General gaming discussion

Potential-Monke · 14-08-2025 03:54PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123722478#Comment_123722478

A few more hours played and yeah, there are some points where you can free roam, but theres no reason to right now. There's no side missions (yet, if any), and they dont extend the gameplay by making you travel back at the end of ~~missions~~ chapters. Like, I finished a chapter last night by walking a lad back to a car. He gets in, says see you later. The objective changed to "Go Home" but it immediately faded to black and loaded me into the next chapter. Brilliant really. Same with a race. Banged up car gets delivered, they talk about doing it up for the race, you tow it to a garage, get out, talk, screen fades and loads into the race. Other games would make you drive around to collect parts, etc. No wasted time as such in this. Its good.

Zero-Cool · 14-08-2025 05:48PM

Mafia 1 and 2 were the same, songs like a nice change of pace to me. The only side thing/collectible in a Mafia game should be playboy magazines.

Corvo · 15-08-2025 12:10PM

How long is Mafia meant to be? I love a story driven game but is there any replay value in it?

Sephiroth_dude · 15-08-2025 12:16PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123724900#Comment_123724900

Its great game, 10-15 hours, maybe a little more if you go after collectibles etc, I'm nearing the end now and really enjoyed the game, got my moneys worth.

Corvo · 15-08-2025 03:07PM

Well goddamn you all, I'm now €50 less well off.

Jordan 199 · 15-08-2025 04:13PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123725506#Comment_123725506

Money well spent son.

Potential-Monke · 15-08-2025 09:40PM

Credits just rolled on Mafia, ~12 hours. Solid enjoyable experience, if not fairly predictable. But it was executed pretty well. Biggest impression as I said previously, and it remained throughout, is the work done on facial animation, with the eye use being the highlight. Extremely well done, if not always perfect, but really added to the immersion. Its most definitely a movie with some gameplay between, I spent just as much time watching what was happening as playing.

The gunplay is grand, nothing spectacular but fitting for the period. You can try and collect all weapons, but I didn't see a need, unlocked 2 of the best through just playing the game and stuck with them. But only about 25% of the game is shooting. About another 25% at sneaking, and the rest is cutscenes or moving conversations I'd say! But interesting enough that I sometimes walked instead of ran to the next bit, to keep immersion and to hear the npc comments.

No interest in cleaning up and collecting the collectibles (newspaper articles). In fact, there isn't an end game but you can reload chapters. Plat would take 2 playthroughs so meh. Its a one and done game, but one that felt like it was made to include all the usual open world time wasting, but it was all cut at the last minute. Appreciated it. Added bonus is it will have only cost me €19 when I trade it back in for €31. So well worth a punt if you can play the disc edition. Looked stunning at times, even on performance mode (quality is 30fps even on Pro) and it wasn't always smooth 60fps, dipping a bit when loading into towns, but completely ignorable. I assume it will be patched better in future updates, and if they could improve the loading time down a bit from the ~8 seconds it can take it'd be better. We need more straight forward games like this. Hangar13 did a great job. Fuhk 2K though.

Jordan 199 · 15-08-2025 10:16PM

It sold 800,000 units in the first five days of sale.

TitianGerm · 15-08-2025 10:19PM

It strikes me as a game that could be on Game pass or Plus very quickly. I'm having to much fun with donkey kong at the moment but will probably pick this up in a few months time.

CatInABox · 16-08-2025 01:30AM

Imagine being the PR guy at Roblox right now, knowing that Chris Hansen of "To Catch a Predator" fame is now investigating children being exploited on your platform.

https://twitter.com/chrishansen/status/1956463610563051924

Delighted to be honest, Roblox is shady as ****.

Penn · 16-08-2025 03:24PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123715839#Comment_123715839

Finished Ninja Gaiden Ragebound. It's certainly a great game. The design is damn near impeccable, it doesn't overstay its welcome and some of the boss fights are terrific.

Is it perfect? No. I'd probably give it 8/10. There are elements of the combat that, when you're in a good flow, work really well. But the aura system ended up becoming more of a series of constant roadblocks. I lost track of how many times I ended up essentially just bouncing on a large enemy's head 10+ times to kill them or even just running past them because I either killed the enemy that gives you the rage attack in the wrong way or it used the attack on someone else etc. Either that or I was trying to get the enemy and ended up being hit by anything and everything else on the screen.

It ended up causing a lot of sections to just be frustrating to deal with, and as fun as the game is to play, it's not fun enough that it offset that frustration enough.

Overall, it is a great game, I just can't overly sing its praises either.

johnny_ultimate · 16-08-2025 03:42PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123728237#Comment_123728237

Ive only played the demo so my perspective is incomplete, but yeah those ‘rage’ / aura attacks were what kind of killed my interest in the game during that demo. I get what they’re going for (and it may be much better in the full game!) but it for me it got in the way of the flow of some of the encounters rather than make them more exciting. It was a real bummer to miss one as it blinked by so fast, and then having to tediously stop to take down a larger enemy.

I know it would potentially be even more frustrating to make that system more essential, but I think 9 Sols has set my bar particularly high for a while in terms of achieving a thrilling mix between challenge, flow and player expression in a 2D combat space. But I will give Ragebound a fair shake soon.

Penn · 16-08-2025 06:59PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123728283#Comment_123728283

Yeah, when you're in a good flow and you are hitting those auras and one-shotting the larger enemies, the game can feel awesome. And when you see the enemy with the aura you know there's a larger (or shielded) enemy so that really helps too. But later in the game with the amount of enemies, projectiles, some enemies with auras literally just flying off-screen meaning you miss the aura... it can become an annoyance because the game is so reliant on that. With some of the larger enemies and particularly if they're on a ledge, you have little choice other than just bouncing on their head about 10 times to kill them.

I also found in the game that most of the talismans and different weapons you can get, there was very little utility in them. I barely changed them throughout the game.

It is a great game, it just didn't quite hit that upper level for me.

Retr0gamer · 17-08-2025 10:20AM

I quite liked the aura system. If you missed one of the aura enemies the penalty was some frustration as the flow is broken and it does feel like your fault. I thought of them as more high speed puzzles. There was a few times I missed a series of them and just reset to the last checkpoint as I knew I was screwed but the check points system is so generous that once you know the scenario you can flow past them.

It's not a perfect, I can see how it could frustrate people not as tuned into action games as myself and there's probably a more elegant solution to it rather than killing a big enemy in one hit or getting frustrated hitting them 7 or 8 times especially if they have a shield. In the games defense it's better to ignore a lot of these enemies if you mess up the aura puzzle but gamer compulsion is to not let them away with being an annoying fucker.

I can see the game being a lot of fun if you are playing hard mode or speed running when you know what to expect from the aura systems.

johnny_ultimate · 18-08-2025 09:39AM

Finished Öoo over the weekend and want to reiterate my strongest recommendation of it for anyone interested in puzzle games. Only 2-3 hours long, but that running time is packed with moments where you have ‘eureka’ breakthroughs to seemingly impossible puzzles. I wouldn’t quite say the puzzles frequently break the fourth wall, but they require thinking about the available tools in ways beyond the limits of what you might expect from other games of its ilk. Anyway, a wonderful little puzzle-platformer odyssey.

Zero-Cool · 18-08-2025 11:30AM

This is a brilliant vid where a Squid Game like role play server is setup to pit the 10 biggest GTA V creators against each other and 100 other players in various challenges where the winner gets 10k dollars. I already watch a few like TGG and Broughy, heard of some others but it's a ton of fun. Rockstar should be advertising things like this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lyZdI2flVZU