What Has Everyone Been Playing This Week? 4

[QualityChimp]

At first glance, this looks like a Gangsta Rap album about the high-rollin' and glamorous lifestyle of domino playahs.

[vanpeebles]

They want to get the woodworm sorted in the study anarl.

[QualityChimp]

They want to get the woodworm sorted in the study anarl.

[Dogg Thang]

I'm still being forced to play Undertale. It's okay but I'm rubbish at the combat and it frustrates me. The writing is funny but the game is kind of janky.

But I'm also getting to play Final Fantasy XII and I'm absolutely loving it. I haven't been sucked into a Final Fantasy game for years, over a decade at least, but this game has really sucked me in. The world is gorgeous and I love the play system - I'm getting really into building my characters which is something I rarely bother with in RPGs. I love the characters too, although they look a bit too similar. It's a really strong FF game and, if it continues like this, will come out as one of my top favourites of the series.

[QualityChimp]

More Arkham Knight. I got past a certain plot point and it seemed to have unlocked some more content like Riddler trophies and side-quests like Azriel and Man Bat.

Did the last part of the Azriel quest where Batman keeps challenging him and it was solid. Took me loads of attempts. I had to suss out the yellow counter moves, where they do several strikes and you have to hold counter and away throughout the animation. Once I sussed that, it got easier, but sheesh, I re-did it looooads.

Talking about Manbat makes me think of two things:
Scene: The comic book store.
Sheldon: I have a question about Batman. Batman is a man who dresses up like a bat. Man-bat is a part man, part bat hybrid. Now, if Man-Bat dressed up as a man to fight crime, would he be Man-Batman?
Leonard: No, he’d be Bat-Man-Bat.
Raj: But wouldn’t Man-Batman just be a Batman that was bitten by a radioactive man?
Howard: But Batman is a man. You’re talking about a man who would have the powers of a man. That’s just Man-Man.
Sheldon: Well, isn’t Man-Man just Man?
Leonard: But what if Man-Man dressed as a bat?
Raj: Well, that’s just Batman.
Leonard: No, if a man dresses as a bat, that’s Batman, but if Man-Man dresses as a bat, that’s Batman-Man.
Howard: So does that answer your question?
Sheldon: Oh, I haven’t asked it yet.

---and---

[briareos_kerensky]

Alternating between Susume! Mamotte Knight and Legend Of Dark Witch on the Switch, and having completed Ys IX Monstrum Nox on PS4, I moved to Code Vein on PC.

[Dogg Thang]

Finished Undertale and it brought with it a pretty huge milestone in life - the very first time I handed the controller to my kid and asked them to finish the boss for me. In my defence, I hate the combat system in this game, even when you’re choosing not to fight. It just frustrates me, especially as it feels like it’s in a game that probably doesn’t need combat. The charm of the game is in the writing and the journey and the little moments. And those aspects are really strong. So I can see why it is well loved but I really didn’t get on with the combat.

Happy it’s done now so I can devote my time to FFXII.

[Neon Ignition]

Gonna try and put some time into Call of Duty: Modern Warfare this weekend

[Cepp]

I started Gears of War 5, was quite eager to after the excellent 4th game. Unfortunately, there seems to be an issue with it disconnecting my entire internet every now and then, which freezes my PC for a good 20+ seconds and I have no idea why. Sometimes it's in the menu screen, sometimes during a level, it's bloody frustrating since it runs silky smooth at all other times.

I'm only playing this in single player, why does the campaign have to connect to servers anyway? I hate this always online garbage.

-edit-
**** it, I'm done. Life's too short.

[Cepp]

So continuing with my exploration of the Game Pass library I've started Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice. I'm not too far into it yet but holy hell, the atmosphere here is off the charts! Great use of audio with headphones as well. I'm looking forward to continuing it tomorrow.

[randombs]

MGSV, Mario Odyssey and Shenmue 2.

Just started the final part of Shenmue 2. Used an FAQ because there’s bugger-all decent gameplay for a while before that. Mostly QTEing across planks and the like.

[Atticus]

Link's Awakening on Switch. It's a sweet game but I'm not head over heels loving it. Just feels like I'm getting through it for the sake of it.

Modern Warfare. Got this for my birthday and I've played a little multiplayer and campaign. All in all a decent package ... but I think I preferred the mp levels and overall vibe in BO4.

[QualityChimp]

Still on Arkham Knight.

I could easily plough on with the story, but I'm enjoying the variety of the challenges, mixing up a selection of them each session, so it's not just punching people. I'm really pleased how I've gone from frustration to enjoyment with this.

I want to play Yakuza eventually, but I'm now going to be wishing I could grapple to the rooftops and glide across the city.

Most the bits are done, but I'm leaving the turrets and firemen for the XP. I'll have to finish them eventually as I've got most of the upgrades I want for Bats now.

I've done about half of the Riddler challenges and I hope it's not like that last elusive Crackdown orb or final 1% completion of GTAIV.
I do like how you can shake down the Riddler's henchmen so you get a trophy location added to your map.
However, most the bad guys are refusing to tell me now and they're saying "I ain't telling you nothing!" and Batman is failing to say "A double-negative, so you are going to tell me something..."

[Neon Ignition]

Going to try RDRII a few more times but if there's no improvement I'm going to uninstall it for the foreseeable future. Their launcher is a big part of the issue so I'm assuming there's a race on to fix it before pirates give players a preferable alternative.

I'll do some Taiko on the Vita as well as CoD: MW single player which has been fun so far

[Paddy]

Just about finished Legend of Heroes Trails of Cold Steel II (the end area and its conclusion were good but went on for quite some time (epic music though)). Unbeknownst to me after the ending song plays there was an option to save and continue. It appears there's an epilogue which provides a nice nod to older Trails games and the ability to visit the neighbouring country of the one you move around in ToCS II (I think it covers the country from the previously released Kiseki/Trails PSP titles but I'll have to read up on that to confirm).

It was a little more streamlined than ToCS I and suffers a little bit from the same overly-long sections of dialogue/plot development but developer Falcom has made a range of characters that I liked in Class VII (minus one but I left them out of the party so that wasn't a problem).

Now its onto finding a copy of ToCS III for less than £40 but I think I'll be waiting a while.

Edit: I've finished it now and although it was enjoyable the epilogue felt like it went on for ages. I guess Falcom really wanted to give Class VII a decent send-off (the end boss is cheap as **** again and you have to pretty much dominate it which is what I pretty much did this time around as well).

I played the ToCS III demo tonight. The gameplay's still decent and the Brave Orders (team buffs) are a nice addition. Half of the demo seems to be dialogue and cut scenes where as I'd prefer it to lean more into the gameplay/free roaming. Not a bad start though and I could see the new characters (Juna, Kurt, Altina from ToCS II, Ash and Musse) winning me over like Class VII originally did.