This week's post got a bit late due to some personal matters. Sorry about that. As for the games. I did not want to start any big game, and take care of some smaller games that I have been meaning to try for a while, ended up starting multiple games. 😢
I have moved The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom to a secondary game, so while I am going to play it here and there, I am not going to focus on it anymore.
Playing Carto, it's a beautiful, small, puzzle, indie game. If you have played the board game Carcassonne, you should love it. Basically, you have to solve puzzles by moving the map pieces around (and some other stuff). Highly recommended! It's a very small games, I have done about 60%, going to try to finish it this weekend.
I started New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe, have been meaning to play it since it released but there was always something else that I wanted to play first, but with Wonder releasing soon, finally started it. I have just cleared the first (Acorn) world. Loving the game and platforming, but not a huge fan of timer in each level. It's usually not a big deal, but when you are going slow, trying to find all secrets, it finished up pretty quickly.
Also started Fire Emblem (GBA version) on NSO, and I am enjoying it a lot more than Three Houses, the only other FE game I have played (playing, technically).
Finished The Order 1886. A wonderful game that still holds up really well, both gameplay and visuals. But it was too short. A sequel could've been great.
That's all from me. What about you guys? What have you been playing? And what are you planning to play this weekend and beyond? And how are you liking it?
Currently waiting for QOL updates for Techtonia, an underground factory game that just came out and is extremely tedious. But I managed to get PC Building Sim 75% off so I've been playing that along side mobile minecraft
Thanks for the post! If I see it out and about I might try buying the Kirby return to Dreamland game.
Otherwise if I play switch it's that pokemon scarlet and violet game set. They did a really awesome job adding ridable pokemon, auto battling, and raids. To me it's pretty much everything I asked for as a kid. The graphics leave much to be desired but if you're playing in 1080p anyways it's like who cares, you're playing for the concept anyways lol.
How is Ocarina of Time (NSO version) for someone who has never played it before? I remember there were many posts about how there are issues with the port, so I haven't tried it yet.
I don't know if they refer to technical issues or bugs. Have not encountered any yet, or at least anything memorable. But the controls are rough for someone used to modern control schemes like BotW for example. Also the screen looks too small in handheld. Unfortunately I cannot play it docked currently. The game is fun though so far and it seems to go even deeper story wise down the road. I'll update when I have played more the coming weeks.
I was meaning to get back to DQXI after TotK, but want to play some of the smaller games from backlog, before jumping fully back in such a long game.
NSMBUD (Wow, even in abbreviations it is such a long name!) is really fun. I am having fun, but having trouble getting all the big gold coins (the ones that are 3 in each level).
Which Pikmin do you have in queue? 4? What about the previous ones?
I’m continuing my tour of Nintendo’s back catalog on the DS. I’ve been playing Dragon Quest V. I really like how you can get random monsters to join your team. It’s the first Dragon Quest game I’ve ever played.
I'm still very slowly whittling away at Tears of the Kingdom. It's a very slow burn for me, I commonly lose interest after a half hour or so each time I pick it up. Otherwise I'm playing Fire Emblem on GBA virtual console.
It's one of my favorites of all time. I played it to death in 2003, so it's a treat to relive my first foray into the franchise. Props to Smash Bros. Melee to puting it on my radar!
Tears of the Kingdom. I did figure out where the tear in the Hebra geoglyph was and have gotten a bunch more since then. I went madlad and completed Gerudo second of the four areas despite Gerudo usually being the hardest area in these types of Zelda games, and honestly, the only really hard part of it was the temple boss, which took me a fair number of tries and a short detour from the temple for some cooking, but I eventually beat it when I discovered a trick for the second half of the fight. Now I'm just wandering the land filling the map some more and doing a bunch of side quests and shrines where I find them before I take on the Goron area third.
EDIT: I should note I'm not wandering without an objective, I wanted to make sure I visited Kakariko and Hateno villages at least. I actually spent almost my entire three-hour play session last night in and around Hateno doing side quests.
I think I'm getting close to the end, finished Rean's Act 4 and now working on Lloyd's route. Game is a huge improvement over CS4 IMO, even though Lloyd's route is still too cheesy for my tastes.
Also, I kinda like the idea of the Reverie Corridor.
Reverie Corridor spoilers and some coments on CS4
This series tends to have a ton of sidequests, but in most games of the series the plot starts slow, and by the time it speeds up near the end the number of sidequests shrinks to focus on the main plot.
This however doesn't work on CS4, because you already start the game in a major crisis, making the classic JRPG trope of "why are you playing mini-games when the world is about to end" hit really hard.
Reverie also starts with a crisis, but takes a different approach to this: Most of the optional content takes place in this dream-like world where memories from the real world are hazy and time flows differently.
Since this is disconnected from the main story it also lets the developer play around, include characters from older games, let you mix parties from different routes, and so on.
Just to clarify, I though CS4 was one of the weakest game in the series, which is why I'm glad Reverie is a big improvement.
But even the weaker games in the series are fun, I did play CS4 for 80h-ish hours and had a good time - it just felt like a significant downgrade after CS3 which was one of my favorites.
Tears of the Kingdom, one last time. I've done and collected everything I care about, which is pretty much everything except Korok Seeds, upgrading pointless armor and schematics (though I probably have all of those) and all that's left is to beat the game.
And then I'm finally free again! I can jump back into Monster Hunter Rise, which I haven't touched in two months. There's some endgame content I haven't even touched yet and I'm sure I'm rusty enough to have a very bad time! I can also finally take a look at Sealed Palace, an Ocarina of Time Rom Hack.
I probably won't get around to the next large game yet, Caligula Effect 2, which has been sitting on my shelf for a while. But I do want to finish that before Baten Kaitos releases, so I shouldn't wait too long.
My final percentage was 84.83% after ~205 hours. I didn't think I'd have more than 70%, I was kinda surprised. I also forgot to add the monster medals to the list of things I don't care about.
The first Caligula was... okay. I liked it and completed it 100%, but I wouldn't recommend going that far. You can tell it was originally a Vita game, it looks quite awful. But that's also why I'm excited to play the sequel, it was made for modern hardware.
After 100 hours of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, I decided to take a break. From the initial 4 temples, I am just missing the one in Gerudo, but I'm on my way there and done some quests in Gerudo. But as I've mentioned before, I know I'm going to be playing this game for a while. So I'll get back to it here and there too and get a few long sessions for specific things (the temple, more of the story, etc.) every now and then.
I've been playing Pikmin 4 since Friday. I shared my initial impression on the other thread. I still agree with that after a few more hours, but it's been fun. I like that it's very relaxed and easy. Although the timer for the day keeps going, I don't have the pressure to finish in x amount of days like in Pikmin 3.
I started New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe, have been meaning to play it since it released but there was always something else that I wanted to play first, but with Wonder releasing soon, finally started it.
I'm past the tutorials yes, it's just the first hour or so but it's really annoying. After that you do get some text from NPCs, but it's not as annoying. It's pretty relaxed and fun now!
I picked up my switch a couple of weeks ago. First game I picked up was Xenoblade chronicles 3 which has been a lot of fun though i think i picked up to many ganes to quuckly as im starting to fall off at level 17 i have not licked the game up in a few days. Even though at first i was hitting this game hard.l also picked up northgard great rts.
Monster train a rogue like card game where you play monsters and try to defend your crystal as you try to destroy an angel? Story is light but gameplay is so good.
Also got diablo 2 resurrected monster hunter rise and some overwatch 2. I just got the switch and I'm bouncing from thing to thing. It's really got me back into gaming.
Haha, I can understand how you feel. I didn't had PS4, so when I got PS5, I started tons of games at a time, but then I couldn't play any game properly, so I stopped most of the games, and started to focus on one game at a time.
Xenoblade Chronicles can be a tough game to get into, but it's a pretty great game if you end up liking it. It's more of a love or hate game.
These are all great choices, would love to hear from you in future to see where your gaming journey takes you!
I'm in full "Starfield waiting room mode". Between this and my job taking a large portion of my time I'm disinclined to fully invest in any game. I still spend a few of hours here and there, but it's less focused and more just 'dicking around'.
WoW solocraft server is something I've been meaning to get setup for awhile. I tend to be a solo WoW player and the leveling process draws me more than endgame. The server I run is passable, but a little jenky. The space bar causes you to jump when underwater, global cooldowns have a hiccup delay, pet aggro functions incorrectly, etc.
Xenoblade 2 has been on my list for awhile. For misc reasons I gave up on the game partway through in favor of watching the cutscenes movie-style. I still want to beat the game though. The game is complex and I've been trying to get advice on a methodology for playing the game's systems. Until I get that help though I merely dabble with the game and tiptoe forward.
Gregtech NH. It's been a hot minute since I've run a minecraft mod pack. A friend mentioned them and I figured I'd do a bit of research and find what people consider to be a good one. GTNH is not new, but apparently it has had a long time to cook and is balanced and developed.
BotW may not be the shiny new TotK, but it's what I have. I didn't 100% Tears, but I saw all the story content and beat it. My copy was borrowed so afterwards I returned it. Now BotW is all I have, but it's still fun and an excellent 'dicking around for an hour' kind of game.
I want to play Starfield so much! Don't have a PC that can play it though, so thinking about getting an Xbox. But going to wait a bit a few after release, to let them fix the bugs, and for a distant chance that it may actually come to PS5 (yeah, I know, never going to happen...).