards that allow you to pick more (often at some cost, such as removing a random card or reducing other rewards), and the trick is to chain cards in such a a way that you can clear the entire board, which gives some bonuses.
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    No, I meant in 4, because I still occasionally messed it up in 4. I also don't think I got a second pick ever. But still, 'here's X cards face up, just pick, we're not going to even shuffle then in front of you' is boring.
    Snazzy avatar (now back! ) by Honest Tiefling.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Zelphas View Post
    So here I am, trapped in my laboratory, trying to create a Mechabeast that's powerful enough to take down the howling horde outside my door, but also won't join them once it realizes what I've done...twentieth time's the charm, right?
    Quote Originally Posted by Lord Raziere View Post
    How about a Jovian Uplift stuck in a Case morph? it makes so little sense.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Anonymouswizard View Post
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    No, I meant in 4, because I still occasionally messed it up in 4. I also don't think I got a second pick ever. But still, 'here's X cards face up, just pick, we're not going to even shuffle then in front of you' is boring.
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    You should get plenty of second (and third, and fourth) picks later on. I remember in the later dungeons of p4g with a bit of careful picking you could often clear the entire board, but this is something not introduced all at once. I'd personally say this is an improvement, as it turns the system into a bit of a puzzle, rather than a very simple shell game, but that's just me.
    Jasnah avatar by Zea Mays

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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Quote Originally Posted by DeTess View Post
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    You should get plenty of second (and third, and fourth) picks later on. I remember in the later dungeons of p4g with a bit of careful picking you could often clear the entire board, but this is something not introduced all at once. I'd personally say this is an improvement, as it turns the system into a bit of a puzzle, rather than a very simple shell game, but that's just me.
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    I think you're thinking of the P5 Golden system and not P4 system, which was all the cards flying around and you said when you wanted the card at the front? Because that all makes sense from what I've seen of the P4 Golden system, but at the moment I'd rather have the shell game because it seems to literally just be 'pick one of four' at the moment.
    Last edited by Anonymouswizard; 2020-06-19 at 11:43 AM.

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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Wife and I picked up the phone version of Lords of Waterdeep, so we can play during the day (and without the kids messing up the board).
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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Quote Originally Posted by Narkis View Post
    Obviously, it would have been best to have smart AI. But if the AI is gonna be stupid anyway, then being unfair at least makes it challenging. And I relish that challenge.

    Your mileage might vary, naturally.
    I didn't get the usage of "unfairness" instead of just plain old "hard", but I suppose you mean asymmetrical bonuses/penalties and whatnot. If so, sure.

    Quote Originally Posted by Mark Hall View Post
    Wife and I picked up the phone version of Lords of Waterdeep, so we can play during the day (and without the kids messing up the board).
    I played the board version with a few friends, and the whole messing with other people's quests thing was pretty fun. I wish it made better use of (or had more) D&D aspects, though.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Narkis View Post
    Obviously, it would have been best to have smart AI. But if the AI is gonna be stupid anyway, then being unfair at least makes it challenging. And I relish that challenge.
    I'm not even sure that would have been best - there are a lot of games that work well precisely because the AI is predictably dumb. DROD AI is about as dumb as it gets, because it's intentionally designed to be completely predictable - I know exactly how every individual dungeon roach / rock golem / living gel / whatever is going to move, much the way I know exactly when the pressure plate I'm standing on is going to vanish into the void, much the way I know where everything in the room is. That knowledge is what lets the designers make functional puzzles out of it.

    This gets a little less obvious outside of a puzzle game context, but a lot of those same principles can still apply to other genres. To pick the slightly less obvious one stealth games benefit from predictable patrol routes that can be studied and learned, guards that react to distractions in predictable ways, etc. There's a definite case for this in strategy games too, where you acknowledge that the AI will not be human level and you arrange for it to be dumb in ways that can easily present interesting strategic decisions, then build scenarios around that. It definitely seems like it could be a stronger approach than making it just generically dumb and generally increasing quantitative values.
    I would really like to see a game made by Obryn, Kurald Galain, and Knaight from these forums.

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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    I think there is something to be said for stupid but asymmetrical AI. If I'm clearly not playing the same game as the AI, I don't mind that it plays by different rules, so long as those rules produce fun results.

    Where the crankiness with 'cheating' AI comes from is, I suspect, due to the impression that you are in fact playing the same game, except for a list of weird advantages it gets. For instance having the AI build resource buildings that are rendered effectively meaningless because it gets such a huge bonus income; it's just window dressing that makes blowing them up irrelevant. Since blowing them up is both something of a challenge, and the sort of thing that feels like it should have strategic impact, this makes the game feel a lot less enjoyable to play because it isn't responding sensibly to your actions.


    I also think that, generally speaking, people don't actually want an AI capable of beating them a substantial portion of the time. If you lose to the computer 50% of the time, it's probably going to feel unfair and frustrating in a strategy game (if nothing else you're going to suspect the AI of blatantly cheating). What most people probably want most of the time is an AI they can beat like 80% of the time, but they feel responds sensibly - if not super effectively - to their actions, and present a credible enough threat that loss feels like enough of a possibility you have to display some skill and system mastery. An AI you can curbstomp 99% of the time isn't interesting, because there's no threat, and your choices become more or less irrelevant.
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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Spoiler: Per. So. Na.
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    So I beat Shadow Yukiko, on the last day before the rain started. I feel like I should have held off a day and faced her on the first rainy day because I've now lost out on a potential Social Link boost, but I'll just grind stats instead.

    I was somewhat disappointed by the fight, I walked in with two fire resistant Persona and discovered that she's now weak to ice attacks. Which you'd think would make the battle easier, but it's just longer than the original, making the difficulty come from pure SP and item attrition. I don't know exactly Plus it makes the boss a lot less proactive, in the early battle one in four turns seemed to be dedicated to putting up White Wall after an All Out Attack, whereas I remember having a lot more issues with my HP in the early part of the original fight.

    Plus what's this, another social link? I'm not sure I managed to complete four in the original, time to see if the additional SL brings with it less grinding in the later levels of these, see if I can get five or six completed this time.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Zelphas View Post
    So here I am, trapped in my laboratory, trying to create a Mechabeast that's powerful enough to take down the howling horde outside my door, but also won't join them once it realizes what I've done...twentieth time's the charm, right?
    Quote Originally Posted by Lord Raziere View Post
    How about a Jovian Uplift stuck in a Case morph? it makes so little sense.

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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Speaking of Persona, another hour and a half in and done a couple of boss battles now. I'm guessing this is where the game opens out a bit, because up until now it's been entirely linear?

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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Quote Originally Posted by factotum View Post
    Speaking of Persona, another hour and a half in and done a couple of boss battles now. I'm guessing this is where the game opens out a bit, because up until now it's been entirely linear?
    Ehhhhh

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    The game is never really open ended, but if you've beaten Shadow Chie then it gets to what the actual gameplay is like for most of the game, although somewhat more limited. Seeking out and finding Social Links, grinding up both Social Links and conversation stats, and dungeon crawling.

    Basically the main plot remains relatively linear, but you now have the option of exploring the unlocked side plots in the order you wish and at the rate you want to. Until the plot decides to have a break for high school antics, like Yosuke forcing the girls to wear bikinis. There's as I remember two school trips, a school fetefestival, some hot springs scene, and some days just dedicated to advancing the main plot.

    Note that dungeons unlock with the plot, so you'll only have access to the one for now, and going Dungeon crawling locks you put off doing almost anything else for the entire day (you can still interact with the fridge, and might be able to do some other nighttime things, but you can't work or study in your room).
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    Quote Originally Posted by Zelphas View Post
    So here I am, trapped in my laboratory, trying to create a Mechabeast that's powerful enough to take down the howling horde outside my door, but also won't join them once it realizes what I've done...twentieth time's the charm, right?
    Quote Originally Posted by Lord Raziere View Post
    How about a Jovian Uplift stuck in a Case morph? it makes so little sense.

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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Well, yeah, I wasn't expecting full open world, that's why I said "a bit"--this isn't my first JRPG. I assume by conversation stats you mean those occasions when you're speaking to someone and, out of the blue, it tells you one stat or another has increased?

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    Quote Originally Posted by factotum View Post
    Well, yeah, I wasn't expecting full open world, that's why I said "a bit"--this isn't my first JRPG. I assume by conversation stats you mean those occasions when you're speaking to someone and, out of the blue, it tells you one stat or another has increased?
    Yep, just being specific about what does and doesn't open up, this ain't no Skyrim.

    Knowledge, Expression, Understanding, Cottage, Strange, and Diligence (one of these is not a real one). If you go to the status screen for Souji and press F I believe it brings them up, each has five levels and you need to increase them to unlock social links and dialogue options (Aiya is good for raising three at once, the fridge will also occasionally cough up something inedible you can eat food a large Courage boost, and a couple of Social Links train them).
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    Quote Originally Posted by Zelphas View Post
    So here I am, trapped in my laboratory, trying to create a Mechabeast that's powerful enough to take down the howling horde outside my door, but also won't join them once it realizes what I've done...twentieth time's the charm, right?
    Quote Originally Posted by Lord Raziere View Post
    How about a Jovian Uplift stuck in a Case morph? it makes so little sense.

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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    So, with recently discussing of Star Wars Squadrons putting me in the mood for a Star Wars game, I had been thinking about getting out my old copy of Empire at War and doing a run through that before proceeding to the next game I'd planned to play - but then I remembered another old Star Wars RTS I haven't played in forever, Galactic Battlegrounds. Found it on Steam nice and cheap, so I grabbed it and started playing. And wow, I'd forgotten what a generic RTS it is. So many units are basically identical between all of the factions, whether you're the Rebellion, Trade Federation, or even the Wookiees. There's a few, mostly those you make out of the Fortress structure, but that's a higher-tech one. And I'm pretty sure there's no such thing as a faction-specific building - in fact, I think most of the faction differences will come from upgrades, with things like Wookies getting an upgrade to let their non-mech units auto-heal.

    Also, wow, the pathfinding and AI on these units. I really need to babysit my armies to get them to do things competently - hell, even when I tell them to shoot something, sometimes some of them just pick another target seemingly at random anyway. And for some reason they're set up to auto-shoot buildings that are strictly cosmetic and I gain nothing from destroying if they're in range - except walls, which I do need to tell them to shoot manually. I do not understand that.

    Plus, I've noticed my own tendency to just turtle up and max out everything before trying to do any combat in this kind of game rearing its head and causing me to play rather slowly. That especially is making me think I probably shouldn't play through the whole series of single-player campaigns before moving on, it'll definitely take too long, particularly for a game that just isn't as good as I thought I remembered it being. Probably should've just gone with Empire at War after all.

    Spoiler: Persona replies to Razade, spoilered for length.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Razade View Post
    Finished my first run through Persona 5 Royal. I say first run because I know I'll eventually be back to 100% the thing. Managed to max out my social stats and get 16 of the 23 Confidants done. Got all the extra content and generally enjoyed it. A few minor gripes.

    - Maybe it's just lack of memory but I feel like Persona 3 and 4 were a little more forgiving with their time. The middle part of the main game of Persona 5 really doesn't offer a lot of time between going to Mementos and all the scripted stuff. The trip to Hawaii could have been a lot of fun if it weren't such a short trip that was 100% scripted. Following that with a week dedicated to totally manufactured drama with Morgana and Haru and then slapping a deadline onto you and then exams really killed the momentum for me. I was warned that that segment of the game was a "run killer" and I can totally understand why. I hope in future installments that they open up the time management a little more. Not because I just want to 100% a game on the first run but there's just so much to do! 120 hours of content and a lot of time spent agonizing over every choice.
    I think Persona 5 is quite a bit more forgiving on time than Persona 3 and 4, personally. The big difference being that the extra benefits you get from Kawakami's (Temperence) and Chihaya's (Fortune) social links make it a lot easier to use your time efficiently. Kawakami getting you free time during class gives you extra opportunities to read books to raise your stats without spending time you could be using on social links, she can do laundry for you so you don't ever spend time on that, and once maxed out (and she's probably the best one to max out first) she can give you a massage that will allow you to go out at night even after spending the day in a Palace or Mementos, which helps considerably with the game's many night-time social links. Which is also a big comparison point between P5 and its predecessors - in past games most social links occurred during the day, with only a handful of night-time ones to worry about; in P5 it's about a 50/50 split, which makes things easier in the end. It can be a trap if you're coming to it knowing how things worked in P3 and 4 and expecting that night time is when you want to spend time building your stats because you think there will be fewer social links there, though - day time is actually typically better, since you're mostly spending time on stat-building earlier on, and many of the day time social links open later in the game, while you can unlock most of the night ones pretty early.

    Anyway, Chihaya's big benefit is her rank 5 fortune that lets you pay 5k yen to boost your relationship with one social link without spending time. Use that and you never need to spend time just adding points again - you can rank up every time you spend time with someone, which makes things considerably easier to max out. 5k yen is a somewhat steep price at first, but quickly becomes trivialized as you go on; especially in Royal where Jose can get you massive bonuses to the money you earn in Mementos.

    Quote Originally Posted by Razade View Post
    - Mementos was dull and that's with the Royal content. A bunch of empty hallways with battles you can just skip if you're high enough level. I found it was pretty much impossible to not be overleveled and increasing the difficulty in JRPGs, this one is no exception, just means beefier enemies. Which is...no thanks. It would have been cool if Confidants and their Ranks were more important, providing rooms and other content to the wanna be roguelike Mementos wanted to be.
    Yeah, Mementos was the old-style "random dungeon" crawl of the game. It serves its purpose, but the Palaces are definitely much better, more engaging dungeons.

    And yeah, even though I avoided ever taking Jose's bonus to experience, I did find myself over-leveled without even trying in Royal for some reason. Not sure why. Don't recall that being an issue in the original, but maybe I've just forgotten.

    Quote Originally Posted by Razade View Post
    - They really dropped the ball in boss fights for most of the game. When I fought Kamoshida I thought sending a teammate to distract him for more damage and stuff was a clever concept and I was hoping they'd expand on that as your team expanded. More tactical bosses where you actually have to use the whole team to strategically beat them would have been great. Using the whole team but in different theaters would have made things a lot more varied and interesting. There were glimpses of what could have been here and there, and while I found most of the boss fights to be really easy, I still enjoyed the bulk of them. The Royal Boss fight was a great way to finish things and Shido's boss fight was really fun.
    Agreed. Personally, after Shadow Kaneshiro, I thought they were all mostly dull up until the final bosses (the original one and the Royal addition). Shadow Okumura had a good concept, but poor execution.

    Quote Originally Posted by Razade View Post
    - Too many dang elements. Fire, Ice, Lightning, Wind, Gun, Almighty, Curse, Bless, Nuke, Psychic. That was just a lot to juggle and I don't really feel like Almighty, Psychic or Nuke added a whole lot or really made any damn sense in the wider mythological context of the setting. 4 only had 7 and that felt well enough.
    Psychic was a major part of the "technical" system, since it was the only thing that combos with a lot of mental status effects (confusion, fear, forget, despair). Besides that, I'm guessing that it and Nuke were added in order to allow all of your party members to have their own element, rather than the overlap that team members often had in past games (Akihiko and Ken, Junpei and Koromaru, Chie and Teddie).

    Almighty is a SMT staple that's always been around for the Megido line of spells and the odd top-end unique spell.

    Quote Originally Posted by Razade View Post
    - The guns were a neat idea but they just became sort of a gimmick by late game. Using actual attacks were almost always more viable than using guns considering the damage they did. Between Charge/Concentrate and a massive number of late game enemies either resisting or outright being immune to gun damage...I never really felt like I was obligated to use them. Persona 5 has a ton of mechanics between it's quasi-stealth elements to its double moves to its positioning and dealing with Persona. The gun felt slick and inventive at first, the idea that you had a limited but powerful attack to unleash was neat. Then having a whole character involved in souping up guns as a Confidant was further fodder to making guns really cool. They just sorta weren't by the end.
    Guns are very useful once you start customizing them. The best use by far is to give them the ability to inflict status ailments, with the best one being shock, followed by freeze, and burn being the least useful but still handy ocassionally. They're a lot more reliable at inflicting those ailments than lightning/ice/fire spells, even with the [ailment] boost ability and Makoto's passive to help, and can set up technical combos on enemies who have no weakness to exploit, allowing knockdowns you otherwise need to fish for crits to get.

    Quote Originally Posted by Razade View Post
    - Persona 5 is a JRPG at it's core and while a great many JRPGs have bucked the need, Persona 5 still has a dedicated heal character.
    True, which is a product of how its combat system works - high damage all around. You might often wipe enemies out without them even getting to move due to the weakness/technical knockdown into all-out attack system, but when you don't, whatever they do to you usually hurts quite a bit, unless you're sufficiently over-leveled. I rather like that, personally.

    Quote Originally Posted by Razade View Post
    It's not all gripes though. The plot of the game was enjoyable. I liked it more, from what I can recall of 3 and 4, than those two titles. I loved the cast and while I feel a few of the later game options such as politician and reporter were kind of weak, the over all number of people you encounter are really interesting. I don't, and again the time between them is the reason, remember such a varied cast of people with such a varied depth of traumas and dramas in 3 or 4 as there were in 5. I never felt like the story came to a grinding halt even with the Morgana stuff and while that was the one major story beat that I disliked, it wasn't even close to making everything else around it less enjoyable. I found myself coming to care for the characters a great deal. Ryuji was the perfect, in my opinion, opening to the story and Ann to follow up after you get a little further in was a good one two punch. They balance each other well and make a really firm and fast intro to the over all mood. I'm honestly going to miss all of those goofballs as I move on to another game.
    I'm actually the reverse, personally. You can look back at my own recent posts on playing Royal for the details of my criticisms, but I feel it drops the ball on certain story elements in the second half in a way that P3 and 4 never do. And I do feel that P3 and 4 have equally well-written and interesting characters across their social links, though that's one where I certainly don't fault 5 either. Persona definitely has a knack for making you come to love its characters, no question there.
    Last edited by Zevox; 2020-06-21 at 03:27 PM.
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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Wrapped up Halo: Reach today, after a several month pause about halfway though.

    It was really nice to play a game that was just a shooter with a campaign, complete with vehicle sections, attack and defend objectives, and proper levels designed around them. And no unnecessary leveling mechanics or crafting or unlocks or anything. Just straight up shooty-fun-times, and oh my how'd I'd missed that. It's hard to think of really anything that's come out lately which occupies the same sort of traditional shooter design philosophy, which is honestly sad. There's a reasonable amount of stuff I like about modern open world games, but there really is something to be said for the curated approach to game design.
    Blood-red were his spurs i' the golden noon; wine-red was his velvet coat,
    When they shot him down on the highway,
    Down like a dog on the highway,
    And he lay in his blood on the highway, with the bunch of lace at his throat.


    Alfred Noyes, The Highwayman, 1906.

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    Default Re: What Are You Playing, Part 3: The Assassination of my Wallet by the Cowardly Sale

    Quote Originally Posted by warty goblin View Post
    Wrapped up Halo: Reach today, after a several month pause about halfway though.

    It was really nice to play a game that was just a shooter with a campaign, complete with vehicle sections, attack and defend objectives, and proper levels designed around them. And no unnecessary leveling mechanics or crafting or unlocks or anything. Just straight up shooty-fun-times, and oh my how'd I'd missed that. It's hard to think of really anything that's come out lately which occupies the same sort of traditional shooter design philosophy, which is honestly sad. There's a reasonable amount of stuff I like about modern open world games, but there really is something to be said for the curated approach to game design.
    The new Doom games might scratch your itch. There's very minor "progression" mechanics (you can pick one of two upgrades for each weapon that add a bit of extra versatility to your arsenal beyond the basics), but that's it.

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