Topic: Games you've recently beat

@nessisonett Oh wow, do the characters in ToCS not realize they're not blood related?

I actually would mind a full-on incest plotline far less. That sort of thing happens. Just, y'know, acknowledge what it is, and then if you want to keep going and say that the relationship is fine regardless for reasons, I'm cool with that. I mean, it's still creepy, but it's fine.

I'd even be fine with the "incest-but-not-really-cuz-genetics" thing if it was approached with a modicum of respect, and if the characters picked a lane.

Maybe I should bail out of the series where I am.

This is why the Ys series is superior, man. There's very little of this. I think Ys VIII had one eye-rolling scene where Adol stumbles on a character bathing and gets slapped, but otherwise the writing is pretty respectful of the characters, and the other games I've played haven't even gone that far. It's just Adol and his bro Dogi going on adventures and defeating evil.

The music in Ys is way better, too.

@Ralizah They’re aware that they’re not related but at the same time, she’s grown up with him since she was 3 years old and so would have spent quite a few years before having it explained to her about them not being blood related. That’s wayyyy worse than Sky because the flashbacks in Sky SC show them both as being fully aware of their circumstances. It’s that whole thing of it being weird once but even weirder more than once. Like come on guys. On the topic of Ys, Cold Steel had a scene with a girl appreciating a phone strap of Dogi while the MC insinuates that men like Dogi appeal more to the gay audience. I’d love to think that some dudes in the 80s designing the first Ys were really into bara hentai lol.

@nessisonett At the end of the day, no matter what flimsy romantic subplots the developers attempt to erect, it always goes back to Adol and Dogi setting off together.

Sort of like with Edgeworth and Phoenix, courtship takes many different forms.

s'all I'm sayin'

@Ralizah Having just played and finished Ys VIII for the first time, I can say that scene you mention actually makes sense given the way the female character acts early on. At least in my opinion it's perfectly fine, especially given the character arc Laxia goes through.

@KilloWertz She's a tsundere, so you'd expect her to act that way.

Ys VIII was fantastic overall, though. Did you play the PS5 version? I can't imagine what they could have added to justify that port.

Agreed on the final chapter definitely being the most interesting part. I wonder if I enjoyed the game overall more because of the lack of Context I have with Trails in the Sky & the Crossbell titles.

... Heh I wonder what you'll make of Steel 2 by the time you're done. I can finally ramble about my grievences soon enough with you ness!!

Lol poor Gaius (Or whatever his name was) who has like 0 bearing on anything. I didn't mind the railroading surprisingly (though the pace is a bit more questionable).

Nice worldbuilding but yeah I certainly didn't the feeling of "amazing writing" the series is supposed to have. Though I did find most characters having a charm to them.

I know EXACTLY which character you're on about for Steel and I'll leave it at that 😓

I didn't mention that whenever I talked about it because... Yeah I didn't want to acknowledge it.

I think it's even WORSE in Steel 2 from what I remember 🙄

@Ralizah True, but even if that wasn't a Japanese thing, I'd still be ok with how the scene when her and Adol first meet to be just fine.

Yes, I played the PS5 version. It is true that it isn't that much of an upgrade. Obviously the graphics look a bit better, and obviously it's clearly than the Switch version (minimal "noise" on the ground and such while moving like a lot of Switch games have). I believe the frame rate is a rock solid 60 FPS rather than occasional dips on the PS4 version. Minimal overall, but it was reasonably priced and obviously my first time with the game, so it made perfect sense.

I actually ended up selling my Switch copy after finishing it. For whatever reason, the framerate sinks into the single digits during certain late-game optional dungeon sequences that were added when the game went to PS4.

I'll probably repurchase on PC eventually.

Nooooooooooooo~

Congrats @Killowertz on finally beating Ys VIII! I take it Ys only got more enjoyable for you in the final few hours?

... I said I think @Ralizah!

It might've been that it just ended up bothering me more in the second title.

It's just been like 2 years and I tried to scrub that part of the game out my brain!

@HallowMoonshadow Gaius and Machias are literally pointless in every aspect and I’ve already dropped them from my party in 2 😂

So far, the cringe seems to be dialed down with a more serious plot but I guess I better be on red alert!

@KilloWertz Congrats for beating Ys VIII! Yeah it's definitely going to be hard going back to the older titles after having played the greatness that is VIII.

My first Ys game was Origin and it was great. I have such fond memories of that game. Then I played Ys 1 and 2 on Vita, which were terrible. Ys 3 was decent. Ys 4 (which is also on PS4) is fantastic. Haven't played 5 and 6. Ys 7 on Vita was great as well. I have Ys 9 but I haven't played it yet.

@HallowMoonshadow Thanks. In a way, no, as I was already highly enjoying it. I was happy with how they ended everything though. They more than hinted at Adol and Laxia becoming a couple, and I would have been fine with that, but oh well. I get it that almost every game is different, so she couldn't be his love interest. And obviously their lives wouldn't have really allowed it to happen long term anyways.

@LtSarge Thanks. If you mean the older Ys titles, no worries there as I don't have a Vita to play them on. I do plan on playing Origin, Memories of Celceta, and Ys IX at some point since they were released on the PS4. Not sure what order I will play them in, other than obviously IX last, probably well after it's PS5 version comes out.

The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog. For a free April Fools game (made by Sega), it's actually rather good.

Just finished Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales on PS5. Such a good game! I enjoyed it way more than the 2018 game. Playing the game on new hardware certainly enhanced my experience. But the game itself was better in other ways. For starters, the gameplay was much more varied compared to 2018. Having special movies tied to Miles' bio-electricity was really cool, as was the ability to camouflage, which made stealth even better. Secondly, I liked the story more than 2018. Granted, 2018 had more villains. But I just like Miles as Spider-Man more than Peter. Could also be because I know so little about Miles that it felt refreshing getting to know another Spider-Man other than Peter for once.

The game was so much fun that I wanted to do everything in the world, which I did. It took me around 14 hours in total to beat the game. It's too bad though that the Platinum trophy is locked behind New Game Plus. Despite how good the Spider-Man games are, they get repetitive rather fast. Playing through Miles Morales again would just ruin my opinion of it. Not to mention that we're getting a new Spider-Man game later this year. So I think I'll just wait for the next game.

@LtSarge OMG, it is like you have posted exactly how I felt about the game lol.

It doesn't suffer from the bloat that the 2018 game had I thought.

I did start New Game+, which is a rare for me, but soon gave up as my enjoyment levels were being sapped. And that is not how I wanted to remember the game.

@LtSarge I may be in the minority here that still liked the 2018 game more than Miles Morales, but I can't fault the reasons why you would like it more than the first. I never really thought there was much bloat to be honest (I even enjoyed the MJ stealth missions), but I am a huge Spider-Man fan and it was one of my favorite games of the last console generation.

As much as I enjoyed both, I can understand not wanting to do NG+ though. I tend to just start from scratch rather than do NG+ if I replay a game anyways, but having a lot of other games to play in my backlog does usually keep the desire to a minimum. I wouldn't want a really positive experience to be tarnished either.

Maybe you'll go back and do NG+ a few years down the road or something when it will be more fresh again, like I have done with replaying a game here and there. Horizon Zero Dawn several years later being an example, which worked perfectly since it worked as a story refresher right before Forbidden West came out.

@LtSarge I think both games are great but MM just feels quite fresh with the different characters and the shorter play time definitely works to it's advantage.

The NG+ wasn't too bad though as the main story is really quite short if you did everything else in your first play through.

@JohnnyShoulder Haha, nice!

I'm picturing the same thing happening to me. I'd just start it up on NG+ and then get fed up with the game. I think it's for the best to leave it at that.

@KilloWertz I mean, it could be because of various reasons that I didn't like 2018. Ultimately though, I thought it was a mediocre game back when I played it at launch. It just felt like a bog-standard open world game combined with the combat of the Arkham games, which I had played through recently at the time.

Exactly, I have such limited free time for gaming nowadays that it would also feel like a waste to play the same game again instead of one of my hundreds of backlog titles. I might replay it in the future though since it is a short game and I wouldn't need to gather all collectibles a second time.

@Thrillho Yeah that's what I'm thinking as well. Who knows, maybe I'll play it again in the future when enough time has passed that it will feel more fresh to me.

@LtSarge

@RogerRoger I'm definitely looking forward to Spider-Man 2 more now that I've played Miles Morales and knowing he'll be in the game.

Just finished Persona 3: Dancing in Moonlight on PS4. It was overall pretty good but I definitely preferred Dancing in Starlight for numerous reasons. I like the P5 cast more and the music is much, much better in Starlight. Not to mention that I don't even recognise most of the tracks in Moonlight, even though I've played Persona 3. But that's probably because I played Portable and not FES.

There are some great tracks in Moonlight but some of the remixes are just awful, like this one:

I genuinely don't understand how anyone could think it was a good idea to put this remix in the game.

Anyway, I liked the game overall but I'm definitely glad I'm done with it.