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 On 11/26/2018 at 09:36 PM by Super Step See More From This User » |
Sales
Since it's Cyber Monday, I decided to look on both Steam and PS4 for sales and ... well ... at least I'm still technically in the clear as far as my monthly "Wants" budget. Kinda. Merry Christmas to me, I guess.
On Steam, I bought Bayonetta, Cuphead, and Life is Strange 2 Episode 1 for a total of $26.77.
I don't have an XBONE, so PC is the only way I can play the former titles. I wanted the latter on PC so I could make another video review without getting a capture card (my PC has capture functionality cause it's a "gaming" laptop) and because, while I've played the series on PS4 before now, it does seem like a PC kinda game when all is said and done.
I had money left over in my "Wants" budget, so I decided to pick up Shadow of the Tomb Raider and Detroit: Become Human for a total of $51.89 on PS4, since I wanted to play them anyway.
I was tempted to buy Doom for PC or Assassin's Creed Odyssey for either system (probably PS4, cause I don't like to make $20+ purchases for PC for compatibility bullshit reasons ... still pissed I can't run Grand Theft Auto IV on my brand new GAMING laptop; it didn't work on the last one I was pushing the limits of either, yet Tomb Raider 2013 ran just fine on that old one), but decided to be good and not jump the gun with no wants budget left after the games I purchased. I do still have $60 or so left for the month and that will roll over into next month, so we'll see what sales are closer to Christmas. I would also have bought DuckTales Remastered and Prince of Persia: Sands of Time, which are forever on my Wish List, forever going on sale, and forever being overlooked because I know they'll be on sale again.
That would have been it, but I remembered I have a Money Network card I got from the new job (it goes direct deposit now, but I had to do some weird bullshit with Money Network checks when I lost my first one and ... long story). Anyway, it had about $90 or so dollars on it, so I bought a 2TB external drive for my PS4 at Target. I plan to transfer a bunch of stuff onto it shortly, unless they've finally patched that update to where you can have things stored on both system and drive.
As for what I've been playing:
More SNES Mini, mostly Super Castlevania IV, in which I am now at Stage B, which is the level after the clocktower (Stage A) and it looks like before Dracula if I'm reading that map right? This is the one game with passwords I'm able to do completely the old school way, since the passwords are done with 4 icons: a blank space, a holy water container, a heart, and an axe, and I can remember those a lot better than the 12-number passwords in Mega Man X, a game for which I use the built-in save point system that allows you to restart the SNES Mini to save at a particular point.
Speaking of Mega Man X, I beat Vile on the way to Sigma's castle ... too bad there was a section involving some of the most annoying enemies ever interrupting your wall climbing. I don't know if I'm going to get past that part and I tend to leave most Mega Man games unfinished by beating the robot masters and more or less leaving the castle alone. I pretty much "Patrick" (NWP reference) all of them.
I actually beat Star Fox not two/three hours before writing this, and I wonder why I remember it being so hard? It's not because I took a harder path as a kid; everything in the middle path was familiar right up until the penultimate stage and Venom, which I surely never got to back then. Most of the difficulty comes from not knowing what the hell is going on and slowdown, but the game is actually pretty forgiving about what hits you, outside of those small corridors with the sliding doors and beams in later levels that appear a bit faster than it looks like your ship is moving.
I played some Super Mario World as a break from Super Castlevania IV, but actually wound up a bit more frustrated when I got to castle 3 only to be small Mario and not be sure of what to do to get below those wizards. I didn't realize you go back two stages when you die, and I had a hard time beating those in particular, so I switched to Super Metroid, but I STILL cannot get the hang of the stupid wall jump. I hate how much of a problem it is, because every other 2D Metroid makes wall jumping fun. It's a game-stopping chore in this iteration.
Finally, I got a little farther into both Super Punch Out and Street Fighter II: Turbo. By farther in the former, I mean "I knocked Bear Hugger out twice, why the hell does times up mean I lost and why the hell does this game not have a tutorial mode?" Yeah, I'm stuck on the second level. As for the latter, I got to Ken's stage, which for me was either one or two levels after the car smashing minigame, and while everyone else was just stupid enough to get barely beaten by some corner hadoukens, this piece of shit countered my every move in ways that made me think the computer was cheating and had replaced itself with a pro gamer using an arcade stick. I got SO CLOSE to beating him a couple times too. In fact, a lot of these matches end up being down to the wire and it makes defeat even worse. I might have to play on Normal as opposed to Turbo or lower the difficulty next time, for the sake of my blood pressure.
Before all this, I had been playing Rondo of Blood from the PS4 Requiem Collection that also features Symphony of the Night. I think Super Castlevania IV and Rondo of Blood are both short enough I should be able to finish them before moving on to SotN. I'm finding that I kind of prefer the 2D action sidescroller Castlevanias to the Metroid-style ones, though I do think certain things should be updated if they ever bring that style back. It could just be that Game Over load screen in SotN taking so damn long every time I die though. Also, I'm kinda bummed they "fixed" the voiceovers, since I was really looking forward to the cheese.
My only other recent PS4 news was that I was trying to get through God of War, but it's gotten dull for me and I'm not sure if I want to keep it and plow through because of what I do like or make it the first game I ever sell back/trade in. I never had a reason to before cause I never used to buy too many games (thank you, Blockbuster) and replayed the hell out of ones I did, but I don't know how much I'd actually replay this one. I might like my free copy of God of War III via PS+ better.
Speaking of PS+, I now own both a physical and digital copy of Yakuza Kiwami on PS4 and I'm pretty excited about not having to get up to change games out now that I have it digitally and have a hard drive to put all my stuff on.
As for Steam, I played a little bit of Knights of the Old Republic today because it finally started to cooperate (I think the 32-bit architecture causes some issues on my 64-bit PC, but at least it runs, unlike GTA IV). I gotta say, I didn't realize just how D&D inspired this game would be and I'm still kinda working through the pause-unpause combat system, but I'm enjoying it so far. I do kinda wish the game would take you out of combat mode automatically though, so I don't think my game is glitching when I don't have anything to click on to move to and WASD isn't working. I'm looking forward to the story more than combat and while I may or may not set things this way, I'm glad there's at least an automatic combat option.
I also solved a perplexing mystery today when I played Golden Axe by way of the SEGA Master System & Genesis Collection and discovered Golden Axe is DLC and that's why my virtual shelf in that game is devoid of anything else. What remains is the mystery of how the hell I came to possess that DLC in the first place, since I definitely don't remember buying it or getting it as a gift. Maybe I should be more suspicous of this.
*Phew* Long blog. Anyway, I'm still taking podcast topic requests and might start streaming soon with my PC, since I now have the equipment to do it with at least my voice (I'm not sure I'm ready for the world to see my gamer RBF just yet). Let me know what you think.
What have you been playing? Did you get anything on sale this weekend, gaming-wise?
I love love love the SNES Mini. You know that 'what would you take on a desert island' game? Well, I think the SNES Mini would be one of those things I would take, as long as I had electricity. :)
If it weren't for Animal Crossing: New Leaf coming out that same year, DuckTales Remastered might've been my Game of the Year when it was released.
The SNES Mini has the best library of any Classic console for my tastes. I might get a NES Mini too. If the Playstation Classic had a better library, I might consider it.
I do want to play DuckTales Remastered eventually, but there's usually something more expensive I want.
There's an option in Kotor to let you move during combat. Actually has a bunch of tweaks there, you can set how you want your party AI to react, whether you want to pause after each command, etc. Hope you enjoy that one
As for my Black Friday, I got Spyro, PSVR with Astro Bot/Moss, and Mega Man 11 on Switch.
Yeah, I got the impression that game was pretty customizable, just figuring out how I want to customize it still.
I might get Spyro for Christmas; I was asking Nick if I could review that one until I learned someone else had dibs. Soul Calibur VI is another potential Christmas gift for me. PSVR is one of those things I'd love to have, but don't know how much there is I'd actually ewant to play on it. I'll have to look up Astro Bot/Moss. Mega Man 11's demo was harder for me than other Mega Mans I've played, so I kinda gave up on it.
If I was fully back to FT work, I would've gotten a Switch on Black Friday. It depressed me a bit, not being able to participate this year, so I ignored all the other sales.
I hear ya. Look on the bright side, you're getting a lot out of the games you do have and you have that money in your pocket.
Yea, I actually still have too many choices. I can get free rentals from the library and a ton of free stuff is still unplayed on my boxes. It does weird things to my brain. I just can't handle it anymore.
I just looked through my PS4's "purchased" library and, after whittling it down to only games I have actually paid money for (no PS+, no demos, although I kept the one freebie The Adventures of Captain Spirit in there, since it's a Life is Strange 2 prequel and kind of its own thing), I have ~100 fewer games in that category than the system initially told me.
I am only downloading the games I wish to play right meow onto my hard drive. I find my choices easier when I base them on "what do I want to play RIGHT NOW?"
I made an essentials list for myself and I'm trying to stick to them, but there's so much thrown at you now days, that it's easy to get distracted. I watched Mark start up Dante's Inferno today and I've been meaning to get back to that for years now. I didn't give in though.
I'm often tempted to buy Doom as well, but I haven't yet.
Cool that you bought a hard drive. It definitely increased my pleasure with my ps4.
Super Mario World is a GREAT game, but it can be tough. The best 2D mario though, if you ask me.
Looks like you're really savoring your SNES. I'll bet a lot of people bought it and only played it a little bit.
Most of the games on the SNES are games I have some kind of nostalgia for (SMW, MMX, DKC, SSFII:T, etc.) or games I've always heard of but never got to play until now (SCIV, SG&G, SoM, SPO, etc.) or games I wasn't fond of as a kid but want to revisit (Earthbound), so yes. I bought it to play it, not just for nostalgia. I'll let you sort out all those abbreviations. 
I'm very much looking forward to fewer decisions about what games I can have on my PS4 at any given time.
Wait why can't you run GTA IV on your laptop? I'm pretty sure your laptop has more horsepower than mine, and I was able to run it. I do think there was a work around with changing a file to get it to run because I think it was glitchy.
Good pickups. You bought stuff you want to play, and I do want to jump into the next Tomb Raider but I am going to wait until after the new year. I might get it on PS4 just to mix it a up a bit.
Yeah, I'm sure there's a patch on Steam to run it. It's the game itself, not my machine. Apparently, Rockstar is known for stuff like this. I may try to re-download and try again with a patch, but I'm annoyed I have to. This is what I don't like about PC gaming.
I got Life is Strange 2 on PC to mix it up, but I think I'll stick with a controller for the series from now on. This is also the first time I've bought an episode in this series and not the whole package at once.
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