What Are You Playing: 9 Years since the Last Dragon Age

[Batcathat]

I remember finishing Portal 2 for the first time and replaying it basically right away, despite the fact that it's entirely linear and puzzle-based (I think it was equal parts the story/characters and just how fun it is to use portals). I've replayed it a few times since then, but in those cases it's been years in between and I'm blessed with a rather poor memory.

[Zevox]

Just off the top of my head, any game that heavily relies on exploration or puzzles has the first playthrough as the best experience. They don't tend to be particularly replayable. Sometimes, attempting to replay them can even damage the positive impressions you originally had. You simply can't re-experience the wonder of figuring out a puzzle for the first time or the surprise of finding something you had no idea existed. They're still great games; they just don't tend towards repetition.

And yet I've greatly enjoyed replaying many Legend of Zelda games, which lean heavily on puzzle elements, over the years - especially Ocarina of Time, which is one of those games I played so many times when I was younger that I've got it practically permanently memorized.

You seem to really enjoy story heavy games, so it's no wonder that Dragon's Dogma isn't a winner for you.

As I've said, I did like Dragon's Dogma. Played it through twice. That's why I'm considering getting 2. It's just I specifically liked its combat, but did not like the whole concept of the pawns. (And obviously not the story, but I doubt anyone was a big fan of that part.)

I've never found my desire to replay a game to depend much on "replayability" as generally defined, i.e. unseen mechanical or story content. If I had a good time the first time through, I'll consider replaying it, otherwise I won't. I've happily played through Tomb Raider 2012 at least twice, and that game is completely linear. Infinite loop games, at least the singleplayer ones, tend not do much for me, at some point it's extremely obvious I'm just making the number go up, and I don't care - hence my substantial apathy towards the world of Diablo type games. Which isn't to say I need a story, I've played something like 70 hours of Crimsonland, which is pure score attack, I don't want to admit how much World of Warships, and I used to play Enemy Territory: Quake Wars in endless bot matches. If the gameplay is good and engaging, I'll show up, but I don't need replayability type stuff like NG+ or endgame content or whatever to do it.

That's basically where I'm at as well. It's nice if a game I liked enough to want to replay it also has more stuff for me to see the second+ time around, it probably makes me abit more likely to replay it shortly after the first time. But it's not what makes me want to replay the game, just enjoying it enough does that.

After two times through, I've seen everything there is to see in Midnight Suns (and there wasn't much different the second time), but just mentioning it in my post last night made me consider playing it again. Because I just have that much fun playing it, and I know I'd enjoy doing so a third time.

[Cygnia]

Hubby tried "Obra Dinn". It gave him motion sickness, but he's offered to let me play on his system to give it a spell.

[Cespenar]

Obra Dinn is one of those rare games where you wish your memories would deprecate faster so that you may replay it again.

[halfeye]

Just checked the achievements in DAO, and there's one for have had all possible party members, why would they do that? It's not even as if you can see the achievements before you get them.

I was thinking about trying a bit harder for Jowan, but now that seems pointless.

Obra Dinn is one of those rare games where you wish your memories would deprecate faster so that you may replay it again.

Would you rather know whether you need to buy milk?

[SerTabris]

Even Capcom can manage to create characters with a basic personality and backstory, which is all it'd take to be better than the pawns. And I'll take having to equip them over needing to hire new ones every couple of levels because only your main one levels up with you.

They can even create fun, colorful party members with distinct personalities as party members in an RPG series primarily focused on dragons! Or at least they could back on the PS1.

[Errorname]

For a similar point of comparison, I like Fire Emblem quite a bit more than X-Com in the turn-based strategy game category. Having actual characters probably contiributed to me liking Midnight Suns more than X-Com too, though gameplay also plays a big role in that one.

Perhaps notable that when XCOM gives the players Squaddies who are actual characters players tend to really latch onto them. But also there's massive appeal to building your own team of custom badasses who you take through each playthrough. It is a fair point that in this sort of game you want to strike a balance between the story the developers are telling and the one the players are organically creating as they play.

But that has little effect on replayability for me. I've done a bunch of XCOM playthroughs but I have also already replayed Baldur's Gate 3 a few times, a game which actively hates the idea of letting players design their own hirelings rather than playing through with the developer designed companions

[Zevox]

Damn, these hard mode exclusive combat sims are taking me some time in FF7 Rebirth. I managed to conquer all of the single character vs 5 waves ones in a reasonable amount of time - Cloud's was the easiest, Tifa's the hardest (despite Cait Sith being the one I never play I managed to beat his in one try). But beating that those unlocked two duo character vs 10 waves ones: one for a team of Cloud and Sephiroth, and one for a team of Cloud and Zack. These are the only times besides the brief designated story moments where you can play Sephiroth and Zack.

The Sephiroth one turned out not to be too tough, only took me two tries. Partially because Sephiroth is kind of nuts, appropriately enough. Hell, his dodge being amazing and him having a good projectile ATB weapon attack basically means he's the counter to the final fight of the bunch, Odin. But the Zack one took me quite a few tries, and I only just beat it. Zack himself is notably less durable than Sephiroth, has a less useful array of magic materia equipped (you can't equip either of them), and his unique mechanic is difficult enough to use that I just gave up on doing so after a few attempts at learning it. It got the point where the first 8 fights were basically a pushover as long as I didn't get careless, but the last two against Bahamut and Odin kept tripping me up. Especially Odin, who I repeatedly got close to beating, only to have victory snatched away by Zantetsuken. You just need to play very cautious against him, and seeing the end in sight kept making me get just eager enough to see him go down to end up taking a few hits I shouldn't have and losing.

These things are fun, which is why I never gave up on that Zack one, but oh boy do they take forever. Each attempt at the Sephiroth and Zack ones took me around a half an hour, since every round is basically a boss or mini-boss (one of the summons or one of the regional mini-bosses like the Quetzacoatl and Mind Flayer). The single-character vs 5 rounds ones took about 10 minutes average for for me (Cait Sith's was the outlier at 20, which is due to a combination of me not knowing how to get great damage out of him and playing like a coward for fear of needing to it a ton of times). And there's still two of the Brutal Challenges (pick a 3 character party vs a 10-round gauntlet) to go, and those are averaging 15-20 minutes per attempt. If those last ones prove frustrating enough, I may give up on them; I've done everything else, as much as I enjoy the game's combat I don't think I want to keep delaying Hi-Fi Rush by too much longer just to wrap up the last two challenges the game has for me.

[Spore]

I tried Dragon's Dogma 1 last night and god damn I now know why Dark Souls 1 is one of the best games of the genre (comparable release window) again. One is showered in exposition (Dark Souls has 1 minute of intro which is inconsequential) and tells its story through set pieces. DD has an intro sequence which is meant to hype up the game and explain basic functions, two long cutscenes and after that you are a nobody with a wooden sword a magic stick that shoots pitiful magic or an archer with an ugly ass bow. In the same time in Dark Souls 1 you are confronted with huge demon forcing you to flee, walk a small gauntlet, get a weapon, potions and are allowed to fight the same demon again, now on equal footing.

I dont know how Dragons Dogma 1 was such a hit. But I am pretty impatient.

[Anonymouswizard]

I dont know how Dragons Dogma 1 was such a hit. But I am pretty impatient.

Get up to the encampment, especially as a Strider, and it'll become clear. Plus the combat is pretty damn good once you've unlocked a few skills, comparatively Dark Souls characters feel like they don't know how to swing a sword.

Plus the setup of the Dragon is pretty damn amazing. Sure it's a couple of cutscenes, but there's just this moment where he stops acting as a rampaging beast and chooses your character and it's great.

The biggest downside to DD1 is that the gear treadmill can make switching classes on the fly night impossible. Oh sure you'd like to be an X but you need to cough up the cash for their weapons first, and then probably upgrade them. The second biggest is how you'll always romance a shopkeeper.

[Cespenar]

I tried DD1 very recently, and unlike Dark Souls, the feeling I got was one of 2000s european RPGs, ironically. It's not a today's game, but back when it came out, it must have been fun.

[Rynjin]

DD1 honestly kinda sucks right up until you get to Gran Soren, thus fully ending the tutorial segment. That's when you unlock the Advanced and Hybrid Vocations, get access to real shops, quests, etc.

Just remember once you get there: go BACK to Cassardis before proceeding with the main questline or you'll miss a critical plot quest chain.

Return home regularly.

[Zevox]

Wel, beat those two Brutal Challenges I had left. Honestly, I was surprised by how much easier than the Cloud + Zack Legendary Challenge they wound up being, especially the last one, which is clearly intended to be the toughest challenge in the game.

Spoiler: Rulers of the Outer Worlds

Show

The challenge's rounds go:
1) Phoenix & Kujata.
2) Titan & Bahamut Arisen.
3) Odin & Alexander.
4) Gilgamesh.
5) Sephiroth.

The summon duos do have less health and are easier to stagger than when they're on their own, but also unique mechanics, like when you fight them before the regular Gilgamesh fight. Gilgamesh starts with all of his weapons equipped, and is at full power. And Sephiroth has new moves entirely, including one where he binds anyone he hits with it until he either binds everyone (in which case he Octoslashes the group) or is staggered.

Despite all that, it only took me four tries to beat, and the first two were just me trying to pass the first fight with my default materia setup before deciding I needed to switch Cloud and Aerith to have fire immunity. So two tries in which I was actually getting anywhere rather than just feeling things out. That Zack challenge really forced me to master fighting the six summons, so once I had the fire immunity for Phoenix + Kujata they were easy; Gilgamesh was touch and go at times, but I never lost to him in the end; and Sephiroth I just needed to remember to have Barret cast Barrier on the group so I could survive if we got Octoslashed (though I managed to only have that happen once on the successful run, since I learned parrying his binding attack is actually fairly easy).

By all rights this should've been harder than the Zack challenge, because Gilgamesh and Sephiroth are both tougher fights than any in Zack's gauntlet. But I guess having a full team I get to select and equip is just that much better than only having Cloud and a pre-equipped Zack.

So yeah, I think that's finally the end with Rebirth for me. Damn good game despite my dislike of the open world elements, would likely be an easy GotY for me if it weren't for Persona 3 Reload. On to Hi-Fi Rush!

I tried Dragon's Dogma 1 last night and god damn I now know why Dark Souls 1 is one of the best games of the genre (comparable release window) again. One is showered in exposition (Dark Souls has 1 minute of intro which is inconsequential) and tells its story through set pieces. DD has an intro sequence which is meant to hype up the game and explain basic functions, two long cutscenes and after that you are a nobody with a wooden sword a magic stick that shoots pitiful magic or an archer with an ugly ass bow. In the same time in Dark Souls 1 you are confronted with huge demon forcing you to flee, walk a small gauntlet, get a weapon, potions and are allowed to fight the same demon again, now on equal footing.

I dont know how Dragons Dogma 1 was such a hit. But I am pretty impatient.

"Hit" is not the word for it. Cult classic, more like. When it initially came out Capcom noted that it had sold well in Japan, but struggled in the west. But it sold better over the long haul due to positive word of mouth and the "Dark Arisen" expanded re-release a few years later.

Though personally, Dark Souls is one of the few games I'd compare Dragon's Dogma to positively on the storytelling front. Because at least DD makes sure you know what's going on and why in its world, which is more than I can say for Dark Souls.

[Anonymouswizard]

DD1 honestly kinda sucks right up until you get to Gran Soren, thus fully ending the tutorial segment. That's when you unlock the Advanced and Hybrid Vocations, get access to real shops, quests, etc.

I'd argue that it's about Level 20 that it stops sucking, when you'll finally have the free cash to switch to vocations with unique weapons (Magick Archer, Mystick Knight, Warrior, Ranger, and Sorcerer). In fact I suspect it's playthrough 2+ where you'll have multiple locations at different ranks that it really shines.

Anyway I accidentally got Mercedes killed in my playthrough, hoping when I come back from my break that I load far enough back for her to be alive.

[Rynjin]

I'd argue that it's about Level 20 that it stops sucking, when you'll finally have the free cash to switch to vocations with unique weapons (Magick Archer, Mystick Knight, Warrior, Ranger, and Sorcerer). In fact I suspect it's playthrough 2+ where you'll have multiple locations at different ranks that it really shines.

Anyway I accidentally got Mercedes killed in my playthrough, hoping when I come back from my break that I load far enough back for her to be alive.

I wouldn't sweat it too much, just save her on the next run.

[Spore]

I'd argue that it's about Level 20 that it stops sucking

It isnt DD's fault, and I don't even know if Lv 20 is fast or not, but I am SICK AND TIRED of games that go "once you sunk 20 hours into it it gets good, I promise".

Because for one I dont have this kind of time anymore. For another, I cannot tell if it is sunk cost fallacy or actual enjoyment.

[warty goblin]

It isnt DD's fault, and I don't even know if Lv 20 is fast or not, but I am SICK AND TIRED of games that go "once you sunk 20 hours into it it gets good, I promise".

Because for one I dont have this kind of time anymore. For another, I cannot tell if it is sunk cost fallacy or actual enjoyment.

I'd very much agree with this. If the game takes 20 hours to get to the good stuff, somebody somewhere screwed up because that's a lot of time to spend on a mediocre thing. I'm not demanding instant gratification here, it's fine for the beginning to be a bit slower paced to let new players get used to the controls and so on, but that's like 2 hours of lower key challenge and tutorials, tops. Not 20 hours.

[Anonymouswizard]

It isnt DD's fault, and I don't even know if Lv 20 is fast or not, but I am SICK AND TIRED of games that go "once you sunk 20 hours into it it gets good, I promise".

Because for one I dont have this kind of time anymore. For another, I cannot tell if it is sunk cost fallacy or actual enjoyment.

So the issue in Dragon's Dogma is twofold:
-You begin with only two skills, which are the meat of the combat system. Not too bad, but the tutorial gives you a full set of six.
-Changing vocation does not give you a basic set of gear, discouraging changing into more fun ones until late into the same.

The first is the major cause of suck, but is a non-issue after a couple of hours. The second takes a long time to solve, especially if you're trying to work around Mage's low stat growth, but if you like the combat system shouldn't be a deal breaker.

DD2 apparently fixed the second issue by doing what the first should have done: make sure you have a basic version of every weapon so you can try out vocations without issue.

[Rynjin]

It isnt DD's fault, and I don't even know if Lv 20 is fast or not, but I am SICK AND TIRED of games that go "once you sunk 20 hours into it it gets good, I promise".

Because for one I dont have this kind of time anymore. For another, I cannot tell if it is sunk cost fallacy or actual enjoyment.

Level 20 is pretty quick; the cap is 200.

[Rodin]

Dragon's Dogma is a classic case of "first impressions matter". And those first impressions were enough to make me stop playing after (checks time played) 2.1 hours.

Finally getting my party and finding out they were mindless pawns was the first big hit, I'd say. Running around the overworld with my pawns shouting generic lines over and over killed any interest I might have had. I also remember the overworld being very underwhelming, just empty space with nothing interesting going on in it. Maybe that's just the opening zone, but I found it boring.

[Rynjin]

Dragon's Dogma is a classic case of "first impressions matter". And those first impressions were enough to make me stop playing after (checks time played) 2.1 hours.

Finally getting my party and finding out they were mindless pawns was the first big hit, I'd say. Running around the overworld with my pawns shouting generic lines over and over killed any interest I might have had. I also remember the overworld being very underwhelming, just empty space with nothing interesting going on in it. Maybe that's just the opening zone, but I found it boring.

There's a lot of stuff hidden even in the early game, but I completely understand bouncing off the first couple of hours. The flow of the game goes Taste of Power > Generic Chosen One Opening > Tutorial boss fight(s) > Boring escort mission before you can actually get to the good stuff. It really doesn't put its best foot forward.

[warty goblin]

Reached Act 4 in Knight's Tale. As per previous act transitions, the dominant enemy has shifted from the Sidhe to the Formorians, because the game is basically dumping all of Brittish Isles folklore into a big bowl and stirring. As Arthuriana is already a total gamish of different traditions and a millenia plus of rando ideas grafted onto the same trunk, I like this.

Also the Formorians are a decent challenge, and thankfully quite different from the Sidhe. They don't do annoying things like pull dudes out of position or freeze people when they die, instead they have HP bars about a mile long, more armor than a tank, and hit like a ton of bricks. They also have seriously annoying sorcerers.

Fortunately I now have Lancelot. If your problem had an HP bar, Lancelot can fix it. And by fix it I mean run up to it and remove most of that HP bar. I like to use Guinevere in a buddy system with Lancelot, both because I'm a traditionalist and because the team up is alarmingly powerful. Lancelot is basically a knightly missile, and Guinevere extends both his operational range and his destructive power. And then she teleports in and shanks fools from behind.

[SerTabris]

Dragon's Dogma is a classic case of "first impressions matter". And those first impressions were enough to make me stop playing after (checks time played) 2.1 hours.

Finally getting my party and finding out they were mindless pawns was the first big hit, I'd say. Running around the overworld with my pawns shouting generic lines over and over killed any interest I might have had. I also remember the overworld being very underwhelming, just empty space with nothing interesting going on in it. Maybe that's just the opening zone, but I found it boring.

I know one of the main things that made Skyrim never really click for me was having usually either no companions, or a single person with only a few lines; it sounds like for me this might feel worse, but I'm not sure.

Fortunately I now have Lancelot. If your problem had an HP bar, Lancelot can fix it. And by fix it I mean run up to it and remove most of that HP bar. I like to use Guinevere in a buddy system with Lancelot, both because I'm a traditionalist and because the team up is alarmingly powerful. Lancelot is basically a knightly missile, and Guinevere extends both his operational range and his destructive power. And then she teleports in and shanks fools from behind.

Well, if you've got a premise of 'evil King Arthur', I feel like pairing Guinevere and Lancelot is just very natural; nothing stopping them then, is there? (And now I'm thinking about the other fun variations of this I've seen in both story-based games and books and other media...)

[Rynjin]

I know one of the main things that made Skyrim never really click for me was having usually either no companions, or a single person with only a few lines; it sounds like for me this might feel worse, but I'm not sure.

Pawns have a lot more personality than your average Skyrim companion, though that's not a high bar to clear. There's a few different personality/voice presets, and they'll all pick up little quirks based on how you ask them to play. SOme will (over)eagerly focus on collecting items and crafting new ones, others will be glad to play a support role, while others will be more aggressive and fighty, and they do have different lines for these.

But in the first game most of your callouts will be related to enemy behavior and quest completion so those are a lot more generic.

[Zevox]

FF7 Rebirth: So, when I said I thought I was done with Rebirth? I was wrong. Because two things occurred to me: one, I could go back and see all of the "date" events that I hadn't with ease; two, I'd previously tried fighting some of the summons at their full strength with Cloud solo, and found it a fun challenge. So I went and did the former. Short version: Aerith and Tifa's are what you'd expect; Yuffie's is good and fortunately much less date-like than Aerith and Tifa's; Barret and Red XIII don't actually do anything in Chapter 8 (Barret for obvious story reasons, no clue why that's the case for Red); Red's in Chapter 12 surprisingly contains the one moment in the game where someone openly refers to having been able to see the future back in Remake; and the Cait Sith/Vincent/Cid one that I didn't existed until I saw it in the menu options (I'm not sure what its normal trigger condition is; having a bad score with everyone, maybe?) is mildly amusing.

For soloing the summons, I decided to go and challenge myself to do it with every character (except Cait Sith since I don't like him), with the summon at full strength, with no or minimal changes to my default materia setup for the character (because obviously you can make them a lot easier if you specifically choose a materia setup to counter them). And I was mostly successful. Cloud and Tifa were pretty easy to do this with, especially Tifa, who just destroys bosses with her damage output by spamming Unbridled Strength -> Omnistrike once she gets a stagger, and is very good at getting those. Red XIII was also pretty easy, with some difficulty with Odin, though less than many others. With Yuffie I struggled on Odin for a bit but ultimately took him down, and for Bahamut had to swap in a Barrier materia to survive Gigaflare, since the only to prevent him from using it when you're solo is to kill him before it goes off, and her damage output just wasn't up to the task. Aerith was the hardest, since her everything is slow, and even Radiant Ward's improvements to her moveset and dodge only go so far, but I was ultimately able to do it, mostly because Arcane Ward -> Firaga does insane damage even to non-staggered enemies. Finally, Barret, while mostly easy to do since I had him built like a tank, I wound up having to do something I didn't want to in order to beat Odin: give him Reraise materia (lets him set up an auto-revive if he dies). He just couldn't dish out enough damage to keep Odin from getting bored and doing Zantetsuken, especially since his dodge is terrible so he was unable to avoid Odin's glowing attacks, and even perfect parrying them sets you up to get countered if you do any ATB attacks afterward (and unlike Aerith he can't abuse something that makes him invincible while he does a move). Wish I'd figured another way around that, since Reraise is kind of a hard counter to Odin's gimmick, but I couldn't come up with one.

Now I'm pretty sure I'm actually done with the game. I think. We'll see if I get some other bright idea for some combat challenge I want to pursue in it.

Stellar Blade: A demo for this just came out today, and I went through it. It is unfortunately not what I'd initially expected/hoped, but it seems pretty good nonetheless. Based on the initial reveal trailer I'd taken it for Bayonetta but with Eldritch Horrors for enemies instead of Angels and Demons; in reality, it's a game that really wants to be Nier: Automata, with a bit of mechanical inspiration taken from various action games. It has combo routes based on varied light/heavy attack sequences; perfect dodges whose animation looks like it was taken from Bayonetta (the backflip) but does not a Witch Time style effect; blocking that reduces damage taken but doesn't negate it, parrying which does negate damage and reduces the enemy's "balance" (which, when zeroed out, leaves them open to a big damage cinematic attack); special moves that are powered by a meter you build by doing normals, perfect dodges, and parries; and attacks are usually pretty freely cancelable into dodge and block/parry but oddly enough the active frames for some (mostly heavy attacks) seem to be uncancelable, only the startup and recovery. You get to unlock follow-up attacks you can only do after a perfect dodge or parry, which are pretty satisfying, and some grant you buffs. It doesn't have the fast pace or silly tone of a Bayonetta game, but nor is it the slow, methodical pace of a Dark Souls style game (though it does steal the basic Bonfire concept for how its Camps work, as most enemies respawn when you use them). All in all, I was enjoying the combat, and that's what'll sell me the game for sure.

The rest of it, eh, less so. Like I said, it really wants to be Nier: Automata, and while I liked that game, it was mostly for the combat - Platinum Games and all - while the story I was more "eh" about. And while there's others who like Automata's story a lot more than I do, I doubt anyone's likely to feel this game's story lives up to that. From the demo it really doesn't feel like the characters have any particular personality to them, and details about the setting and their goals are pretty unclear - it's set on a post-apocalyptic Earth that's full of Eldritch Horror style monsters, and there's not a lot more I could tell you. To be fair, maybe the demo's just doing a bad job showing these things, as it does seem more focused on getting you into the gameplay than giving you a taste of the story, but if it is representative of the final product in that regard, well, I think more effort went into the jiggle physics for the lead character than into the story, sadly.

Hi-Fi Rush: Now this is the kind of Bayonetta-level silliness I like to see in my action games. Chai literally has the music in him, because his MP3 player got fused into his body about where his heart should be and is now granting him musical rhythm-based power-ups as he bashes robots with his electric guitar-style weapon made from junk parts. I'm not far in, just beat the first boss and reached the hideout for the first time, but I can easily tell this'll be a good time.

I might not be as good at this as I usually am with action games though, because of the rhythm element. I'm kind of bad at that. So far I'm struggling to get above 50% just timings in a fight, and am often more around 30%. I think part of the problem for me is that I'm timing it to something that's not based on when I push the first button: even my initial attack is judged by whether it's in time to the beat, and the actual attack swings always happen on the beat, so if I'm pushing the first button earlier or later relative to the beat that changes the timing for my next button push to get it right. While I can easily learn how long to wait between pushes if the timing is defined by when I push the button for the first attack in a sequence, timing everything to something external like that, without significant visual aids (I have an easier time with the "beat" attacks due to the rings that pop up for them), is not something I'm good at. Guess it's a good thing I'm playing on normal difficulty then, I suppose.

[Anonymouswizard]

Mass Effect Andromeda: retry #ImNotSure. Pretty much still a case of 'I like the gameplay and more Star Trekky vibes, not sure about everything else's.

But both this and DD1 are serving as breaks from BG3, and they're doing that very admirably.

[NeoVid]

Yesterday, I remembered something. Hadn't I heard about a game that was made as the spiritual successor to Road Rash? I went looking for whatever game that was, and immediately learned that Road Redemption is currently $3 on Steam. Got it on the spot, and ended up playing for two solid hours even though it was already 2 AM. And for a totally unexpected addition to the simple and addictive formula of Road Rash, it's also a freaking roguelite. The routes and objectives are heavily randomized and you have to start over from the beginning whenever you die, but at least you can get unlocks and XP before you go flying off that bridge...

The warped sense of humor is stronger here than it was in the original games, complete with a character who has higher stats the better your graphics settings are, but takes auto damage if your framerate drops below 60. It's been a long time since I've found a game I can just pick up and play for 15 minutes at a time... even though it tempts me to keep playing for far, far longer than that.

[Zevox]

Beat Hi-Fi Rush. It's excellent, best new addition to the DMC/Bayonetta style of over-the-top action game series since Metal Gear Rising. The rhythm element definitely makes it harder for me than other games of its ilk - even as I got towards the end of the game I don't think I was ever getting more than 60% just timings in a given fight, and certain parry sequences were rough - but it's a lot of fun nonetheless. Great cast of characters, great music, great combat, mostly good pacing (Korsica's stages and boss fight went on too long, but other than that all was good), and really good humor too; I wasn't expecting so much office work humor, since I wasn't aware of the nature of the villains going in, but there's some good stuff there.

Seems it unlocked quite a bit of post-game stuff after I beat the final stage too, so I'm probably not done with it. Won't likely be cranking the difficulty up, as I imagine I'd struggle quite a bit with that going more than maybe one rank higher, but I'm having too much fun not to check out whatever else the game has to offer.

[Form]

Beat Hi-Fi Rush. It's excellent, best new addition to the DMC/Bayonetta style of over-the-top action game series since Metal Gear Rising. The rhythm element definitely makes it harder for me than other games of its ilk - even as I got towards the end of the game I don't think I was ever getting more than 60% just timings in a given fight, and certain parry sequences were rough - but it's a lot of fun nonetheless. Great cast of characters, great music, great combat, mostly good pacing (Korsica's stages and boss fight went on too long, but other than that all was good), and really good humor too; I wasn't expecting so much office work humor, since I wasn't aware of the nature of the villains going in, but there's some good stuff there.

Seems it unlocked quite a bit of post-game stuff after I beat the final stage too, so I'm probably not done with it. Won't likely be cranking the difficulty up, as I imagine I'd struggle quite a bit with that going more than maybe one rank higher, but I'm having too much fun not to check out whatever else the game has to offer.

Hi-Fi Rush is one of the games of which I saw a playthrough, but which I regretted watching instead of just playing the game myself. I held off on it because it's a rhythm game and I don't like rhythm mechanics in games, but for Hi-Fi Rush I think I should have made an exception. Chances are I'll give it a shot myself after all one of these days.

[Eldan]

I saw part of a playthrough, thought it looked fun, got it, ended up brutally stuck almost immediately since I couldn't get the rhythm combat to work and then watched the playthrough instead, which was more fun.