Completion Thread 2012: Hai! Dekimashita!

[Rumpy]

Harley's Revenge (Batman: AC DLC)

It's more Rocksteady Batman, so that rules. Problem is that it's super linear and very short. What's there is a lot of fun though. It assumes you've finished City so it plops you into full on fights and ruins the end of City if you haven't played it. I'd suggest waiting for it to go on sale for $5, 10 is just too much for what you get.

Max Payne 3
Big fan of this series, but 2 remains my favorite. Not much is changed gameplay wise, you just go from kill room to kill room with cutscenes put in between. You still have the same bullet time and dodging, with added cover mechanics. The concerns of it being too far removed from the film noir motif are largely non existent. This is still Max Payne, he's just as miserable and he has to kill an army to get out of the ditch he dug for himself. It looks and sounds awesome, the different environments through the story keep things interesting. It's a tough game too, I got stuck in sections a few times, you can't just attack like a bull. Keep moving, know what weapons to use and always aim for the head.

One of the biggest problems I had was with the auto-pill pop mechanic when you are on your last legs. It enters bullet time automatically and lets you shoot the guy who is about to take you out. If successful, you live by taking a pain killer (if you don't have any you die of course, no bullet time escape for you). Problem is, you could be contorted or just behind something that won't let you get a clear shot of your attacker so you just end up shooting a desk or a poll and die like a fish out of water. Plus, when you come out of it you are always on the ground and that often sets you up to get overwhelmed. The close quarter combat also continues the Rockstar tradition of being awkward as shit.

[No One]

There hasn't been much coming out on home consoles to interest me as of late, so I've been getting back in touch with my inner F-chan and catching up on my portable pile of shame.

17.) Touch My Katamari (Vita)

It's Katamari with no frills. I do appreciate that the first six DLC levels are all free. Seeing the King rendered in full 3D is about as creepy as it sounds. Definitely a tired formula at this point, although I liked that the game seemed to acknowledge this in the storyline. It'll be hard to play the older games without being able to squish and stretch the katamari to get through tight spots. Neither bad nor great.

18.) Riviera: The Promised Land (PSP)

I wish I hadn't waited so long to play this. Aside from the incredibly slow-going battles, this was a surprisingly charming game. Yggdra Union and Knights in the Nightmare are pretty cheap on PSN, so I think I'll check those out too.

19.) Ys I & II Chronicles (PSP)

I played the Eternal versions of these games to death on PC, so I had no real interest in playing them again. I was so pleased with XSeed localizing them that I bought a physical copy and later the digital variant for my Vita, though. Finally got around to playing through it over the weekend. I could beat these games in my sleep now, but I always end up getting into them regardless. Some surprisingly mellow arrangements of classic songs in Ys II.

20.) Ys Seven (PSP)

Got to the last dungeon in this one many months ago and then just stopped for some reason. Finally finished it off. To be honest, I actually think it's a little too lengthy for an Ys game. Still, the gameplay is super-quick and swapping characters on the fly to deal with certain kinds of enemies is quite fun. Thankfully, it would appear the upcoming remake of IV is retaining this system.

[Compass]

18.) Riviera: The Promised Land (PSP)

I wish I hadn't waited so long to play this. Aside from the incredibly slow-going battles, this was a surprisingly charming game. Yggdra Union and Knights in the Nightmare are pretty cheap on PSN, so I think I'll check those out too.

Voice acting made this game for me. Hopefully you left it in chan. Lina was so kawaii.

[No One]

Voice acting made this game for me. Hopefully you left it in chan. Lina was so kawaii.

I always do this if the option exists. I assume the Atlus dub was decent (as it always is), but I'll take the original VO every time.

[Tain]

24. Wonder Boy in Monster World



A cool game by the end, but it takes a while to get beyond the bland hallways with simple yet high-HP enemies. Definitely not as good as any of its predecessors. The bosses are pretty lame, even by series standards, and seem to involve a lot of bouncing around and winning via DPS. Loved that moving platform room near the end.

[007bond]

5. 50 Cent: Blood on the Sand (360) - actually a decent game that can be finished in a few hours (6 or so in my case). Sure it's a 3rd person cover based shooter that doesn't break any new ground but some unintentional comedy and the absurdity of the whole game/story made it worth the quick play through.

[FirstBlood]

Max Payne 3

Eh, it's really just not as good as the first two. Way too much of an emphasis on cover shooting. The presentation is what you'd expect from Rockstar but they don't even attempt to bring the original surreal-noir tone to the game. More of what I'd expect from a GTA if it was more linear and combat driven. It ran beautifully on my new PC, looked very nice and definitely not a game I want to play with a controller (headshots all day every day with my mouse).

It's not a bad game, and I really hope Rockstar learned something from the combat and hopefully uses it in GTA5 because they built a solid foundation here. But ultimately it doesn't do the series justice.

[Melf]

#14.



After around 90 hours and about 72% of the trophies, I'm giving this one a rest. I beat the main game and am in game+, and while I really LOVED this title, it's a great example of why Japanese developers are so far behind in design. The typical cryptic quest bullshit that's standard in JRPGs is here (don't take the quest being offered to you RIGHT NOW because that could lock out a quest offered by someone you haven't met yet much further down the line!). This wouldn't piss me off if it didn't have a trophy hinging on doing all the side quests handed out by NPCs. It's impossible to do them all perfectly unless you have a guide or FAQ with you step by step.

Some of the boss trophies are like this too. I missed the dragon one because I had to kill them after I killed the main boss but before I actually finished the game itself. Who the fuck would have known that there's a dragon waiting in a tower when you went there at least 3 times during the main game and he wasn't there? Oh, that's because he only shows up AFTER you kill the final boss and BEFORE you end the game. Finish the main story and you have to play through the entire game again on game+ to get him.

Many of the side quests are also incredibly vague. For instance, there's one where you have to find evidence to acquit or convict a businessman, and the only people flagged for speaking to are not the ones you need to find. There's another quest where you have to find a lost guy, and the people with whom you need to speak are scattered around the city and don't show up on maps. SOME OF THEM ARE INDOORS! It's always fun to scour every room of every building in the city to find that one dipshit who can move the quest forward.

Aside from that, my only other gripes are how small the world is overall and how much back-tracking there is. There's no fast travel (unlike just about every WRPG today), and the closest you can get are crystals that cost $200,000 each and have to be placed at the locations manually. Then, you need a $30,000 ferrystone to go there and another one to get back. Even worse, these crystals are only available for sale near the very end of the game!

I may sound harsh, but none of this is enough to make the game unenjoyable. I loved exploring, and combat was enthralling, especially the larger creatures like metal gollums an the Beholder. The vocation system is great, and there's a ton of customization. This has major potential to be a great franchise, but the suckiness of Japanese game developers is very apparent here. Bethesda has nothing to fear from them at all.

[Pineapple]

22. Asura's Wrath (360) 1000/1000

http://www.the-nextlevel.com/tnl/ent...-Asura-s-Wrath

23. Espgaluda 2 (iOS)
It says 24 of 28 achievements, but I only see 2 that I'm missing, and that's Continue 50 times (I'm ok not getting that one) and find the hidden whatever in stage 3. Screw you hidden whatever, I didn't need you!

162,302,271 Ageha no continues
143,059,325 Tateha no continues
125,818,012 Asagi no continues
I really like this one a lot, although I'm still not 100% sure how to best use the meters and bullet cancelling and whatnot, but I play this on an iPod so it's hard enough with the tiny screen trying to move and press the right "button" when I want to.

24. Limbo (xbla) 190/200

Had a hankering to play through this one again and I wanted to try doing it in 1 sitting with 5 deaths or less, but then I got into it and realized it had been so long since I played that it would take me probably 3 or 4 more times through to do that so I said screw that last achievement. Love the game though, playing it in the dark with stereo headphones is the way I wish I had seen it the first time.


25. DoDonPachi Blissful Death (iOS)

My only decent score in this one is 66,689,390 with Type B EXY. I've tried to unlock that second loop or whatever by getting all the bees, but it's not going to happen. I don't know where they are or the secret paths n whatnot. Still a very good shooter, this one especially I would love to find on console.

[GohanX]

No, you do NOT want to do the second loop, or fight the true final boss. Mostly the true final boss. I hate that motherfucker on the 360 version.