What games are you playing and why?

Yes, I discovered that and it's KINDA cool, except that it also takes your gems lol. So I keep having to run back to the bank while crafting just so I can retrieve the gems that I had intended on placing into the items. That small part of it was not well thought-out.

BTW, the first time I accidentally pressed the button and saw all my crafting crap disappear, I panicked and ran to the bank and didn't see it there either (didn't notice a separate button to access a completely different part of the bank).

They may as well bite the bullet and simply allow full bank access from anywhere and that would take care of some of the annoyances of the system. Except that they do that and charge money (well, gems) for that service.

The other issue I'm finding is that there's these trophies that keep accumulating in my inventory -- I finally figured out that those are quest items. They really need to do what Rift did (And one other game I can't recall) which was to stick quest items into a separate inventory space.

 

Spent some of this evening on Alice: Madness Returns. Not a bad port - certainly not great, though - and I guess I... liked it.

Wouldn't say I'm enjoying it, though.

 

Picked up Ys I&II Chronicles+ on Steam. Fascinating as a time capsule, horrible as a game. Don't play this, seriously. I've almost finished Ys I on Nightmare and I'm uninstalling it the second I do. This hurts please send help

 

Hm that's... unexpected. I have been enjoying Ys: Origin a LOT and I'd even recommend it to people. So yeah I was tempted to get that one

 

Yeah I did hear that, but still, I was looking forward to it... Guess I'll watch a longer Let's Play to decide then

I mean... I just finished Barkley: Shut up and Jam: Gaiden, The First Chapter of the Hoopz Barkley Saga, and that's very old... and the graphics are horrible, and the battle systems and quicktime events are... well... shoddy (but function flawlessly) and I really enjoyed that

 

Sometimes I scare myself.

 

I know right, you've got a full screen irc window open *shudders*

 

That's because it's in Firefox.

 

Ys I isn't that bad on Normal. On Hard the difficulty starts to get a little silly and on Nightmare it stops being about memorization or skill and becomes an exercise in frustration and trial-and-error until you just straight-up luck out. I completed it just before typing this post out and I have no intent of ever playing the game again. It's certainly beatable but no matter which way you cut it they're really not *fun*.

If you like Origin though, I highly recommend picking up Oath in Felghana. It's a completely unfaithful remake of Ys III (and for the better) and probably my favorite in the series. About the same difficulty level as you'll find in Origin, little less and a little more in areas, but it's a blast and the soundtrack is fantastic.

 

Thanks jadkni. What surprised me most in Ys Origin was the story and the fact that the different characters have different story, that was really neat. Can you tell me about the story in Ys Chronicle? If nothing else I can just play it on normal to get the story and stop there.

@Althea: aren't those lumps the lungs I see there?

 

Yup. The guy had no ribs left, his sternum was shattered and both of his lungs were thrown around. And his new heart wasn't connected. After I'd thrown it around a bit.

I don't think his chances were particularly good, all things considered.

 

Getting bored of Tera... it's not that great overall, the questing is awful and the combat is inferior to pretty much every active aim MMO I've played previously(Neocron, Tabula Rasa, Fallen Earth, Chronicles of the Spellborn, Planetside 2, though of these only Chronicles of the Spellborn was fantasy).


... /uninstalled

 

Ys Origin has the majority of the story from I&II wrapped in with it. Upon playing a bit more, (AKA playing Ys II), it does get better. The boss design in particular, which is where most of my grief came from, is less frustrating. If you were dead-set on playing every Ys game you could do worse, though skipping Ys I might not be a bad idea, since really nothing *happens* in that game. But the abbreviated version is

Spoiler: Hint Text

that Adol collects the tomes of the six priests and returns to the flying island that got devastated in Origin. Dalles, who is the servant of a big evil thing that came out of the Black Pearl, brings Ys to the ground. You murder Dalles and his master Darm, the goddesses turn to stone, game over.

Not really related to the story of Oath, though, so by skipping them you basically miss nothing except for an explanation of where Adol met Dogi.

 

Just curious, has anyone got/played A Valley Without Wind 1/2?

 

I played the first one, and tried playing the second one a few versions ago.

The first one was... somewhat weird, but it was nice if you didn't mind the fact that it could get repetitive at times.
The second one was an attempt at making it feel less repetitive and more action-centred, and as of the time when I last played it the result was mixed, but it does appear to be trying to move in a good direction.

 

Would you recommend the double pack, then? It's not expensive.