General gaming discussion

johnny_ultimate

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123089628#Comment_123089628

You'll definitely get better using it very quickly - some of the early bosses are very much skill check bosses around key mechanics like the talisman.

There are three options for Talisman as you level up, and each one has its fans (I'm all in on Full Control). One of them has automatic detonation which means it won't be interrupted.

Wossack

dang, was between wave tail and nine sols during the winter sale there and from this thread, I reckon I chose wrong

Retr0gamer

Stay safe everyone. If you are without power I hope you remembered to get batteries for the Gameboy.

TheValeyard

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123094594#Comment_123094594

Sega Gamegear.....so that's about 20minutes of playtime.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123094594#Comment_123094594

I forgot to charge the Steamdeck last night. Only had 44% when I tried today. Got a few games of Balatro and then it died.

Stupid Penn! This was one of the reasons you bought it!

CastorTroy

Finally went back to Professor Layton vs Phoenix Wright on the 3DS. Finished a chapter just as the power came back on. I'll try not to leave it as long next time.

RedXIV

Charged up my Gameboy SP to finally start a playthrough of FF:Tactics that I'll finish but then the power never went……I will get to it some day!

CastorTroy

As soon as the power came back on Vodafone text me to say they're working to resolve an issue with broadband in my area. But my Internet was working okay, then it stopped. Now I can't launch Indiana Jones because can't play in offline mode due to the fact you apparently need to go online to set up offline mode.

PC Gamepass.

Retr0gamer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123096858#Comment_123096858

Just play the original tactics, aka secret best final fantasy.

johnny_ultimate

Nine Sols done. That final boss… a hell of a fight. Took me several hours over three nights to get there, but worth every minute of getting it down. An epic brawl and one of the great bosses, honestly. It's relentless and it's punishing if you err. But you keep at it and learn to master it. Could get through the first two stages with barely a scratch by the end. There is some classic 'anime attack bullshit' in the final phase, but even that you can learn to deal with. It's true badass mode when you perfect parry dozens of attacks in a row and throw on a Talisman to take away a quarter of the health bar in one go (didn't use the slash button once).

I'm a month or so late declaring it but definitely my game of 2024. Just 2D combat perfection IMO, with amazing art, music and even a really quite lovely story that comes to fruition nicely in the final hours (and the way it weaves taoist philosophy into the gameplay flow is super impressive). There's also a pretty great Metroidvania and platformer in there, although I think some of that only becomes apparent when you're backtracking for items at the end. But it's the fighting you're here for, and rarely outside of classic character action games has a game had such a perfect, effortlessly cool fighting rhythm.

Retr0gamer

Yeah sure but is it better than Ninja Garden?

johnny_ultimate

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123097087#Comment_123097087

Funny enough I’ll be moving on to Grunn shortly, which I’ve heard a bit of buzz about being an Outer Wilds like set exclusively in a garden 😂

Grumpypants

I'm still without power, internet, water, heating, TV, radio....it got so bad I went into the attic to get a 25+ year old Walkman that I remembered had a FM radio. Have that connected to a Bluetooth speaker and a lantern.

The only thing gaming wise that's working is the switch and steam deck.

SuperBowserWorld

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123097811#Comment_123097811

Nintendo Power

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123097085#Comment_123097085

Got a few more hours in today. Have beaten the second Sol boss (Goumang).

Getting better, but that whole agricultural area was a nightmare. I don't mind tough enemies, missing parries etc, that's all my fault. Those f*cking exploding bugs though, they got me extremely tilted.

It's just finding that balance between the Sekiro-style combat, and the Metroidvania-style combat that I'm struggling with a bit (in terms of trying to parry/counter properly while also dealing with environmental-type issues/enemies). I might just need to farm for a while too because I have lost a lot of Jin along the way and could do with some upgrades.

Luna84

I had power. My sister and local town had none. Phone line Internet worked for about an hour and went yesterday and still hasn't come back yet. Phone had no coverage at all yesterday or today until about an hour ago so I'm back online. It's mad how my life revolves around the internet. You do not realise until it goes.

johnny_ultimate

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123098107#Comment_123098107

Hopefully you shouldn’t have to farm too much - didn’t do it all except for a few mins at the very end to just grab the money for the last couple of items I needed.

There’s definitely a few things designed to throw your counter timing off, but there’s thankfully nothing too punishing outside of the bosses. One or two more bosses til you get to the run of really epic battles.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123099121#Comment_123099121

Yeah I'm stuck on a mini-boss at the minute and I need about 18 fingers to do it. You have to deflect projectiles, while dodging through little mouse-bomb things, while also dodging through his slam attacks, while charging your attack to break his shield, whilst jumping because he's floating so you have to jump to even hit him, and if you do that successfully, you might get 10% of his health down before his shield comes back.

Edit: Just beat him

I think that's what's been throwing me off the whole time. All I heard about this game (not just from here) was it's Sekiro combat but in 2D. It really just isn't. When you get the parries and stuff down it can emulate that feeling and satisfaction from Sekiro, but there can be so much going on in most fights (even boss fights) that it's much more of a metroidvania with some Sekiro-style combat than a 2D Sekiro-type combat game in a metroidvania style.

johnny_ultimate

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123099391#Comment_123099391

Interesting, I found it much, much more combat focused than the average Metroidvania. Maybe it’s because later on you spend large amounts of time in boss duels, but I definitely think it’s more focused on combat than exploration. It does take a while for the full arsenal to unlock though, and there’s a particular boss that really starts ramping up challenge.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123099748#Comment_123099748

I think it's just that in Sekiro, while bosses might throw some fire or poison about the place or something, it's generally just learning their patterns and facing them with a back and forth parry-deflect-hit. Whereas here, it feels like a lot of the time there's so much going on outside of the actual enemy in terms of environmental or other hazards; lasers or explosives or small adds (explosive mouse or bugs or whatever). Which isn't to say the bosses aren't about learning their patterns, but I think you have to put so much work into avoiding those external factors that even the boss fights can often feel like more of a traversal puzzle within the boss fight.

johnny_ultimate

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123099874#Comment_123099874

Ah thankfully a lot of the later bosses are much more about learning their unique patterns rather than just trying to juggle the environmental information. I think the second Sol in particular is more of a ‘gimmick’ fight compared to the others.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123099899#Comment_123099899

That one I didn't find too bad. Took a few tries but easy enough to figure out. Beat the third Sol boss last night, the old dude with the robot. Again, I died a few times to (or trying to avoid) the lasers rather than the enemy itself. But wasn't overly difficult either.

I twigged a better comparison too, the boss fights (or at least mini-bosses) can often feel a little more Cuphead than Sekiro, where you need to parry some attacks to gain meter for a larger attack, but most of the time you're fighting the screen rather than the enemy.

None of what I'm saying is necessarily a criticism; it's more that I went in with "2D Sekiro" in my head whereas the combat can be more multifaceted than that, and it's adjusting to that in my own head that I'm having trouble with. But I'm getting there. Didn't even need to farm last night as by the time I went through a few more sections I had enough Jin and components to get a few key upgrades anyway.

johnny_ultimate

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123100508#Comment_123100508

Well the devs themselves do say ‘Sekiro-inspired’ in the actual Steam description of the game, so it’s clearly a comparison they want players to make :) I’d definitely agree it’s more multi-faceted than just Sekiro in 2D, but I think the comparison more than suits the game too - especially as the game progresses. But it’s a Metroidvania too for sure.

Goumang is more a gimmick boss than the others (barring arguably one later game one with a similar idea) mainly because you’re dealing with more info, but yeah it’s one of the easier ones too. Sol five and six are the first of the really epic fights IMO.

Retr0gamer

Finally finished the true boss of the current story content of Wizardry Variants Daphne. My issue was resources, I just kept running out of special attacks and especially healing before I got the last of FOUR phases. Had to do a bit of grinding to afford a full set of the best healing items and some decent earth element weapons for my physical attackers as that was the bosses weakness. My plan was if I had earth element weapons I would do more damage and therefore not need as much resources and also be able to do decent damage when resources ran out.

Anyway didn't exactly go to plan and it turned into an absolute slugfest. The problem was the first phase, who wasn't weak to earth elements. They pretty much took half my physical attackers SP which is the only way to deal big damage. The second and third phases went well and my earth weapons along with some high damage attacks made quick work. However by the time I hit the fourth stage I was all out of SP, my healer who was also a stat buffer had about two area heals left and and I was already dipping into my healing item reserves. Still I kept it together until I hit the end of my healing items and both hit by a big full party attack that took everyone's health to dangerous levels. I had to switch to pure DPS as I wasn't surviving another attack. Went all out, my mage slowed the boss down to get a few more hits in but he didn't go down and his next attack was the one I didn't want to see, the same full party attack.

Thankfully he still had an accuracy debuff on and missed quite a few of my party and anyone that was hit survived by the skin of their teeth. My healer did go down but they weren't contributing anything as they had run out of resources. I wasn't going to survive whatever came next so had to go all out again. Each attack landed but didn't put him down. Came down to my main character, I could see the boss was next in the turn order window. 160 damage from the earth daggers, not much but just enough to put him down.

Haven't had a close RPG fight like that in a long time. Anyway below is my party that limped back to base.

SuperBowserWorld

Bad news: PS5 pro gone back to 799 from 769 in Smyths. Could have saved 30 quid.

Good News: I saved 769 quid.

Irish Gunner

Not sure if correct forum move if need be

Have a nvidia Shield 2019 contoller and a mad catz ps3 controller and looking to use them with windows 11 pc. I can get the shield controller to attached but could not map it using RPCS3

Any recommendations for decent controllers for games to play on PC nothing mad expensive

Cheers

Luna84

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123101615#Comment_123101615

Xbox controllers work best.

Retr0gamer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123101615#Comment_123101615

I'd completely avoid using a PS3 controller. The software to get them to work is third party and is also Chinese spyware. I'd highly advise not to use them. Any Xbox or PS4 or onwards controller would work best.

Irish Gunner

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123101701#Comment_123101701

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123101714#Comment_123101714

Cheers

Any recommendations as checking Amazon CEX and Smyths to see and not sure what to choose as noobie for this as you probably can tell

Retr0gamer

Go with the controller you are used to. I'd go with an Xbox controller as they are really well made and solid. The PS5 controllers have bad dodgy joysticks. A PS4 controller isn't a bad shout either. I'd go with official controllers as they are usually well made. For Xbox I'd also recommend a rechargeable battery pack.

A switch pro controller is also worth considering. They have a battery that last forever and very high quality parts. They work really well with steam but I find they take a bit of tinkering for games and emulators not launched through steam.