For this week's Demo Play Thursday i played the PlayStation 4 version of Labyrinth of the Demon King from developer Jacob R. Hudepohl and publisher Top Hat Studios.
Scary games, horror games, psychological games, they're all genres that i don't play because i don't like them. but i was intrigued by the icon and thought i'd give Labyrinth of the Demon King a go. the fact that i couldn't finish the demo doesn't meant that it's a bad game so if what you saw looked interesting i would recommend that you check it out for yourselves.
It's aiming for a PlayStation 1 era look and it gets there but it feels less "janky" than similar PS1 games do so during the video i remarked that it's probably more accurate to call it a "PS1 Pro" style game. at times it felt like this look and the type of game Labyrinth of the Demon King is combined into something that felt old, whilst other times it really worked. from a demo perspective, it's a shame that it's never made clear if save files carry over, and a little disappointing that there was no link to buy/preorder the game from the PSN store.
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. The newest game in the Backlog Conquering series is the PlayStation Portable version of Final Fantasy. this is the downloaded version of the game, but it is also available on UMD. To help with this playthrough i'm proudly using a guide from GameFAQS. here's the link, https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/psp/937909-final-fantasy/faqs/55625. i'm not following it exactly, but it's useful to have.
I was right, Part 17 was the final part in my playthrough. as i guessed, we had two more bosses to fight again before we battled the final boss. Garland was the most difficult boss character to fight in the game. i didn't know that he could heal himself and it was demoralising when he did it, effectively going back to full health. more than once i came close to loosing my team. in the end, Sara ended up being my only character to not die during this playthrough.
After the credits i checked out some of the extras. it's clear that there are plenty more enemies left to find in the game. the concept art was nice but because of the PSP screen resolution zooming in on it wasn't that nice. what i did enjoy was the music player. i played a little of all the tracks in the game and i was surprised to see some tracks from other Final Fantasy games, too!
The new game in the Stories on Tuesday series is the PS4 version of Arcade Spirits from Fiction Factory Games. this is the disc version of the game, published by PQube.
This is Part 4 of my Arcade Spirits story and it's the culmination of the previous 2 parts, it's Francine’s Arcade Funplex Event. not only was it difficult for the main character of the story, but the choices we had to make were also difficult and by the chart shown at the end of the video, i don't think i made the best choices.
You can check out the previous parts of this playthrough:
This week's new Cloud Monday video is part 1 of playing Ghostbusters: Spirits Unleashed - Ecto Edition on PS4 via the PlayStation Plus Cloud Streaming Service to my Japanese launch model PlayStation 4.
I chose this game for a particular reason, i wanted to see how well an online multiplayer focused game would work being streamed to me. normally, it would be a console talking to online servers, and those servers talking back. but with Cloud Streaming, it's my PS4 to the Cloud Server, the Cloud Server to the multiplayer server, back to the Cloud Server, and then back to my PS4. This series has shown that playing games from the Cloud is mostly fine but i wondered if this extra link in the chain would bring noticeable lag in a game mode that typically needs fast reactions.
Ghostbusters: Spirits Unleashed - Ecto Edition is either smartly designed, lucky, or a bit of both because how the weapons work in this game is slower than typical first person online shooters. it reminded me of how on PS3, the Killzone games were slower because of input lag but the game was built around this idea of slower responses because of the weight of everything. because Ghostbusters: Spirits Unleashed - Ecto Edition has this build up in the proton pack before it fires, it completely hides any and all lag that could come from being streamed to me.
As i haven't played other online shooters for Cloud Monday, i don't know how the others manage it, but as i've only tried Ghostbusters: Spirits Unleashed - Ecto Edition i have to be critical over the lack of information. I couldn't see the game auto saving so i have no idea if saves are limited to the completion of online matches or more than that. there's also no way for me to manually save. even going back to the main menu wasn't clear if anything was saving. If our connection to PlayStation Plus Cloud Streaming service degrades, we're only given a 20 second warning before disconnection. With Part 1, i don't know if i can force a save by looking for a match, from having a conversation, or anything. But with an online game there's an extra concern. if i'm in a match and i get the 20 second warning and then i'm disconnected, what happens? am i given a timeout penalty for not finishing the game? i feel like Ghostbusters: Spirits Unleashed - Ecto Edition could use the home menu at the start of the game to give Cloud Streaming players information on when the saves are and penalties for not finishing a game, like Press L3 and a text box comes up and details it all.
So after Part 1, there's good and bad when playing Ghostbusters: Spirits Unleashed - Ecto Edition in the Cloud. one positive must be that i found matches quickly and even in my first games i was able to contribute even if a little.
For this week's Mobile Friday i tried Tsukuyomi: The Divine Hunter, from developers COLOPL, on my #iPhone 14 Pro. I switch between two microphones, the backup recording starts and my normal recording set up finishes, so it may sound a little strange.
The press releases for this game have focused on two things, Kazuma Kaneko has joined from #Atlus and worked extensively on the game and that together they developed “AI Kaneko” to generate cards in this game. But what was strange was that when i checked the store page for this game, the focus had moved away from the game's use of Ai, so i included a copy of one of the press releases just to highlight such promotion of Ai.
The game came across as highly polished which made rough areas really stick out. for example, they did a great job avoiding the Dynamic Island that when it did get it the way it was noticeable. another was a translation error in that English was missing. but other than that, it felt great to play. the music was also fantastic. it hadn't been highlighted in the press releases or on the store page but i think it really adds to the experience.
there is an additional data download at the start. in comparison to other games i've played with such a download, it's relatively small. but it's still big enough that i wouldn't recommend starting this game on a mobile network. starting it at home isn't an issue as Tsukuyomi: The Divine Hunter has a cool console feature, the ability to manually save and come back to the game later. the auto save was also noticeable.
The Roguelike element to Tsukuyomi: The Divine Hunter is fairly simple but i do think the game could've done a little more to make it clearer to the player. when your run ends, you do not carry over any of the cards, items, or currency into the next run. However, the Ai generated cards are logged and you seemingly can pick one to take into the next run. your experience points are also kept. as you level up, you unlock items that can be discovered in the runs. these are one time use items, but you can find many of them. in this video, even tho it's long, i was only able to start a second run so there are plenty of gameplay elements yet to uncover.
I only got to experience 2 Ai cards being generated in this video. the first one was satisfying. it looked good and what it did was useful. the second card that was generated was trickier to use in a run and i wasn't too satisfied with the artwork that had been created. The artwork was fine, it just didn't really match what the card did. for example, the first card was equally defensive and attacking. the picture was a knight in armor. this felt appropriate. but the second card was a guy in a suit, something that didn't match that this was an attacking card. maybe i was lucky, maybe i was unlucky, i can't say. perhaps in the comment section you can talk about your experience. but the game's news section was asking players to report inappropriate Ai generated cards so it's clear the system isn't perfected quite yet.
I think Tsukuyomi: The Divine Hunter is worth trying. the card combat was good, the graphics and art were great, as was the music, and it worked well together. there are a couple of rough spots and i didn't progress far enough to comment on the story or other gameplay elements. but what i did play was solid and the manual save feature is great for those playing at home or out and about on a commute.
For this week's Demo Play Thursday i played the PlayStation 4 version of Pipistrello and the Cursed Yoyo from developers Pocket Trap.
I had heard some talk about this game on podcasts i listen to, but after the Pepper Grinder experience i must admit i had some trepidation going in. Thankfully, after playing this demo for a little over an hour i came away feeling positive about the demo itself and the game.
Pipistrello and the Cursed Yoyo has a look the reminds me of the Game Boy Advance era of games and as someone who grew up during this era i feel like they did well in matching the controls to that look. What helps is that Pipistrello and the Cursed Yoyo feels far more cohesive of an experience than Pepper Grinder ever did is that the controls, the art style, the character design, the music, and more importantly the story and gameplay are all woven together successfully. The demo is also bespoke and shows off the initial introductions, tutorial, and plot of the game. the second demo shows off a different area and the new puzzles and ways of using your Yoyo. the final section to play is, what i assume to be, the first boss battle in the game.
Pipistrello and the Cursed Yoyo isn't an easy game and whilst loading back to the screen you were on is quick and easy, i'm not sure i agree with the punishment being financial. the demo gives some examples on how money is used in the game and i'm a little concerned that it needlessly punishes the player. But, at the start of the i checked out the game's options and in the difficulty settings you can decrease the financial penalty for trying again. there are a whole host of ways you can customise the game to your difficulty level and this really does make the game very accessible. it's a shame that the game doesn't make it clear if changing the difficulty will affect earning trophies or not.
i would recommend people check out the demo for Pipistrello and the Cursed Yoyo. the game has links to the PlayStation Store if you want to pre-order the game, as it comes out at the end of the month.
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. The newest game in the Backlog Conquering series is the PlayStation Portable version of Final Fantasy. this is the downloaded version of the game, but it is also available on UMD. To help with this playthrough i'm proudly using a guide from GameFAQS. here's the link, https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/psp/937909-final-fantasy/faqs/55625. i'm not following it exactly, but it's useful to have.
With Part 15 not really offering much to the overall story, in Part 16 i decided to go and do the end game. It starts rough with the magic using White Dragon and like in Part 8, i think, they do a lot of damage even knocking out a couple of my team. getting off the first floor was a relief as the other monsters haven't come close to wiping my team. But we did end up back on the first floor and even end up going deeper. the levels are large and it's easy to get a little lost. thankfully this means we're levelling up nice so when we come to the first boss, we managed to defeat it whilst i was still buffing my team. i ended the video after the second boss which probably means Part 17 has at least 3 more to go!
