This week's new Cloud Monday video is part 1 of playing the PS3 version of Ratatouille on PS4, via the PlayStation Plus Cloud Streaming Service to my Japanese launch model PlayStation 4.
I'll admit that i'm not a fan of the movie Ratatouille. As for the game, it's not something i've ever looked into on any platform so i didn't know what i was going to be playing here.
As ever we're looking at the save situation and unfortunately there appear to be no manual saves in Ratatouille. the Auto Saves seem to be when ever a quest is finished. there are collectables, but picking them up doesn't trigger the auto save. at the end of this part, before the PS4 internet speed test, i did check to see if the game's checkpoints were working as save points but they weren't. so if you pick up collectables, you have to finish the quest you're on to trigger the Auto Save to get them saved.
This part focused mostly on the tutorial, but that's mostly because of how poorly implemented the controls were. because of my previous experience with cloud based gaming, i do not believe that the poor controls are a result of the game being streamed, rather it's an inherent issue with Ratatouille. thankfully, there will be a Part 2 so we can have another look at the controls, but ultimately i get the impression they're a little broken or at the very least not as accurate as they need to be.
For this week's Mobile Friday i tried Silver & Blood from developers Moonton and publishers Skystone Games on my iPhone 14 Pro.
I had seen this game rise slowly up the free to play App Store game charts and was curious how they'd make a vampire themed RPG work. the app store page offers some hints, but going in i wasn't too sure how it'd all work out.
It's disappointing to say that when you start the game you have to download extra data. i thought this might be the case as the game is less than 1GB to download. the game does say you can play through the start and it'll download in the background, which might be a decent option for those with newer phones, or you can download it all right now. the problem is, you have to download over 5GB of extra data. So it's safe to say that you must start this at home and download the data before playing this out and about. at such a big download size, especially when compared to the game's initial download size, it almost comes across as more suited to Apple TV or a Mac.
That initial disappointment is maybe the only disappointing thing i experienced across this hour of gameplay. We start the game with an almost anime like intro showing our death before the game shows us the day before. We're slowly introduced to numerous characters across this hour at a pace that didn't seem to fast whilst only being told enough about the world and what's happening to keep the story going forward. The game is also using it's tutorial smartly to introduce us to how basic combat is done whilst also tying it into the story on occasion to explain why a character is fighting at the back and why, to show how to use their special moves, they're only going to attack certain enemies.
Silver & Blood smartly uses it's own world to explain other game mechanics. So many games struggle to explain their "summoning" mechanics in a way that ties it into the world that's already been introduced. towards the end of this video we're introduced to it in such a smart way that it tied directly into the world and made sense. it also will make sense why the result can be random. they've done a fantastic job creating a world that makes sense and keeping you in it.
By the end of the first hour we came to the first chapter of the game and i was genuinely interested in learning more. i wanted to know about the world the game is set in as it comes across as rather bleak. i want to know more about our character and what makes them unique. and of course, there's the mystery behind Dracula ... or rather which body does it in habit, as in Silver & Blood it's memories that are key and what is past on to create immortality or insanity.
For this week's Demo Play Thursday i played the PlaySation 4 version of Knightica from Mad Mango Games.
Knightica appears to have a simple premise, choose a leader, create an army, then defeat the enemy. the tutorial helps by keeping it simple when explaining how to play the game. the tutorial uses videos to show off game mechanics before letting us try. Quite quickly, i was combining troops to level them up, strategically placing them to offer bonuses to other troops, and thinking about which troops to save.
What i didn't get from this demo was the roguelike elements of the game. when my run was over, there were stats, and then we're back to title screen. a demo is a representation of the game, so from this demo i can only assume this is the case with the final game. if you have played it and know how the roguelike elements work, please let us know in the comments.
The demo does have 3 characters, of which i tried out 2 in this video, two of which are unlockable from completing quests. i don't think this is what they mean by roguelike but i can't be sure.
It's a shame a gameplay element doesn't come across when there's much to like from playing Knightica. it looks great, runs well on PS4, and has nice music. playing and watching the action was fun. but when the game's Steam page says "Recruit powerful units, place them strategically and find the best synergies in this Roguelike Autobattler!" i have to question whether this demo is a success and whether it's a good demo or not.
It's worth playing the demo for Knightica as it comes across as a fun game to play. but i don't think it successfully gets across what the game is so there's a chance there's an element of gameplay you won't enjoy. so i'd suggest checking out reviews and watching more gameplay videos.
This week's new Cloud Monday video is part 2 of playing Bluey: The Videogame on #PS4, via the #PlayStationPlus Cloud Streaming Service to my Japanese launch model #PlayStation4.
Returning to Bluey, after Part 1, let me focus more on the game's design. we learned that it does not have a manual save and we know what to look for when it auto saves. Now i could focus on the gameplay, it was clear just how frequent the Auto Save in Bluey actually is.
There is a story in Bluey and each part of that story is broken up into segments. each of those segments is broken up into small gameplay chunks. a good example in Part 2 is when we went looking for treasure. the story was we went looking for it with our family and grandad. but that is broken into walking sections, platforming, and cleaning sections. each of these is tied together by conversations. so you'd walk for a minute, some talking would happen, then it auto saves as you start the next platforming section.
When PlayStation Plus Cloud Streaming Service is going to disconnect you, it only gives us a 20 second warning. across both parts it's clear that if this happens during the story there's a high probability you've just triggered the auto save or are about to. if you're disconnected, your only going to loose a minute or two of gameplay.
Walking around and collecting stuff outside of the story mode is even better as each time you pick up a collectable, it auto saves. early on this means you're saving very frequently. if you get the disconnection warning, i don't see it as much of an issue. you have either just picked up something, are about to pick up something, or are looking and now know where not to look.
I will say that Bluey is a great game to stream from the cloud. But, whilst the game's design works well on the platform, it's fair to say the game itself comes with it's own amount of jank. so whether it's worth playing or streaming is up to you.
For this week's Mobile Friday i tried Heroes Crew: Strategy Defense from developers Aloha Factory on my iPhone 14 Pro.
i've always been interested in Tower Defense games, i've uploaded a video of the Square Enix PS3 Tower Defense game Crystal Defenders https://youtu.be/CPxDtTKcWJY. but when these games get difficult it often feels like we're unable to make a change and we're stuck with the choices we made earlier on. Heroes Crew: Strategy Defense is great because we have the ability to change things.
Actually there's more to playing Heroes Crew: Strategy Defense that makes it a great game. it has one of the better tutorials i've played recently across any of the playlists i record for. the game doesn't try to add a story in, to then forget about it, the game is simply tower defense. so the game starting with a tutorial makes sense and this tutorial has 4 different sections to help with most aspects of the game. i'll say there's still room for improvement, but for the most part the tutorial is very useful. what surprised me a lot, is that the tutorial isn't over. when the game lets you take on the first section by yourself and you eventually loose, the game will then present you with a screen titled "Clear Guide" which will offer more hints and tricks for your next run.
In this video, i completed the tutorial and then did 2 runs. after the second, i leveled up the area i was in. it's not just the location that levels up, each of the characters i use can also be leveled up, as can items. so they go into the next run stronger, and in that run you're able to combine 3 one star characters to make 1 two star character. the challenge is making use of the character limit. you need stronger rarer characters, long rang and short range characters, and characters that can use magic.
The tag line for Heroes Crew: Strategy Defense in the App store is "Pure Strategy, No RNG, No Luck" and managing how many characters on the field is part of this. The more important aspect of this is placement of these characters. once they've been put down, they can be moved again. a circle is laid out showing their area of attack. game over is when time runs out, there's a time limit to take out the boss. so moving characters around to keep attacking the boss is critical.
But as well as leveling up characters, getting a balance of different characters, and moving around characters, there's another thing to consider, Mythic Heroes. these are much stronger than your own characters, and can also be upgraded in the home area outside of battles. but to summon them you need a certain number of select characters. In the first run, i didn't summon a mythic character but in the second i did and it was very noticeable how much stronger they were and how useful they were when it came to bosses. you can hear in that second run how i try to level up my characters to 3 stars, get a balance, and summon the mythic. but whilst it may sound complicated, i felt that i could do it and i did.
Heroes Crew: Strategy Defense is one of the better Tower Defense games i've ever played and it's one of the most accessible free to play mobile games i've played. i highly recommend people trying it, whether you're into tower defense or not.
For this week's Demo Play Thursday i played the #NintendoSwitch version of Discounty from Crinkle Cut Games.
I didn't know much about this game beyond the shop aspect when i started. i have since learned that the developers are based in Denmark, so the location the game's set in makes more sense and makes it more believable. tho i imagine some of the story stuff may not be real life events, this demo does tease them and introduce them in such a way that by the end i wanted to know more about some of the personal history between characters and what was up in the cordoned-off area.
Whilst that side of the story worked, the story of the shop got me completely confused. was this the one and only shop that had been there for years, was this a brand new one that was opening, was this one that had been open for a little while but was being renewed...i honestly can't say. i feel like the story gave an answer for each in this demo.
That wasn't the only thing rough with this demo. when i returned to the port, so my second time there, the game had some very noticeable graphical bugs to the point where i was concerned that the demo itself would crash.
Other than the bugs, i thought the world looked nice. the graphics and the music worked well together to create a pleasant relaxing time during this demo. there is a time mechanic and whilst i was aware and observant of it, i never really felt the pressure of it. i felt like there was time before work and after work.
Working the shop was easy in this demo. i can imagine how it'd get more difficult later, but for now using the gamepad worked fine. whilst i was playing i thought that using the touch screen would've been faster, like when typing on the PS Vita screen in Crazy Market.
The Backlog Conquering game was the PS4 version of Guacamelee! Super Turbo Championship Edition from DrinkBox Studios. During the 10 part playthrough there were many times when i died and had to retry sections. for platforming, i edited out retries when it took longer than a couple of minutes. as for the fights, i included the first death, but like the platforming i cut out many of the other deaths if it took more than a couple of attempts.
You can check out the previous parts of this playthrough:
This week's new Cloud Monday video is part 1 of playing Bluey: The Videogame on PS4, via the PlayStation Plus Cloud Streaming Service to my Japanese launch model PlayStation 4.
It's been a while since i had a look at a kids game as part of this series, and a modern one at that. The emulated PSP games on PS4/PS5 include kid's games like Up and we have seen with Daxter, https://youtu.be/5-KKF2d-rv4, that those games are easy to recommend to stream from the Cloud. i was wondering if a modern PS4 release would be designed with the Cloud in mind itself.
The quick answer is I don't know! Whilst Bluey: The Videogame doesn't have manual saves, it does save very frequently. it's possible this design decision was made with kids in mind rather than streaming it from the Cloud, but what ever the case streaming it does benefit. It would be nice if the game said what the auto save icon was. after playing a while i noticed a green insect appearing in the bottom right so i tested it. i quit the game after it appeared and reloaded the save. i was right back where i was with all progress.
So, if you're curious about Bluey: The Videogame, but don't want to download it. it does seem that streaming is a good way to play it. an added bonus to streaming is that the game is already up to date, so i was playing with all the additional content and fixes. but Bluey: The Videogame is still a bit rough and jankey. it's not the best game playing experience.
For this week's Mobile Friday i tried Rail Rescue: Puzzle Lines from developers INFINITY GAMES on my iPhone 14 Pro.
The App store page for Rail Rescue: Puzzle Lines really highlights what this game is. there are train themed single screen puzzles. by completing a set, you get a star. you use stars to build buildings in your town. Whilst the puzzle aspect was pretty good, the building the town aspect of the game did seem to just be filler. there were no bonuses to building the town, nor did you have any control over where they could be built.
The problem with Rail Rescue: Puzzle Lines is that it can come off as rude. when we started there was a download. it's small, but there was no announcement made before hand, no warning about doing the download over wifi and not using your data by downloading it over a mobile network. it didn't even tell me what the download was for. The game has adverts but there was no warning when they were going to start. what's weird about them is how they happen during the results screen, but not once the results are finished. instead the adverts appear in a weird place. there's no effort made to hide them or incorporate them into the game world at all.
The game then does have a sale message about buying the game and turning adverts off. i don't mind the developers trying to push their store. but then we got a sale offer that involved the game's in-game currency. at no point in this video was the currency used. trying to sell stuff to make money is fine, but i've said it for years now, the player needs to know the value of what you're selling. i had no idea about the currency, i don't know if that's a good deal or not. as for the adverts, i cut out 14 adverts from this video!
Rail Rescue: Puzzle Lines looks good. i thought the music and effects were fine, too. the tutorial is good and so is the gameplay. there is a lot to like about Rail Rescue: Puzzle Lines. but the forced download and repeated adverts make it hard to recommend. it'd be worth making this a paid for game instead of releasing a spoiled free to play experience.
For this week's Demo Play Thursday i played the Nintendo Switch version of Holo's Hanafuda from Gemdrops.
I currently live in Japan and i've heard of Hanafuda and seen the cards. they are typically really beautiful to look at and make a great gift. but i have no idea how to play the game. a majority of the people i've spoken to here also don't know how to play it, often saying it's something their grandparents play. so for me, i was interested in trying this out not from the holoilve perspective but because of the hanafuda.
This is a timed demo and it's clearly labeled as so when you start it. it's also clear that save game doesn't work. 20 minutes does seem a little short but i think it's down to them not wanting the story spoiled and so that the player doesn't learn how to play hanafuda just from the demo, negating the need to buy the full game.
I found the tutorial in this game to be great. not only were the explanations clear, but also playing Hanafuda was clear, too. the tutorial kept it nice and simple and at a slow pace. we were then taken into a game where the tutorials kept happening and giving us a chance to use what we learned.
I don't know if the portrayal of the hololive characters is accurate, but they never felt like getting in the way. the story elements were fine, but critically when i was playing it never got distracting. the same with the graphics and music, it all worked well.
If you're interested in learning about Hanafuda, this maybe a great way to do so. i'd certainly recommend those wanting to learn give it a go and hopefully fans of hololive will like this too. unfortunately, i don't know about hololive so maybe viewers can comment and let me know if this game was good for them.
Welcome to Backlog Conquering. This is a series were i play a game from my backlog that i may or may not have played before. the goal isn't necessarily to finish the game, the goal is to play it. that way, i can have an opinion about it.
This week's new Cloud Monday video is part 2 of playing F.I.S.T.: Forged in Shadow Torch on PS4, via the PlayStation Plus Cloud Streaming Service to my Japanese launch model PlayStation 4.
In Part 1, we learned that the game doesn't have manual saves. This is important to know as one of the disadvantages of streaming games from PlayStation Plus Cloud Streaming Service is that we're only given a 20 second warning before disconnection. In Part 2, we got new abilities, weapons, and completed an important mission, and still there was no ability to manually save so i'm sure this game doesn't support that function.
If we can't save manually, then F.I.S.T.: Forged in Shadow Torch needs to have a robust auto save feature. checkpoints are good for a quick restart in game, but to come back to the game we need autosaves. it seems like F.I.S.T.: Forged in Shadow Torch uses the auto save as a checkpoint. this means that the auto saves are frequent because the checkpoints are.
It seems like the auto saves, and therefore the checkpoints, happen before a fighting section, before a boss section, before a puzzle platforming section, and when you use a terminal. In what i've played across both parts, this means that i'm only going a few minutes in-between saves, typically as i travel between one point of interest to another. Whilst this isn't as good as a manual save, it's decent enough for F.I.S.T.: Forged in Shadow Torch.
Because of how frequent the auto saves are, i'm am not going to dismiss F.I.S.T.: Forged in Shadow Torch. it doesn't get my highest recommendation as a game to be played from the Cloud, but it sill gets one as it's a good game to stream. i would say that if you're not looking for a challenge and are in it for the story play on "Easy" as i found "Normal" difficulty to be what i'd expect "Hard" to be.
For this week's Mobile Friday i tried BlazBlue Entropy Effect from developers 91Act on my iPhone 14 Pro.
I'm familiar with the BlazBlue fighting games as i used to have a couple on PS3. but i didn't know about this side-scroller. since i've played this iOS version, i've learned that the game had already come out on PC in 2023 and that there is an Android version.
I Wonder if the Android version was the lead platform as throughout this video you'll see there are moments where the Dynamic Island gets in the way and other times when the curved edges of the iPhone block little bits whereas on my TV i can see things have been cut off. these small things are really the only problems the game has.
playing the game it felt polished and now i know it's a port of an existing game, it makes sense. the tutorial is mostly fantastic and sometimes only great. there was just one thing i didn't understand and that was implanting crystals. maybe the online multiplayer aspect of the game could've been more defined, but there's a chance i tried accessing that too early into the overall story.
I say that because the big story beat at the end required a power level much lower than what i was doing. maybe i was doing more and going further than what was needed so i could've been hitting limitations because i reached areas too soon.
Also at the end, there was the hint of a plot twist. for this video, i wanted to focus on the main story but a part of me is curious as to what the other character was talking about and whether something will happen to us now. the weirdest part of the story has to be the Mysterious Light Orb in the black and white section. that thing was soo huge it's odd that no one knows about it, especially the janitor standing next to it's section. It seemed to know us, tho we didn't know it, and it did reveal there's a collectable for us to look for. but i have no idea how it does or will tie into the story as right now it's still being revealed.
BlazBlue Entropy Effect does a lot right. it also looks fantastic and i enjoyed the soundtrack. there are a lot of customisation options, too. but, what might stop it being the Free to Play Game of the Year is the additional download at the start. there is no warning it's going to download, no message to the player as to how big it's going to be or that such a download should be done over wi-fi rather than using up data allowance. it's rare to find such a rude download nowadays.
The pick up and play nature of BlazBlue Entropy Effect, the way it teaches you how to play, and how the story's been told so far made it so easy to play and one i kept coming back to, which is why this video is so long. i think BlazBlue Entropy Effect is maybe one of, if not, the best game i've played so far this year on mobile and i highly recommend it. just beware, there's a data download at the start that should be done over Wi-fi.
