Lameazoid.com - What I’m Playing

It’s been a bit, so it’s been a bit busy I suppose. I’m going to mostly push off my current “regular games” a bit with Fortnite and Sky. just for some discussion about what else I’ve been playing.

Death Stranding

Funny enough, this isn’t the only game I’m playing at the moment with “dangerous rain”. Sky has a zone of rain that harms you when you’re standing in it. Though, they call it “Time Fall” in Death Stranding, and it’s a Hideo Kojima game, so it’s full of weird unexplained shit that may or may not eventually be explained.

The core gameplay is nothing like I expected. You’re in this weird dystopian future with rain that makes you grow old if it touches you, and dead bodies explode or something within a few days of dying and then turn into these weird invisible monster things that only show up when it rains and then there is this baby in a bottle for some reason. And so far all of the game play has been, “Deliver things on foot by walking through the wilderness.” Like no joke, there is a balance mechanic to weight distribution that has TWO dedicated buttons on the controller.

I really just, don’t know. But it looks pretty. Also I am told that eventually you can make grenades or something from your poops!

Bayonetta

Speaking of weird but highly acclaimed games. I also picked up Bayonetta. I’m… not sure I have the patience for this style of weird anymore. The gameplay is kind of button mashy and the plot is full of “ZaNy AnImE” style shit. Like the intro scenario has this dude just throwing guns at your character going “guns guns guns” and it’s just like, too much odd for the sake of oddness.

Like Death Stranding is weird, but I feel like eventually most of it will eventually be mostly explained by some sci-fi related world building. Bayonetta is just over the top for the sake of being over the top.

Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins

I’ve been playing a lot of random stuff on the Retroid lately but I’m going to stick with what I played significantly. I’ve beaten Mario Land 2 a several times, but decided to play through it again, which took like 2 hours, maybe. And I beat it again.

The biggest stand out is just how many unique enemies are in this series. Plus it’s weird how much the recent LEGO Mario sets seem to be designed entirely around one world in this universe. The LEGO Mario looks kind of like the Mario Zone robot and the Mario Zone itself even includes a LEGO like level.

Wario Land 4

After defeating Wario in Mario Land 2, I realized I had never really played any of the stand alone Wario Land games. So I loaded them up to play through. I’m not sure why I started at the end in Wario Land 4 but I did. I think mostly because it’s a slightly more polished GBA title, so it was more appealing.

I also completed it. It’s not a very lengthy game. The levels also feel like they are intended to be played repeatedly, but most of them are pretty linear despite the interweaving/multiple paths of them (Wario Land 3 is quite literally the opposite).

Also apparently Wario has his own princess now too.

F.I.S.T.: Forged in Shadow Torch

I could have sworn I had wrapped this one up in a post. I mentioned FIST Last time, and I have since completed it. I also finished it 100%, which wasn’t actually that hard to do. The last few bosses are really really rough though the second to last boss, the big sumo pig, is a lot more difficult than the actual end boss.

The most amusing thing about this game, a lot of the plot revolves around this super powered crystal, “The Spark”. It’s weird though because there are at least two of these things, and more importantly, you fight three enemies powered by this “ultimate force”. The first is a rock monster empowered by it to retrieve it. Then later you get betrayed and have to fight a dude in power armor powered by the Spark, which destroys it, then SURPRISE there is another one, which you retrieve but it’s stolen then you get to fight the end boss, powered by The Spark.

It doesn’t really feel all that impressive honestly. I kind of defeated “The Power of the Spark” repeatedly. Not that impressive.

What I’ve Been Playing Recently

I wonder if those titles should be more distinct or if it even matters. Anyway, I “completed” one game this week. Actually I sort of “beat” two games, but I forget how I have counted the Fortnite Battle Passes. Let’s call it one for now. The Fortnite BP technically goes to Level 200.

F.I.S.T: Forged In Shadow Torch

Man, that acronym. Someone really wanted it to stand for FIST. This was one of the free games from Epic over the Holidays that they push every year. It looked interesting from the animal characters and Steampunkish design then I noticed it’s a Metroidvania title, which is probably my favorite game genre. So I decided to jump on playing it. You play as a sort of, grizzled ex soldier rabbit, armed with a giant robotic FIST from his old war days mech. The game play is pretty smooth and it’s definitely a Metroidvania style title.

My main gripe so far is the slight unevenness of the enemies. Most of the bosses I have encountered are super predictable and almost too easy. Dodge Dodge Dodge Strike. It’s a pretty regular pattern for all of them so far. One large biped mech was particularly easy to confuse because it didn’t move and you could just jump from it’s left to it’s right, meaning it would miss miss miss, then turn around, so you move again, and repeat. But the regular enemies, are often tougher than the bosses, and feel like they have just as much health. There is also this really annoying bit where you can stun them out of an attack animation, but not ALL attacks, and often you can’t stop your slightly sluggish attacking, until it’s too late to dodge away. And the enemies often have huge attack arcs. If that makes any sense.

It’s not awful, but it’s annoying, especially with packs of enemies. The game feels like you should be able to “juggle” the enemies, but you really can’t. It’s particularly bad with the samurai looking dudes and worse with the axe throwing shield guys. The game is still fun, but it feels like it could use a slight bit of tweaking to it’s regular enemies and maybe a slight beefing up on the actual bosses.

Fortnite

I finished the main part of the Chapter 4 Season 1 Battle Pass. Which means reaching level 100. The game is honestly, starting to feel like a chore. I’ll keep at it for now, but at this moment, I have no desire to continue to Season 2 unless things seem really good. There have been a LOT of complaints about the new weekly quest system. They expire now, instead of just stacking until the end of the season, and they are almost always incredibly grindy. Like, “you must do ONLY THIS all week” to complete the top tier. The map also was neat at first but it’s gotten really stale. It also hasn’t really changed at all. It felt like in Chapter 3 the map was constantly changing every week or so. The weapons pool also has not really changed.

Sky: Children of the Light

Now that the Season of Aurora has ended and I’m not worried about maximizing my Candles each week, I decided to just go for it at take a swing at The Eye of Eden, the end zone of this game. man, you want a game that is bipolar on its own game play. I kind of want to do a separate write up of Sky, so I won’t go into a ton of detail, but let’s just sat this. The base game play loop is about as non confrontational as it gets. You mostly just, fly around lighting candles and collecting wax balls and occasionally doing little spirit stories. The final zone, is literally an endurance until you die.

Your health is represented by these Winged Light bits that you collect, which strengthen your overall ability to fly and explore. I was up to I think 76 before entering Eden, which is pretty close to max on regular basic Winged Lights. The first zone is a slow climb up some cliffs through winds and rock storms. The second zone is stronger wings and bigger rocks, but now there are Krill dragons patrolling around. The third zone is where the action is, it loses the dragons, but instead there is a constant barrage of lava rocks splattering all over the zone that will basically one shot you destroying some of your Winged Light. You can hide behind some rocks, but for the most part, you have to run around the zone depositing your Winged lights into these little statues to save them. You give up your health, to save these other entities.

You do this, until you die.

And then you get reborn at zero. Though for each spirit saved you get some special candles to use to buy some more permanent Winged Lights. It’s not 1:1 though. I earned I think 13 Ascended Candles. I restarted the game at around 8 Winged Lights I think.

Klonoa: Door to Phantomile

I still jump around a bit on the Retroid Pocket but for now I have settled on playing the first Klonoa game on Playstation 1. I am not sure how far I am, maybe halfway? The game reminds me of the style of Donkey Kong Country, but not nearly as fast paced. It’s a neat little game, though I’m not entirely sure of the ins and outs of some of it. Like occasionally there are clock items to pick up, but from what I can tell, the game has no timer. I’m not too concerned, I am not trying to master this one.