The "What Are You Playing Today" Thread

[Ebiris]

I've only gotten a little bit into Dual Destinies (actually the first appearance of the convict prosecutor) and yeah, he's really not impressive. His super violent/intimidating schtick makes it impossible to take seriously that he's not thrown instantly back in jail, and kinda just feels like trying too hard.

I dunno, maybe he'll grow on me, but he doesn't even seem like the type you'd love to hate, like Von Karma was.

[Dracos]

Their concept with him was definitely just a mess.  Easily the least interesting prosecutor from my perspective.


I finished Castlestorm recently.  I'm of two minds about it.

The story was garbage.  I was okay with simplicity, but getting it as a bundle, they basically have your victories in the main game amount to barely more than nothing and don't even celebrate the main character being heroic.  For a story following a generic good guy footballsy protector of the realm bit, that just felt dirtish.  The girls are all half naked, except for the princess who is a generic damsel.  Fine, I get that they're going generic high fantasy, but it felt weird to me.  The vikings as a whole are undressed, but the others don't stand out quite as front and center on it.  Mainly though the 'You win, Only Not' angle they took for both their DLC put a foul taste in my mouth.

The gameplay I had a lot of fun with for the most part though.  It's a tower defense, focused on side by side castles shooting at each other and sending troops at each other.  You get a set of balista shots, a set of spells, and a set of troops.  Sometimes special missions, restrictions, or encouragements ("Hey use this troop to win the day").  Basically a lot of the time it is either:
Playing Hero on the ground fighting things (The start of both DLC is nasty on that front) - this sucks if that's the level, but is a lot of fun with just summoning a hero character mid battle and slogging through some enemy troops immediately.
Castle to castle destruction, first to take out the castle (or bash the gates open and take their flag) wins.  As the castles get destroyed, you lose access to valuable troops, but just for that encounter.

Also playing a bit of Suik 5 and Shadow Warrior.

[Rezantis]

Amusingly, it appears that Drac and I have independently picked up Suikoden V at the same time, and are actually quite close to each other in terms of story progression.

Also, what I -will- be playing is the Wildstar Beta. O_O

[Dracos]

I'll totally race you...*waves from in the back*

[Iron Dragoon]

Amusingly, it appears that Drac and I have independently picked up Suikoden V at the same time, and are actually quite close to each other in terms of story progression.

Also, what I -will- be playing is the Wildstar Beta. O_O

I was going to sign up for beta, but then I decided to wait to play it until release. I want it to be *super new* instead of having already run through things.

Let me know if it's as awesome as it looks. No NDA spoilers, obviously.

[Dracos]

You and Rez can be the divergent SR contigent then. :P

*is still weak on his MMOness*

[Sierra]

I wouldn't normally advise such things, but for the Suikoden 5 players: follow a recruitment FAQ. I love the game and consider it one of the better entries in the series, but ye gods is it stocked with arbitrary and permanently missable recruitment windows. Do you want ninja detectives in your army? Yes, you do.

[Dracos]

I view that as a must for Suikoden games, because after all, the game is vastly bettered by the presence of more characters as well as the unlocked Got them all endings.

And seriously some of them are completely obnoxious anyway.  It took me over 30 rumor changes to get the salt rumor for Sairoh.  I had tons of salt by then both in my store-room and in my inventory.

Or "fight in this dungeon with a limited party many times until dice come up New Character"

or "Run from x battles"

Or "Finish the game in 16 hours"  (What?  No time for awesome Cooking Battle Antics?)  Well, that's just for Clive's special side story in fairness.

~~~

Just unlocked the castle and Viki.  Movement is so much nicer all of a sudden.

[Rezantis]

I am so glad to have gotten hold of Viki.

But yeah, you -really- need the recruitment FAQ.  This is a serious case of Guide Dang It.

[Dracos]

Just past recruiting the Beavers.

Doing another run of powering up random backliners I'd never otherwise end up using :P

Richard continues to be Richard of Win, The Unstoppable Monster who occassionally just dishes out 5000+ damage, just because.

[Rezantis]

You are beating me.  I had to stop for study and exam. ;_;

Okay, and because I played some Wildstar.

I have acquired Richard, hit Lelcar, and spent like 600,000 potch.  I probably shouldn't have spent that much.  But shinies!

The ones I can't be assed using would be any S range mage.  I mean, if I -need- a mage, I have Viki and Zerase and Sialeeds . . . all of whom have basic attacks that actually function if I need them.  I'm not sure why I'd actually want to use Cornelio or Josephine.  Granted, Kisara isn't bad, especially if you bring Logg and Lun.

[Sierra]

Why use Josephine? Because she is FASHION DIVA.

[Dracos]

Yeah, S-Rank mages pretty much are crippled in that game.  The lot of them lack enough punch or bonus defense or whatnot to compete with the mages that don't have that problem.  And while they don't need to really do damage, they do need to at least hit for Magic Drain to trigger.

[Sierra]

One thing sorta in their favor: S5 MAG values get so high by endgame that you're unlikely to ever be hurting for spell charges. Like 3-4 L4 castings on the top-tier mages high. Not like the game has many real dungeons anyway.

[Dracos]

Yeah, a bit, but that helps all mages, it doesn't really change that even though some of the short range mages are fun, they're basically still dealing with at least as powerful (and often way more) medium and long range mages, that can safely sit in the back and blast magic.