Waited a while for GAF to approve my account, about 6 months(6 MONTHS!?!?!??!
). All this time I have been biting my lip to be apart of this challenge and have kept record of my own bidding and now I will finally share with all what I have done. Take note, I wrote comments during or soon after each game so some of these comments may be outdated but I still read and edited each to the best I could to make it seem relevant upon the day of posting them. This 52 game challenge is awesome, glad to take part of it but I still have ways to go!
(Will put name of game, console played on and dates I completed since not all games are friendly with the time of game played tracker or the fact I use the bathroom or chat with friends/family during a game!)
10 games per post rather than just overwhelming everything all in one post.
1) Conker’s Bad Fur Day [REVISIT](XB1) 12/2-1/1
(That 1/1 cheese to give me a game to use for this year's challenge. No shame at all)
A game that I loved for years for its sheer multiplayer, I of course remember watching my friend playing this years ago as far as single player goes so nothing caught me by surprise with how the game turned out to be but this was a game I juggled around throughout weekends which would explain why it took me almost a month to beat. Very good game, had got some laughs and smiles out of me for its sheer nostalgia, the game had a very solid amount of variety for it to be very enjoyable. The only gripes I can honestly think of is the fall damage is ridiculous where you barely fall yet you lose a chocolate bar and the cameras can be frustrating. Also some parts in the game focus on the whole “1 hit KO” type of bullshit that I am finding more and more games do very frustrating. The Saving Private Ryan end game was a major culprit of this, fortunately the checkpoint was very forgiving in this regard.
Thanks to Rare Replay, I was able to give this game a go and I found myself very much enjoying the single player.
2) Shantae: Risky’s Revenge Director’s Cut(PS4)- 1/2 – 1/3
Very short game, caught me by surprise by how short it was but it was a game I maybe paid a couple of bucks for at best so I can’t complain too much. Gameplay was very standard Metroidvania, wish there was more level design choices that may have separated itself from each level. The concept of revisiting places with the obtaining of new levels was neat. Story was simple enough, nothing too memorable though the font and texture I thought looked very out of place for the game. Game lasted me under 5 hours and I spent about 1-1/2 hours on just trying to retrace my place to visit some new places before opting to put the game down rather than go for more of the secrets left in the game.
I never played a Shantae game though I have heard nothing but great things so I totally see the appeal based off this game alone for plenty. That being said, it is a forgettable game but by no means is it a bad game, just not something you are missing out on if you never play it. I got it for 2 bucks I think on a PSN sale which I feel like should be the price for this. Very good game for this challenge though!
3) Tomb Raider Definitive Edition(PS4)- 1/3 – 1/11
After 2-3 years of just not getting a good enough price on the game or finding the time to go through this, I finally got to try this game out early in the year, as a means to prepare myself for my inevitable purchase of Rise of the Tomb Raider. Got a good online deal for this game so I treated myself to this game. I actually really enjoyed the game, maybe because I didn’t end up taking the game too seriously and allowed myself to just enjoy some over the top fun. I don’t get some of the complaints at all about this game, especially the one “controversial” scene that I vaguely remembering being a bigger deal back in the day. What the heck do you expect, Croft to be invincible and not be in pain or on the verge of death? I do agree with the consensus feeling that the side characters are average at best. I wish there had been maybe more tombs to go towards but there was far more good than bad out of this game. I gave the multiplayer a whirl but I figure since it is “outdated” that I wasn’t going to enjoy it and I didn’t. Very basic multiplayer mode.
I do wish the enemy dialogue sequences were done better, few times where I waited for the full dialogue to finish that I got spotted and shot to death. Absolute nitpicking but the subtitles seem kind of poor from a design point of view and the graphics aren't THAT great on the Definitive Edition. I can see why it was not a big upgrade at all for people who played this game on the PS3/XBOX360.
The subtitles seem very not so well done, especially for a definitive edition. Its sequel didn't do much to solve this matter, the font seemed rather uninspired but this is nitpicky since you can you know actually read the text which some games later on fail to somehow do.
4) Sunset Overdrive 1/12-1/16
An absolutely unexpected blast of a time, this might be right behind Bloodborne as far as my most enjoyed game on this current gen as of January 2016 which says quite a lot. Case can be made for this and 2 other games on my list upcoming that I have beaten. The humor is either hit or miss but for me, I found it corny and silly enough to like it and the characters didn’t make me grind my teeth.
Where this game shines most is the gameplay, the constant need to bounce around back and forth with grinding, it is a game that you will get punished for staying still. I do wish this game incorporated the air dash much sooner because once you got that, the game and better yet the movement around the city just got plain ol’ fun. Can’t say I went and got every single collectable in the game as that got too overwhelming but I found the missions didn’t get all too repetitive with maybe the exception of the defend the base from mutants. Game really encourages button mashing to keep your style points which can really go both ways from how you look at it, it could be good for some since it is pretty damn fun to fool around on fun but it could also turn people away since it is pretty mindless to mash buttons to keep your style up to do more mayhem.
My favorite weapons have to be
1) Roman Candles(Level 5 this bad boy motherfuckers)
2) TNTeddy
3) Hair Spray Bombs
So good, I never gave the multiplayer a try but have seen footage of what it is like and I don't think I would necessarily jump in, especially since I don't know how many people are still playing this game online.
5) Ratchet & Clank: Into The Nexus 1/18-1/20
This game served solely on getting me warmed up for the Ratchet and Clank game I played in April and while short, the game was still solid enough to enjoy it for the few hours I did get to play it. I spent much of MLKJr day playing Ratchet and Clank: Into The Nexus to get a R&C game in the system before the big release of the R&C reboot in less than 3 months. I actually thought I might be able to finish it in one day but I think I am in the half way point of the game. I knew going in it was a very short game but I decided to put it on legend mode right off the bat and it has paid off. Not too much ammo in certain parts, very little health restoration crates and a few good shots can kill you. It has led to a few deaths but I was able to beat some of the bosses on my 1st if not 2nd try. Weapons have been hit or miss, I like the ability to power up these weapons in a sphere grid sort of style. Not going to get too crazy with the story, I have missed 1-2 of the PS3 R&C games and I am taking this game follows everything in order, making it sequential to play each in order. I take it with the reboot coming that Into the Nexus is sort of a final chapter of the original R&C series. It's an alright game altogether, not too much funny sequences for me thus far which is surprising given how light hearted the game tends to be. I got a glitch that forced me to restart a checkpoint about 15 minutes in which is always good
Outside of 1 missing gold bolt and 1 Ryno VII part, I did everything and on the toughest difficulty too. I thought the story was pretty weak but I admittedly was out of the loop with a fair amount of the series as a late PS3 owner so I won't hold it against the game. Some parts of the game I enjoyed like the Clank rift missions(I felt Clank was underutilized in this game sadly) and I thought there was a fair amount of weapons, encountered 2 glitches that made me restart to the previous checkpoint which was annoying. Game went longer than I expected, think I only spent 7 or so hours on the game, heard it was at best a 6 hour game and I didn't even max out the weapons or get the final gold bolt or Ryno VII. It was an alright game but it served it's purpose for the reboot in mid April.
6) Banjo Tooie 1/17-1/30
One of the very few games I can truly say that I should not have played again and a game better left off in my nostalgia view mirror. Unlike with Banjo Kazooie that I replayed back in December 2015, Tooie felt very paddy where it didn’t mesh so well with what its previous entry did. With Tooie, it is the definition of where too much of something just gets overwhelmingly frustrating. Banjo Tooie I think is a game that is better left off in the nostalgia archives personally speaking, had better thoughts of the game when playing as a kid compared to me playing it in 2016. That Gruntilda battle was just awful, who the hell decides to have a First Person Shooter feature in a platforming game for the final boss? Especially when the boss' hitbox is so small and attempting to aim is so frustrating. I don't know how I did it but it took me a good hour and 15 minutes to beat her. Got all the jiggies and cheatos besides the awful Canary Mary minigame that is another awful decision to be there. Tried that a few times, hurt my thumbs and said screw it and I am missing that lone jiggy from 100% the game.
I didn’t remember Tooie being this frustrating but I took 13 days to beat this game for a reason, at least 2-3 of those days I didn’t touch the game which hurts me to say. As a impressionable 9-10 year old, this game kicked ass. 16 or so years later, not so much
7) Gears of War: Ultimate Edition 1/24-2/2
1st play of Gears of War as a new XBOX1 owner back in November(Never owned an XBOX ever) so Gears of War Ultimate Edition and the offer of all the other games was very enticing, game came with the system!
The game was a tale of two halves for me, so I will let both my thoughts 1st half and 2nd half tell the tale:
I do not understand the Gears of War love. Playing the 1st and I do not get the praise. The AI system is awful(If I say regroup and to stick close, why the fuck would you run off 2 seconds later to get killed? So you have unresponsive AI too that go against your orders, that's great), the lack of ammunition has happened quite a few times, the damage done is inconsistent(I shoot upclose with a shotgun or magnum and it does not kill an enemy, they do the same to me and it's a 1 shot kill), the Khryll are inconsistent with their attacks(I shoot a tank, I expect that to be safe haven from their assault...NOPE they come out of nowhere and kill me). I think with a co op partner the game might be salvageable but it should not come to that, the game should be playable alone. Playing on the 2nd hardest difficulty, it should not be this wonky. The checkpoint system isn't the greatest either but i have seen worse so I won't get too crazy on that. I don't even know if I will finish this game, I am not impressed with this game at all. There are a few technical issues with this Ultimate Edition but again, I have seen worse. That isn't my major gripe, the other issues are. There's also so much micromanaging in combat....load up the ammo and time that right, command your dumbass AI, try and shoot enemies that are bullet sponges, navigate through the sometimes unresponsive cover system(I press A and Fenix lunges over cover and gets wiped out, cmon), switch weapons since you only can hold one heavy and one light weapon.
Am I missing something? Am I not doing it right? I really want to enjoy this game but it hasn't done anything for me.
2nd half:
Beat Glitches of War just now, the last few segments honestly tested my patience. I think if you play this game with a co-op partner, you will love it but this is a game that punishes you for playing it solo. The last few parts were in definite need of playing with a co-op, whether it's facing the Brumak, or the chain gun sequence or the final boss. You don't know how much frustration Dom caused me throughout the game, I don't think there's a single worse co op partner than him, he is easily THE worst co-op partner I have ever had to play with. He makes RE4 Ashley look like Tails from Sonic no lies. Dies in 5 seconds, doesn't do what is told to him, runs up to enemies and gets destroyed.....and even gets glitched up and is useless. He did carry my ass in 1 train sequence in fairness. I actually got off my ass, paused the game and gave a standing ovation for saving me from dying. Took about 10 hours to contribute.
I think it's fitting that the final boss of this game stood there after my 8th attempt vs the boss and just stood there and took my combo of bow/lancet to the face without doing anything significant. Supposedly this was a well known glitch to exploit, I honestly had no idea what was going on, I was legit laughing seeing this in action. I think the credit sequence even got glitched, it repeated the same 2 songs and I think ran through the credits twice in a row and now the music went to a complete haul, hopefully it registers what I did but I just don't know. That final boss fight had me frustrated until seeing the boss just stand there, repeat his one sequence of shot and not provide any kind of harm. I was due for some kind of a miracle.
Story was kind of all over the place and some of the sequences I didn't care for but I think the game was alright. I don't know if anyone can really have faith in The Coalition making a new Glitches of War, especially if this remaster is the end result. I really am curious if the Master Chief Collection was worse than this as far as glitches go, I wonder if XBOX/Phil Spencer are going to be careful moving forward in this regard.
Some good, some bad altogether. The AI really was awful though, and there were a few very annoying bugs all around. The exclusive boss fight added in this was frustrating in large part because of the AI. If you want to do yourself a favor when playing this game, find someone to play Dom.
I am a sucker though and will try and plow through all of the Gears games in prep for GOW4 though. Why? Because I am a glutton of pain & punishment.
It is one of those games that the promise is so good and when it is done right, it's really fun! But when it's not, its just mind numbing in the worst ways
8) Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune 2/3-2/6(REVISIT)
Outside of the aiming system where you have no idea if the gun is pointing at the enemy far away or not, Uncharted 1 is just so, so, so good. Yeah the random hoards of enemies can be a bit silly but the action sequences, the dialogue, the game even looks nice(I remember this being my 1st PS3 game that I played and being blown away, 4 years later I don't know about that but the game looks nifty). Really enjoying the revisit back into it.
Some parts towards the end got frustrating until I did what wasn't intended and went back a screen for better cover against the hoards of enemies. I forgot how short of a game UC1 was, kinda surprised I totaled it the way I did. I wanted to go and revisit this series in the efforts to prepare myself for May’s Uncharted 4 so nothing surprised me with the story but I thought that was very well done. The boat scenes weren’t even that bad, I played on the 2nd hardest difficulty as I always do with the UC games.
9) Gravity Rush Remastered: 2/6-2/13
After the first initial hour or two, I was getting worried about how much of a fetchquest this game was turning out to be but this game really picked itself up today for me. Beat 4 bosses all today after none yesterday What a fun, and cool game this has been thus far. Great decision by Sony to not only price this at 30 bucks(And give a physical copy albeit its Amazon exclusive) but to have Bluepoint do the remaster as they are fantastic with remasters.
I am wondering how much further I have with the game but the lone real lowpoint for me with this game is the challenges being somewhat brutal with their gold medal requirements, it takes an insane time or score to get to those so going for the platinum trophy seems pretty tough. The side challenges haven't been all that great, been more like "How many enemies can you kill in a certain time" or "Can you beat the clock and hit each checkpoint?". Seems kind of repetitive to me but thankfully these aren't mandatory. I'll try and finish all of these missions but if I only get a bronze, that's fine with me.
I really enjoyed the game, Gravity Rush 2 is now 100% going to be a Day 1 purchase for me. Felt the game had enough content to make it respectable enough length wise, game got a bit easy once you powered up but there was one DLC mission that was awful but besides that the missions DLC and main story I enjoyed. It was weird because the first 2-3 hours, I was wondering "Where are the bosses" and then one after another after another after another they kept coming Pacing felt a bit off in that regard where the bosses started to come in surpluses. I did everything DLC and the main story and got Gold medals in some of the challenges, some of the other challenges seemed a bit harsh as far as what score or time they wanted, not sure if I want to try and do that just for a platnium trophy. I hope they fix that up a bit in the sequel, I get getting gold is suppose to be challenging but I think the scoring is a little too much. Story was pretty cool, a bit out there but I liked it. It gave off a real Studio Ghibli vibe too it, felt like a nice foreign cartoon from presentation to story telling. I think for the 30 dollars it cost, the game gave me much more than what was expected and I can see why people really love the Kat character. Some of the characters got annoying and I didn't care for but Kat and Dusty weren't either ones.
10) Uncharted 2: 2/13-2/15(REVISIT)
I forget how long this game is but I also remember that the end tallies off with an unsatisfying death of a piece of shit(Fact that this person goes out their way and nearly kills off a inaugural part of the team still irks me but I guess that's the point of the character, you hate the person so much that you hate that they got to go out that way), and a lousy final boss battle(Too much run and gun but it's been 4 years to be fair, I just remember how bad of a boss battle it was). I also remember the OP mythical dudes.....they are bullet sponges even with those badass far range weapons.
The train level was so, so good. The tank was insane though it sucks when the RPG falls off the map leaving you basically fucked over, the action scenes this game has is second to none and of course the dialogue and voice acting has been excellent. The final boss wasn't as bad was I thought, took a few tries but it's just starting over from the 1st part which I remember was annoying. Overall a fantastic game, I really enjoyed it.
What a blast of a game. I really hope Naughty Dog examines what they did right with UC2 and takes it to the next level in UC4.
(Will edit and skim through entries 11-20 and put that sometime within the coming days while I work on this challenge some more by putting hours of gameplay!)