Going to use this thread to recommend AM2R which is so high quality Nintendo could have made it themselves. It also has a great Prime-style OST in a 2d game which none of the other games have done
My favorite Metroid is a knockoff. Environmental Station Alpha. I can’t help but recommend it in any thread that’s even remotely on topic. It’s not “better” than the official titles but I end up replaying ESA way more. The astmosphere and music just really hit me, and the gameplay is tight with lots of secrets.
My favorite official title is Fusion though. It was so awesome being able to play that on the train to school and lunch breaks.
This was a tough one. But I’m probably going to have to say JSawyer Ultimate for Fallout: New Vegas. A continuation of the game director’s own rebalance mod, it makes the game hard in a way that feels fresh and fair (unlike the baked-in Hardcore mode).
I like to pair it with my runner-up: JAM - Just Assorted Mods, for a more modern HUD and a sprint feature. Of course then you need the NPCs Sprint mod to rebalance combat and- you know what, all of the Viva New Vegas modlist while you’re at it ;)
I haven’t bothered with mods for years now but Neotokyo was by far my favourite. Apparently it’s still played to this day by a group of fans but I haven’t joined in. Also the soundtrack is amazing
Though I will likely not be playing the game, I have seen a lot of people running into performance problems, crashing, and just bugs in general. You aren’t the only one.
Yeah, I didn’t consider that. The game would probably have to design the map in a way that keeps all the characters relatively nearby, or introduce a mechanic for them to converge more seamlessly, like maybe having save rooms that teleport all of them together or something.
I’m just picturing big chambers like Super Metroid, and the characters moving around testing things to see what happens, then putting it together. (Maybe a zoom out button, or the map screen being relatively detailed.) So it could be very similar to the original, just “more”. You’d just need a few sets of puzzles in every chamber, for when they backtrack and revisit areas. Mind you I’m not saying it’s easy to “just” design good levels and puzzles, especially in such a large scale, just that it’s easy for me to imagine it being fun.
Seems like all the way on the other end of the spectrum of Kingdom Come deliverance 2. Might pick this up after I’m done with Kingdom Come.
the lack of stealth is a bit of a turn off for me personally, but the hand placed events and mobs seems like a big plus.
Does anyone know if the game is viable without any companions? The reviews I have seen seem to complain about them a lot and I already dislike AI teammates.
I loved the combat system, so I enjoyed every fight in game (except flying monsters in the first game if you didn’t have barret around). I think it’s my favourite hybrid combat system that allows both tactical and reactionary attacks and shines the most when you’re juggling between characters to get the ATB gauges up on everyone as quickly as possible so you have more toys to play with constantly.
The Yuffie DLC (Intermission) then expands upon the traversal mechanics and team based combat mechanics which were a whole lot of fun. A lot of this carried over to Rebirth as well but expanded upon again. Still ended up with Yuffie being one of the most fun to play though because she was originally designed to play mostly solo from her DLC, but having a character that is more fun to play isn’t a bad thing obviously.
Story wise, without spoiling too much, I love how, much like a lot of the mechanics, tries to expand upon old elements rather than outright replace them. And the story being some kind of pseudo-sequel where meta-textuality enhances the experience it ensures that these games are not replacements of the original. Which makes me laud it up in the highest regards. If they had just tried to replicate everything I think it would’ve felt even weirder it trying to be a wholesale replacement of the original like a lot of standard remakes try to be (think resi and silent hill). I don’t know how others can replicate what square is doing though since a lot of it is rooted in it’s story and doesn’t deviate far from the elements introduced in the original and the compilation games. Resi could not have replicated this intertextuality between versions of the game. You could argue silent hill could due to its story elements but they just focused on making it an enhanced version of the original.
I think I’m starting to ramble too much now so I’ll start to end it. I think the fact I can ramble about these games and gush about them so much shows how much I love them.
Other than astro bot rebirth was one of the most refreshing breaths in gaming for me, despite me more often than not despising both large open worlds and ubi style towers. Yet I felt compelled to almost 100% the game just due to the amount of fun I was having that I could just not get anywhere else.
And now I have two extra games (eventually three) I can regularly replay for my FFVII itch, alongside the original which has been a bi-yearly ritual to replay since before my age was in double digits. I couldn’t be happier. Though Rebirth will always be the highlight when replaying just due to the combat overhauls they made which in retrospect makes the first look like a tech demo.
Thanks for your comment on this. I agree that flying enemies are annoying in the game. I did not realize they had improved the combat mechanics in the second game. That makes me interested in checking that one out.
The synergy skill that allows you to have another party member throw you into the air at an enemy, when controlling a melee fighter, (Tifa, Cloud, Red) is so satisfying and welcome in Rebirth when fighting flying enemies.
Rebirth does something with the open world mechanics I haven’t seen in other games. It interconnects everything.
The life springs give you a shitton of materials for the crafting system, they reveal the locations of crafting recipes, and eventually the area boss.
All of which interconnects with side-quests, not just at the start as a tutorial, but throughout each region.
It hence manages to make you want to do everything, almost on accident. If you do all the sidequests, you progress the collectathon a bunch. If you do the collectathon, you end up progressing quests a bunch just by “coincidence”.
Add to that the fast travel that lets you jump anywhere instantly, and nothing ends up feeling like a chore.
Think you’ve hit it on the nail on the head. It feels less like a chore because of the way they all connect with one another.
Although even before fast travel I still did a lot of manual travelling to get everything done. At least until I realised that fast travel was very likely to get better later in the game, which it of course did.
bin.pol.social
Ważne