The First Play Thread of First Plays

[Asura]

My Friend Peppa Pig
Well, the presentation is absolutely on point. It literally looks like an episode. There's barely any semblence of gameplay to it though and, I hate myself for knowing this, but most of the cast voicing isn't from the show which lets it down a little.

Isn't it voiced by different people in different territories? Maybe it's the American cast?

[Neon Ignition]

I never thought I'd spend time researching Peppa Pig cast list but just had a check and only 2-3 of the games cast are from the show, mostly the Grandparent characters. Everyone else is someone impersonating the original, hats off to the one doing the Mum as she's spot on compared to some of the very noticeable ones. Peppa herself is interchangeable as it shifts in the show regularly anyway... vile little creature that Peppa is.

[QualityChimp]

Maybe this game deserves its own First Play at some point but I got Stray last night and started playing it. You play a cat in a cyberpunk world. You can pretty much only do cat things, such as walk around and run and jump and drink water and scratch your claws on furniture, Although you do meet a friend at a certain point and that opens up some other options. But even just walking around and doing the cat stuff is so beautiful. It feels wonderful. And the world is lovely - not anything we haven't seen before but done really well.

I have no real idea how much there is to the game. There doesn't seem to be all that much to it so far but it's really nice.

Enjoying the videos of real cats watching people play Stray.

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[Lebowski]

Isn't it voiced by different people in different territories? Maybe it's the American cast?

Mrs' rabbit is the most iconic character and she sounds all sorts of wrong in this, they could of stretched the budget to to get the full cast onboard as its like they made a pepper pig walking simulator where you are walking though the cartoon with minimal interactions, it doesn't feel like it would of taken them long to put together at all if truth be told.

[Dogg Thang]

Well I finished Stray. An absolutely gorgeous experience. I love it.

[teddymeow]

Well I finished Stray. An absolutely gorgeous experience. I love it.

Stray is certainly going to be up there at the end of the year for my GotY consideration.

[Tobal]

i'm in the minatory on this but is a very standard indie with little variety and way to much boring fetch questing to pad out a short game. Fantastic graphics and atmosphere, internet cat weirdos, and being 'free' on PS makes gives it alot of leeway, will be forgotten in month.

[Lebowski]

i'm in the minatory on this but is a very standard indie with little variety and way to much boring fetch questing to pad out a short game. Fantastic graphics and atmosphere, internet cat weirdos, and being 'free' on PS makes gives it alot of leeway, will be forgotten in month.

Ive found the "Dog" and you would have got away with it if it wasn't for those meddling kids.

I've only played a few hours but one thing that hit me is it's pretty innovative in how it handles its terrain traversal, its a really nice system and fits in the with the cat ascetic really well as it makes moving across the levels pretty effortless. If this had traditional platform controls i could see it being a frustrating mess. You could call them boring fetch quests but i prefer to see them as treasure hunts and as reasons to explore the interesting locations. The chase sections are well signposted and generously check-pointed too if you do get overrun by the robo-mice. its fun being a cat though and its a unique fresh way to view a game world, 8 cat toys out of 10

[dataDave]

Is anyone here playing Xenoblade Chronicles 3? I got my copy, but I’m waiting until I’m home before starting it.

[kryss]

Yup, I'll give a write up in a bit.
TL;DR: it's another Xenoblade game.

[Neon Ignition]

Broadly landed on Stray the same as DT. It's a really nicely represented world and a very simple easy experience to go through.

It isn't remotely worth the asking price it costs at retail, it being part of the PS+ pass carries much of that burden. The open world hubs are well designed, well, more so the first one, but they outstay their welcome. It's very much a walking sim for the most part and as such I can't really echo the comments on its traversal as whilst the main first hub is well thought out the second has less options to it and everything else is based on linear option pressings of X. There's barely gameplay to much of the experience and no skill involved. Likewise anything about it being one of the best games of the year... only possibly because this is a really dire year. It's solid fun, worth more if you like cats (even though the game isn't even about the cat) but like Tobal says, I'll forget it quickly and more lasting walking sims exist.

[Tobal]

Played some Metal Hellsinger which just hit gamepass... nice idea held back by some dodgy gameplay decisions for using a joypad. Gameplay is hit your weapon to the sound of the beat, the longer the combo goes the more it adds new tracks to the current metal song along with more visual effect in the arenas. Main problem is no auto aim which is a problem for every weapon that isn't the sword, you're trying to aim while watching the beat metronome to at least start your combo off, followed by little lock-on for the execution moves (like Doom2016 used to get HP back) you have to aim at the little red square while using the R3 button... really stupid, to close up and it won't work due to the red square disappearing off your screen along being really easy to kill them as you're trying to keep a beat going with out having a clue how close they are to the 'dizzy' state.

summary, to much juggling not enough fun, likely better with a mouse.

[Tobal]

Wu Long demo is out on GP, i was expecting more Nioh, and i got more Nioh with a chinese flavour and sekiro like focus on parry/counters and very basic stealth kills. The gimmick this time is 'Morale', not only do you lose your exp as normal but loss 2 levels of morale and what killed you gains a level, you and the enemies have a morale metre which you basically treat as temporary boost till you die, bigger the difference the more damage they do and you the less to them, beating equal levels or higher boosts your level.

Seemed alright till i reached mini boss flying wyvern thing, lost a good few times figuring out the parry and counter which bottomed me out at level 10 vs a now level 20 boss, seems you can drop a maximum of 10 levels below the monster you died to, only killed it when i countered it's laser beam attack back at it while it was over the arena edge letting it drop to it's death.

Graphics are meh and frame-rate is all over the place in performance mode.

[Lebowski]

Played some Metal Hellsinger which just hit gamepass... nice idea held back by some dodgy gameplay decisions for using a joypad. Gameplay is hit your weapon to the sound of the beat, the longer the combo goes the more it adds new tracks to the current metal song along with more visual effect in the arenas. Main problem is no auto aim which is a problem for every weapon that isn't the sword, you're trying to aim while watching the beat metronome to at least start your combo off, followed by little lock-on for the execution moves (like Doom2016 used to get HP back) you have to aim at the little red square while using the R3 button... really stupid, to close up and it won't work due to the red square disappearing off your screen along being really easy to kill them as you're trying to keep a beat going with out having a clue how close they are to the 'dizzy' state.

summary, to much juggling not enough fun, likely better with a mouse.

i didn't mind it, turned it up super loud and just got in the zone with it, i did the first few areas and the first big boss, my main issue was that weapons like the shotgun dont fit the beat you have to skip a beat to shoot again, being accurate and keeping to the beat is the challenge here id say as its a lot less punishing then DOOM, a solid 7.

[kryss]

Kill La Kill IF

Weirdly 3D fighter, which seems to have some easy to mash combos. I should probably play the story mode to figure it out more.
Discounted on everything right now.