What You've Been Playing This Week

[fishbowlhead]

Hades on Switch. Cant put it down, its got that one more go factory down to an absolute fine art. Amazing game.

[QualityChimp]

RDR2 Online with my mates in our weekly co-op session.

Did a couple of missions, but thought we'd piss around in Valentine, shooting the place up.
Started getting shot and we realised some other players had turned up.
Confused as to why my headshots weren't working on the other players.
Checked our levels. Me and my mates were all sub 30.
These other players were all around LEVEL 500!

So we got the hell outta dodge as it was getting boring and instead started a rumpus in Blackwater.

We spent ages longer on the rooftops taking out the cops. Then some bounty hunters.
Eventually, they just stopped coming and the game told us to escape, which we did.

It felt like the scene in Westworld where all the robots have to get repaired.


One friend didn't want to pay his fine, so carried on rampaging.
I watched the sun rise over the Blackwater Lake


We did a spot of fishing


When we saw a guy with a KAYAK!
We raced over to it and stole it! Grand Theft Aut row

Not only that, but we then spotted a motorboat in the distance!


and soon it was ours!


We then spotted an even BIGGER boat!
I managed to get on from the kayak, but sadly you couldn't drive it - the captain's cabin is sealed.
Not only that, but when it gets to a certain point on its automated route, it sinks!
One friend sunk the kayak and drowned, but I managed to get on another (Cleveland) steamer running in the other direction. Maybe the game runs them like ski lifts, to add authenticity to the game. Most sensible people won't bother trying to get to them!

Our bandit friend finally paid off his bounty and we did a Legendary bounty mission, which was cool.
A gang of female bandits robbed a rail yard, but dressed the same and we had to work out who was the real boss and take her in alive.
I roped one and it wasn't her, but she had a whole speech set that never repeated, lambasting me as the worst bounty hunter ever because I got the wrong woman.
When I roped the actual leader, she was berating me all the way to the police saying she has a long memory and always gets revenge.

All amazing stuff.

Then we called it a night


Well, I finished off my role bonuses. I sampled a bunch of crocs for Harriet in the swamps


The End of our photo story.

[QualityChimp]

More RDR2 Online Japes.
Following the path of the Naturalist means you get a lot more opportunity to interact with legendary animals.
The hippy chick, Harriet, wants you to sedate, sample and release them, but hunter Gus wants them for clothing and trinkets.

To be honest, Harriet's doing my nut in because I have to usually kill an animal for the daily challenges and she knows if you've killed more than 4 animals, so she sprays you with a hallucinogen and you can't trade with her for 10 minutes.
Gus, on the other hand, is always jovial and has some stat boost trinkets if you sell him legendary animal parts.

Anyway, I'm focussing on being nice to the animals at the moment, logging them in a notebook to sell back to Harriet.
Afterwards, it'll probably be a bloodbath...

I was tracking a legendary panther and my mate joined my session. He literally spawned next to the panther and he nearly soiled himself when he got instamauled to death! I took about 10 photos as he ran around trying not to die and I was crying with laughter.
Took a photo of him respawned, the panther and his own corpse.


This isn't the first time he's come home with scratch marks down his back after a tussle with a cougar!


I did an online co-op mission where you work together to protect a freed legendary animal.
Thought it made the animal docile, so took some snaps.
This is the last one before I got savaged to death:


Here are various other creatures I photographed:

[Neon Ignition]

Weekend round up time:

Nintendo Switch
Around 15 Shines into Super Mario Sunshine, so far easy enough though not convinced Mario always jumps when pressed to.

PC
Shifting through hard drive saved stuff, now on a replay of Shadow of the Tomb Raider

[Atticus]

ESP RA.DE. on the Switch. Really liking this with the flip-grip. I have it already on the PS4 so I can play with an arcade stick if I want, but it's nice to have a handheld version that's actually really playable, in a slightly lighter away. But I don't even try to have the mad skills anymore ... I just play one credit, have a good blast and feel good doing it.

I also started Last of Us 2 NG+ this week and it's really great but really grim. So unlike the intense first run I'll be playing this one in bits and bobs. And breaking it up with the likes of ...

Crash Bandicoot 4 ... I've never played a Crash game before but I read a couple of reviews that said it's actually a really fun and challenging platform game so I thought what the hell and gave it a go. Happy to say it's both of those things. I love the platforming, the levels are brill (both in terms of design and visual pop), the different characters are fun and offer a little diversity here and there and the extra challenge is there in every level if you want it. It's actually nice to be playing something light and fun ... a kid's game, like back in the 16-bit days. It might lack the precision of a Mario game but that really doesn't hold it back as it does so many other things well.

[Golgo]

Gone back for a 2nd (Claire Redfield) playthrough of the Resident Evil 2 remake, having done the Leon Kennedy run in January. Gosh, darn and tarnation, but this is a splendid game. I think I'm enjoying Claire's slightly different run through the story even more than Leon's - really gripping stuff, and a good amount of scary.

[QualityChimp]

Gaming night yesterday and we did more RDR2 Online.
We did a crazy bounty mission where the guy we were after threw some chems in a cauldron and we all started tripping.
The small animals were massive and the big animals were tiny and the guy kept coming at us and disappearing in smoke when we shot him.
The chems wear off and you track him down, but getting away is really tough as a load of inbrednecks and crocs start charging you.

As per usual, it's mainly a just a platform to have a laugh and virtually hang out together.

[Colin]

Been really scraping about for something to play which lead to some weird choices. Subscribed to the PS4 streaming service and my wife and I really enjoyed playing and completing Machinarium, even though it seemed to be over too soon. I spotted that Just Cause 4 was on there and I loved the third one so gave it a try. Absolute rubbish, they've managed to make it worse than the previous game in pretty much every single way. Then the other day I spotted they'd added Days Gone, which I'd considered buying when it came out. Very pleased I hadn't though, I think I disliked everything about it for the time I suffered it.

The outcome of all of this? I redownloaded Just Cause 3 and have started a new game from the beginning again as I'd completed it previously. Should keep me going for a while.

[importaku]

This week it's been a mixed bag been trying to play more of the mario 3D collection but it pains me to say this but i'm bored of it even galaxy feels like i'm just going by the numbers to the end. I think i need to shelve this one till im more in the mood for it only a few stars away from the first ending.

On a better note i'm immensely enjoying these 3.....

Taiko no tatsujin, been a long time since i played a moden console version as the last one for me was on the wii and last handheld one was 3ds so it's nice to have the switch version gameplay is solid as ever as is the song listing. gonna set me back 22,000 yen to get the entire lot of DLC but i intend to put stupid amounts of time into this to get back to where i used to be on oni mode so i can take my skills to the arcade again. There's a lot of fun extra stuff in this version i'm enjoying the minigames with the bon odori dance one been my fave. Also enjoying the online battle portion too seems there's themed songs you can unlock if you meet the requirements online this month it's all halloween themed with a halloween song been the reward if you complete all the tasks as well as some halloween avatar stuff i hope more of these themed events are in the game.

Project diva mega mix, also really enjoying this one too but i'm finding it hard to get used to the ABXY buttons as the playstation symbols are hard wired into my head but i think i need to stick to the switch ones for the time been till i learn which is which on the arcade controller to get that muscle memory burnt in then i can go into settings at a later date to switch them. I was thinking of temporarily modding my arcade controller as the button lids are removeable and placing some black electrical tape in the shape of the 4 playstation symbols so they leave a playstation symbol black shilouettes under each of the buttons to match the old layout to help learn where both are for both layouts. Song listing is as maxed out as i can get it as i decided to buy both season passes to buy all the extra DLC songs to bring the song total upto 180+ songs but it's still not on the save volume as future tone but not far away. A lot of my favourites are im there so i'm pretty pleased.

And today i finally got to play the full version of Deemo which i'm also really loving, the artwork for the song titles is stunning the song selection is a wonderful mix too some really beautiful piano pieces. As fast as i'm completing tracks it's throwing handfuls of new songs at me as unlocks i don't know where to start lol. Really need to play this undocked to enjoy it by touch screen as thats where the gaming gets fun as i like to play on hard but on the control pad it's too fiddly. It plays very much like konami's piano arcade game nostalgia which is why i wanted Deemo in the first place. The story is really charming too there's a lot of game in here seems there's also a songbook just for the labo toycon piano if you have one you can use it to play certain songs in Deemo annoyingly i don't have it and one of the songs in there i reallly want to play and you can't play them without it well certainly not with a control pad not sure if it will let me do it on touch screen..

These 3 are gonna keep me occupied for quite some time

[Neon Ignition]

Getting to the end of paternity leave, re-orientating myself ahead of the weekend but the key moment has been that I've finally cleared the 'B' category of my Steam Library backlog. Only 24 letters left to go...

[randombs]

Super Mario 64 (N64)

This is the first time I’ve actually played this beyond the first few levels. It’s wonderful.

It’s almost making me want to buy the anniversary collection.

Almost.

I'm sure the Switch version won't look anywhere near as nice as Retroarch with the CRT shader that I'm using.

Halo 3:ODST (PC)

I found it a bit boring the first time, but I'm loving it now. The only thing I don't like is that I need to spend the night-time bits with night-vision on almost all the time, so it feels like the MGS VR missions. The flashback missions themselves are great, and the soundtrack is phenomenal.

[importaku]

Been practising on taiko on switch again, my skills are shocking i used to be able to clear oni stuff easily i swear my brain has had a stroke or something as i'm struggling getting my hands to do the patterns i had stored in muscle memory. Seems my current limit is 6-7 star difficulty booo to old age my reactions are slowing down but i'll be damnned if i'm not gonna try and whip my brain back into shape as i'm loving the switch version. Bought about half of all the dlc song packs on the eshop so far to totally expand the song library as this is no short term gaming on this one. Some of my all time fave songs like hyakka ryouran are still on there. I really don't like buying digital stuff but with something like this it's kind of a bonus as although the built in songs on the game you get quite a lot compared to previous releases but the dlc keeps it going by expanding the tracklist by a couple of hundred songs. Not sure how many versions will end up been released on switch.

[Cepp]

Playing Pokemon: Lets Go Pikachu. Im not feeling the way you capture Pokemon, but its still fun to make my way through the original story again.

[JazzFunk]

ODST is bloody great!!!!!!

Been on MAID OF SKER, the current Xbox GWG freebie. Been an atmospheric walking sim so far but just spent five mins exploring the hotel, had to switch off just now cos I'm knackered but I like freebies like this, even though it's nowt amazing.

[QualityChimp]

More RDR2, which is still fun, with plenty to do each day, especially as I've started doing all the various roles.

I also completed Streets of Rage 4, which was great fun. Last boss was tough, though.

Also dipped into Fall Guys. There are new levels, but it's still crazy infuriating at times!