That game was fun over all. I was a bit disappointed with some aspects of the story and characters, but I would need to go into spoilers to discuss that here.
Właśnie od niedawna widzę, że bez takiej dawki rano mój mózg nie działa jak powinien (mówiąc krótko, uzależniłem się w ch*). Muszę jakoś powoli zejść z tego, żeby nie ucierpiała praca.
Hm. Trzeba by zmierzyć ilość tej kofeiny i może faktycznie pomału schodzić. Ale szczerze nie chcę doradzać, nie mam pojęcia jak organizm może zareagować.
It is a very beautiful isometric stealth game with a good story. I am playing the demo and I am already hooked to it. The demo is surprisingly long and enough to decide whether you are interested or not in this game.
Gang Beasts is a fun one and supports up to 8 players. Don’t use the native Linux version though. It’s pretty buggy but the Windows version works well with Proton.
Nidhogg is another fun one. It’s only two players at a time but you can do a tournament and it’s almost as fun to watch as it is to play. The sequel is good but I prefer the original for it’s simplicity.
EDIT: Forgot to say, this game never released in English but there is a fan translation patch available that should be easy enough to find if you’re interested.
There’s a growing trend in indie games for the King’s Field-likes; Lunacid, Dread Delusion, etc. I’m a huge fan and if anyone has any other good ones to recommend, please let me know! EDIT: Just found Caput Mortem which looks like it might fit the bill near enough and also features music by Ockeroid of Crow Country notably …
But for this I thought I’d return to the roots. I’ve picked at King’s Field I (JP) and II a bit before and while I enjoy them, they’re overall still very clunky and I usually get distracted. I wasn’t sure how long I’d stick with Shadow Tower Abyss, but I feel like this one I may very well see through, I’m enjoying it quite a bit so far. That’s not to say it’s not still a clunky slog, and it’s certainly not for everyone, but there is real charm there.
(Scoring system: 1-5 being bad, OK, good, great, excellent with decimals being vibe based to push it closer to one rather than the other. For example 3.2 is meant to indicate a bit better than just good, but still not great. 3.8 might indicate close to great, but missing a few aspects that prevent it)
Sound: 3.2/5, Good. Like a lot of FromSoft games, there’s not really much music aside from the occasional musical sting which provides effective ambience. The sound design is minimal as well, but there are some very good moments of creepy thrumming, droning, and distant screeching that make it an intense environment to inhabit.
Graphics: 3.5/5, Good. What’s on display is generally competent and atmospheric, each new area has its own theme which is interesting to explore, but still, I feel like they could’ve done a lot more with the PS2 graphics. It’s certainly an improvement over King’s Field '94, but exactly how much is debatable …
The monster design is pretty good, everything has this kind of alien/abyssal feel to it. The overall theming is on point. Areas of the game have simple descriptions (i.e. Blue Light Area) that give the impression the player character is a foreign explorer rather than anyone with innate knowledge of this weird world. It’s a small aspect of world-building I appreciate.
Gameplay: 3.8/5, Good. Overall control still feels dated, but much less clunky than previous entries. The player moves at a brisk enough pace, but still slowly enough that you soak in the environment and progress feels meaningful. Being an older game you can’t really rebind the controls, but there are a variety of schemes including Type 4 which allow for the expected, modern dual analog stick looking/movement.
Combat can still be a little boxy and clunky but each weapon offers a left and right slash as well as an overhead bashing and frontal thrusting attack. Each weapon also has related stats for these types of attacks and enemies will have weaknesses or possible points of dismemberment making them vulnerable to particular attacks. Unlike some of the earlier King’s Field games, connecting attacks always feels good and has satisfying feedback.
The stats system is definitely very obtuse, even if you are familiar with From’s games and I recommend consulting a guide quickly before your first time playing. Again, as is very typical in From’s fashion, there isn’t an abundance of items but what exists is very deliberate. Money consists of these single large coins which you usually only find 1 or occasionally 2 at a time. Most things will only cost a handful of coins with healing potions being 2, boxes of ammo (for your gun!) being 1(?), and weapons and armor ranging anywhere from ~4-15. You’ll also find a plethora of items scattered throughout the game so there’s no shortage.
There is a unique balancing though as in order to heal yourself from the rare healing stations you have to sacrifice items for their value, although I’m early enough in the game that a basic Hat still seems to fully heal me from low health. In order to repair durability on your items from the rare purple repairing stations, you must sacrifice health with items like magic rings requiring sometimes more health than you currently have! This creates a tense and balanced management situation that feels like you might possibly softlock yourself by eating through too many resources, but so far hasn’t proved an issue for me. As a personal aside, I’m a big fan of playing games as they were designed so I’m doing my best to only save at the rare save points and not save state my way through the game, although this is of course up to your own tastes and discretion.
But is there a poison area with forced damage, I hear you ask? Yes, you fool, YES! Why would you even doubt it? Don’t let this discourage you though as understanding the stats system and equipping proper armor allows you to minimize the damage per poison tick such that it creates urgency as a pressure point more than a pain point. Definitely sacrificed a few lives just scouting the area out, though. Game Over means reload a save.
Summary/TL;DR Shadow Tower Abyss is a very competent dungeon crawler with a unique theme and atmosphere that’s worth exploring if you’d like to see historic FromSoft (it’s 20+ years old, as an ancient gamer I can use “historic” if I want). Miyazaki gets a lot of credit for modern From games and while a lot of that is certainly due, it’s fascinating to see how many of these deliberate design concepts have always been in their DNA.
As an aside, one day I’m going to write an entire essay on what makes a Soulslike a Soulsike. I missed the boat on the original hype and only got into them during COVID lockdown in 2020. I didn’t think I’d be a fan of the grueling, “git gud” experience but I’ve come to realize that’s not what makes those games interesting. It’s one concept and some people may find it unsatisfyingly vague, but it’s not the bonfires, or the losing souls on death, or the dodge rolling. It’s the stone-cold deliberateness. A lot of the difficulty from these games arises out of that deliberateness; what items you choose to equip and how you observe and approach unique situations. The games aren’t good because they’re hard, the specific design elements that make them hard are also the things that make them good.
Damn man, I love Resident Evil and have never finished an SH game, but we have so many of the former (especially considering the indie scene) this seems like an excessively presumptuous comment.
Silent Hill was never a Resident Evil clone. It always had a unique identity. Resident Evil, except the original game, has the identity of a Hollywood Action movie. The developers of the game have stated that is what they wanted from the series starting with RE2. Silent Hill, on the other hand, is like a much slower Alfred Hitchcock Suspense film. Slower paced, methodical, and plays on the viewer’s imagination. Where Resident Evil might explicitly say something in the lore, Silent Hill is more likely to only imply it.
And then we get to Silent Hill 2 Remake which basically is just a copy of Resident Evil 4 Remake, sadly.
Oh fuck, Hard DK has found his way to you too then :)
Streamer Alpharad got a “Hard DK” bit running since they got their ass handed over to them by a crazy Mario Party CPU DK that was just gambling like mad and winning everything.
They trained an incredibly good amiibo CPU DK in Smash they called Hard DK in reference to this.
I’ll never forgive DK for Mario Party that faithful evening. Maybe i should look into the DK Amiibo, it’d be fun to contribute to my friend group’s bit like that. Assuming the Amiibo isn’t crazy expensive.
Amiibos are a bit expensive. There are a few DK amiibos, they should all work with Smash because amiibos have a character identifier that’s recognized between games and amiibo series.
The ones from smash bros and super mario series should be around the “normal” price (for me it’s about 13-15 euros). Maybe you can find a second hand one for cheaper.
There’s a new one with DK and Pauline for Bananza, like other new amiibos it costs a bit more (around 18€ for me). It unlocks a costume in Bananza as an extra.
There’s also an old Skylander DK figure that doubles as an amiibo if I remember correctly. It’s kinda ugly and cheap-looking, and probably not easy to find, but who knows.
Damn, Skylanders is a name I haven’t heard in a while. I wonder if I had the DK one growing up. I collected those things like hot cakes so it’s possible. Anything to avoid spending more money. Alternatively I think I bought some NFC tags I can write myself now that I think about it specifically for this purpose
Decided to check out VOID/BREAKER, a roguelite FPS, which just released into Early Access. The trailer makes it look like some crazy, super fast-paced, effects filled shooter, where you constantly destroy your environment, and maybe it gets to that point, but so far in my <10 runs, 6h, with the game, it’s been pretty basic.
Each run you choose a single weapon, so far I’ve unlocked a pistol (default), automatic rifle and shotgun, and then you’ll find different upgrades and abilities that you slot into your weapon to modify it.
The main thing of this game is the grappling hook. You can either grapple objects in the environment to throw at enemies, like explosives. Or you can grapple to specific points in each arena to fly around, but so far, for me, that hasn’t been as fun as it should be.
Then the destructible buildings, although they are really basic (mainly just boxes) and take a surprisingly long time to bring down, and even then it’s mainly in parts, not the whole thing. Unless you find some upgrades, your grenades (and the aforementioned explosives) will be the main way to destroy stuff, so you’ll have to constantly wait for the short cooldown to throw the next grenade or look for more objects in the arena.
I’ll give it some more time, because I can see the potential, but I haven’t really found anything like the “deep gun modding” or “deadly synergies” the Steam store page is talking about. 90% of the time it’s been stuff like your bullets fly faster, and your grenade deals more damage.
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