Cloud Monday - Humanity - Part 1 - Some Issues Streaming This New Game From PlayStation Plus Premium

Today's Cloud Monday is part 1 of playing Humanity on PS4 via the PlayStation Plus Premium Cloud Streaming Service.

This is a new game from Tha and Enhance Experience that is out across PS4 and PS5. this is the newest game i've tried out on PlayStation Plus Premium Cloud Streaming Service and i chose to play it because i wondered how well having soo many people on screen at the same time would hold up, whether the stream would suffer from macroblocking or other issues.

The game itself isn't as sharp or bold and colorful when compared to some of the recent games we've played on this list. graphically, it has it's own issues on PS4. the one that annoyed me the most was the seeming lack of a shadow of my character. this meant that it was really hard to judge where it was in a 3D space. you'll see in this video that i jump off stuff a fair bit. other things i noticed include how low resolution and low framerate the shadows were.

There might've been a few other things, but it's hard to tell because the game also suffered from streaming issues. for example, the game is a bit murky and not sharp so it's difficult to know if there were resolution drops. my fear about macroblocking came true and it appeared more than once. it was so strong a couple of times that there was even zebra striping. near the end, the warning about the stream came up, too. stream tears weren't that common and even tho there was macroblocking it never really got in the way. unlike recent games who rely on sharp high resolution art and suffered because many issues were soo distracting, with the art style and limitations of the PS4, these issues didn't get in the way of Humanity.

Switch Funday - Mario Kart 8 Deluxe Booster Course Pass - 50 Minutes Playing Online

For Switch Funday, i was looking to play something familiar, something i could relax to. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe isn't the most obvious game, but i know i'm not the best player so there's no pressure on me to try and win. my only goal is to not finish last. there were a couple of times when i failed to reach that goal.

I tried editing this video a little bit, cutting out the lobby time. so in real life, it was near 1 hour 15 minutes. i stopped 'cause the game had started to no longer be relaxing, rather it was becoming a little frustrating. i do enjoying playing it and it's nice that i can pop in for an hour or so and just relax and play with no pressure on me.

Online Saturday - Meet Your Maker - One Month Later

Welcome to Online Saturday.

Today's video is my return to Meet Your Maker. i first tried this game back in April when it first came out, https://youtu.be/AFfyi11Uu24, but back then i was having a hard time with it. i decided to leave it for a bit and come back. hopefully things like raid difficulty would become more realistic. the game has had a few patches since then, with 1.06 being the most recent for this game play video.

Unfortunately, i didn't really notice any differences. loading times are still long, raid difficult levels still seem out of balance, and overall i didn't enjoy it any more than the first time. i did manage to defeat a few bases and it was satisfying to do so. but i didn't enjoy it.

I've come to the conclusion that this game isn't for me. i do enjoy the feel of the controls. i've mentioned a few times that it feels somewhat nostalgic to games like Unreal Tournament. but the game attached to it doesn't quite feel right. the controls feel floaty and fast compared to the gameplay and mechanics which seem to require stealth, slow cautious exploration, and for some reason a grappling hook. in some ways, it feels like two different ideas for the game were smashed together and this was the result, rather than the two being stitched tightly together.

Backlog Conquering - Prehistoric Dude - Part 2 - Unable To Beat Enormousaurus

Welcome to Backlog Conquering.

This is part 2 of my playthrough of Prehistoric Dude on PS4.

In the last video, https://youtu.be/1WgExq3LxwI, i made a lot of progress but got kinda stuck. it felt like i needed a power-up. so i ended that video by going back to the start to check out some new locations

This video continues on from there. it very quickly pays off as i get the ability to go under water. this opens up the game a lot and enables me to check out other areas i had missed. so for the start of the video that's what i end up doing. about half way i get to the big boss, Enormousaurus, but i get stuck. for the rest of the video, i'm unable to beat it. i get close a couple of times but i can't seem to get the final hit. the video ends with me being frustrated at this situation and wondering if i'm still missing a weapon or something.

Backlog Conquering - Prehistoric Dude - Continuing From QT30E

Welcome to Backlog Conquering.

With Malicious now finished, it was time to move onto a new game. in my QT30E series i did a video on the PS4 PSN game Prehistoric Dude. you can catch that video here https://youtu.be/zDgQxE1AIhk and that has the first 25 minutes or so of the game.

Backlog Conquering continues on from that video and keeps going for 50 minutes or so. in this video i continue to not enjoy using vines, i continue to miss wooden platforms, and i continue to hate the spiders. But i do still have fun. maybe i should've stopped a little earlier as i was beginning to get frustrated. but overall it was a good time and some great progress was made.

Puzzle & Dragons Tuesday - Nintendo Switch Edition - Umisachi and Yamasachi Cup - Achievement Run

Welcome to Puzzle & Dragons Tuesday! Sit back and either watch me play through, with no commentary, the cup or leave it running in the background as BGM!

I play and earn all the achievements from The  Umisachi and Yamasachi Cup! (2023/5/15 9:00～2023/5/22 8:59 JST) in Puzzle & Dragons: Nintendo Switch Edition whilst using a GamePad and a docked Nintendo Switch.

This was another quick cup for me. the gimmick seemed OK and making the combos needed was not an issue either. And yet i only managed to beat the boss once, in my final battle. there weren't too many other players online when i did the cup, it's a few days since Zelda was released so i was expecting it. but there were some fun close matches.

This week i played against:

Oolong - Rank 64

ake - Rank 68

そう - Rank 64

Cloud Monday - Super Stardust Portable - Part 2 - A Rougher Stream From PlayStation Plus Premium

Today's Cloud Monday is part 2 of playing Super Stardust Portable on PS4 via the PlayStation Plus Premium Cloud Streaming Service.

I really enjoyed playing Super Stardust Portable on PS4 last week, https://youtu.be/zaOUq0mc6Qc, so i was looking forward to playing it for Part 2 of Cloud Monday. But this week, the streaming experience was much rougher than part 1. Last time, there were issues with macroblocking, but today we seemed to have all the major issues.

it got so rough that the streaming warning appeared for a time! there were stream tears, there were resolution drops, there was macroblocking, and there were times when it felt like it was slowing down and/or stuttering with the controls getting "heavy". there's a chance the latter could also be caused due to the game itself, rather than it being streamed to me. There were a couple of moments when the amount of enemies and particles on screen was really high and this was coupled with streaming/playing issues. 

It's still a fun game to play, but out of the two days i played this game today's issues negatively impacted my enjoyment of it, but it was still mostly playable. if you do have issues, downloading and installing the game is an option, but the point of this series is to see what the streaming experience is like.