Tag: gaming

Super Dodgeball Beats (Review)

As always, huge shout out to Playstack to hooking us up with a review code for this one. Always an honor to be chosen to review a game and this one is no exception.

I am going to preface this review by saying this, on a personal level I did not enjoy playing this game. Rhythm games are always hit and miss for me and this one was a huge swing and a miss for me. My personal enjoyment out of the way, everything after this will be based solely on the game itself because I do have quite a few positive things to say about the game.

First, the music in the game is catchy. It matches the atmosphere well and I was never sitting there wondering why it was chosen. I even found a few times I just left the game on while I was doing other stuff listening to the music because honestly I kind of suck at the game anyway and my daughter liked dancing to it.

Graphically the game is also very nice, I loved the art style and how the story played out in a sort of graphic novel comic book effect The gameplay itself is on the surface pretty simple at least to learn. The characters on your side of the screen are lined up in the same order of the buttons, for example on PS4 the circle square triangle and X buttons. (I’m not calling it a damn cross) As the white circles get where they need to be you hit the corresponding button. Sometimes you need to hold the button or use the left analog stick.

The game itself is pretty well made and as the difficulty ramps up it can become insane, challenging and frustrating in a good way. While the game was not fun for me, I understand the appeal and I would never discourage anyone from buying it. It wasn’t fun for me, but it will be for many others. The game is a solid 7 of 10. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Final Fantasy 8 Remastered

Oh Final Fantasy 8, how I have loved thee since I was a child. The GF’s, the characters, the world itself and the monster designs. As a kid, I used to love these things. However, did this translate to modern times and how did this remaster come out? According to my Platinum trophy pretty damn well.

The story is as you remember, that hasn’t been altered. You play as Squall Leonhart. Student of Balamb, member of SeeD. After being sent on his first mission and meeting Rinoa Heartilly things suddenly take a weird turn and our crew ends up on a quest to stop the Sorceress.

The story aside that I don’t want to delve into deep. The graphical upgrades to the characters are amazing, tho I am a bit disappointed the same treatment wasn’t given to most of the environment. The upgrades to the combat system are nice for an odd reason. You can up the game speed by 3 times, have no encounters and easy combat which basically makes you invincible unless you get killed in one hit, makes your gauge charge almost instantly and your limit breaks will always be charged. This makes the game a breeze to play outside of certain battles. However, if like me you are impatient and hate how long drawing all the magic takes, you can now do in minutes what used to take hours. That alone for me is worth it.

For the trophy hunters in this group, I won’t call this one easy but I will call it straight forward. Only about 3 of them are missable and if you are careful, those aren’t hard to get anyway. You only have to go slightly out of your way for them the benefits for doing so are pretty worth it.

The only issue is if you use the 3X speed upgrade, the game feels really slow in combat when you stop, and it’s really tempting to use the combat assist to heal yourself. Unless you are strong-willed or just want to experience the story avoid using them at all.

I did, however, love the game and have no real complaints with the remaster itself. I for one am glad to finally see this on a modern console and encourage everyone to give it a shot. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Multiple Combat Modes in Final Fantasy 7 Remake

As reported by Polygon and many others, it has recently been revealed that the Final Fantasy 7 Remake will have multiple combat modes. The one we have all seen in recent trailers, and for those fans of the classic turn-based combat, a classic mode. Combat mode will turn the normal combat into a more turn-based classic mode with menus. This still makes me a bit nervous, honestly, but it is a nice attempt at meeting fans of the original halfway between what they wanted and what they are getting. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Truck Driver (Preview)

Anyone always liked the look of American Truck Simulator or Euro Truck Simulator 2? Don’t have a computer strong enough to play one? Well, you are in luck ladies and gents, Truck Driver is your chance to experience that genre on the consoles. It will be on the PC as well, but they have options. Finally, the console gamers have their shot. Drive around in a huge truck, attach trailers, deliver cargo and hopefully not get nailed with speeding tickets are car accidents. Enjoy the launch trailer below, and check it out when it comes out later in the week. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Final Fantasy 7 Remake New Trailer

After watching the new trailer that showed off some of the fan-favorite scenes from the original such as Shiva, the opening scene a bit, the battle for the plate and even the famous cross-dressing scene with The Don. The game looks beautiful and they have clearly added quite a significant amount of content. The problem is as they show more of the battle system the more it just doesn’t do it for me. So much of what made the original great just won’t work with this new battle system. Now I get it, this game isn’t made for me. It is made for a new generation so they can enjoy it. Also, they know most fans of the original will buy it anyway either to enjoy or to complain about it.

So enjoy the trailer below, and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Frostpunk Console Release Date

Frostpunk is one of those games many people have never heard of if you are a console gamer. On PC however it is known as a challenging and beautiful game with pretty high scores across the board, such as 9/10 from IGN or 89% from PC gamer.

Console gamers, however, will finally get their chance to enjoy this one come October. Enjoy the trailer below and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Utawarerumono Zan Released

Quick question, can anyone pronounce the name of this game? I am seriously curious. Just sell it out phonetically for me. The game, however, has finally released and has 2 characters you can pick up as well if you feel the need, Munechika and Oshtor. There will also be a DLC Hooded Kuon available.

unnamed (2).png Hooded Kuon DLC Availability Period
NA: 9/10/2019 – 9/24/2019
EU: 9/20/2019 – 10/4/2019
ANZ: 9/20/2019 – 10/4/2019

So feel free to pick this one and enjoy the trailer below, and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Romancing Saga 3, Coming to America

24 years after its initial release in Japan it has been confirmed by Square-Enix that it will finally be released in America on November 11th. It will, of course, be available on the PS4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, and Steam. This HD remaster will add a new dungeon called the Phantom Maze, New Game Plus, updated graphics, and new story content. Enjoy the trailer below and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Port Royale 4 (Preview)

Port Royal as a series has always been fun to me. You start with a small ship and a little bit of money and attempt to build a trading empire. Tho you can do that by hook or by crook as they say. If you want to pirate the goods and sell or pillage a few towns, by all means, do it. You can also do it legit and just buy low and sell high while building warehouses and other business. The choice as always been yours, and I for one am looking forward to another game in the series. Enjoy a video below and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Empire In Ruins Beta

As many of you know I am a big supporter of this game an the guys over at https://twitter.com/EiR_TD. They are a great bunch and always make time to answer any questions anyone has. So when I got a message saying hey you want to check out the latest beta you guys know I was going to give it a go.

The idea behind this game is pretty interesting. They took a 4X and a tower defense basically and just tossed them together. The graphics are beautiful and the sounds amazing. Personally, it contains one of my favorite songs in gaming, and I don’t mean just on the indy scene, I mean anywhere. Plus baby Savior dances to it and leaves me alone so that is a huge bonus.

The game does tower defense well, it isn’t easy but at no point did I feel like it was unfair. I lost a few battles and realized pretty quickly how it was my own stupidity. All the menus on the mao can be a bit daunting at first but they do an excellent job explaining things I thought. I do have to be fair, I do play games like Stellaris and Imperator Rome so maybe that gave me some advantage.  Regardless it won’t be long before you are making decisions about if you want to help build more food to keep people happy or try to fortify the defenses. Do you want to try to talk those rioters down, or just be a tyrant about it? The choice is obviously yours.

The story tho is where it is at for me. I appreciate Sgt. Hans Heimer and his need to save his booze and wanting to stick it to the system a bit. The dark humor really set this game apart for me from what I am used to playing. The loading screens alone made me laugh, which I have included some screenshots of a couple so you can see what I mean.

The only real issue I ran into while playing I can truly complain about. It is a beta and it easily could be my PC. Occasionally while playing the game would force close at loading screens. I never lost any real progress from this and was just more annoying than anything else but I do feel obligated to point this out tho I am confident this won’t be an issue by the time the game releases assuming it isn’t just my PC being a pain in the..well you get it.  So head over to https://store.steampowered.com/app/604510/Empires_in_Ruins/ and wishlist this bad boy and get in on the early access. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you brandy and glory.