Games beaten/completed in 2017

Finished a couple of things.

First is the excellent fangame Castlevania: The Lecarde Chronicles 2. The game's design feels like a midway point between Symphony and its successors and Simon's Quest, and the fusion actually manages to work. It kills Levels and experience entirely so there's a lot more Metroid-style item gathering, some very good puzzles, excellent music choices, and some seriously cool boss design. Oh, and Death is hard again, as there's no easy way out of having to deal with all his stuff. And it even adds a little something to Symphony of the Night.

The second game I beat is the Monster Party Prototype ROM. While the gameplay is pretty much the same, there were a lot of changes to the boss and enemy sprites and even some backgrounds to make it copyright-friendly for the US release.

Games beaten in 2017:

01/08 - XBlaze Lost: Memories (PSV)
01/14 - Sakura Swim Club (PC)
02/05- Hitman: Blood Money (PC)
04/24- A Kiss for The Petals: Remembering How We Met (PC)
06/17- Deus Ex: Human Revolution
07/16 - Lucy - The Eternity She Wished For (PC)

When I have seen this game in the store, the name and description, I had the feeling that it was an attempt to do something like Planetarian - The Reverie of a Little Planet. After having played the game, I believe I was not wrong.

Lucy is a visual novel centered on Lucy, an android (gynoid) whose charm is being almost human, though with some flaws, much like Yumeni was in Planetarian. Although I quite liked Lucy character, everything else is sacrificed in favor of making Lucy a likable character.

The main problem when compared with Planetarian is that Planetarian has a solid main story and the developments make you love Yumeni, while in Lucy the whole story revolves in trying to make you love her and forcing the question about how human a man-made being that acts and resembles a human must be considered.

Even though I liked the game, I advise other people to be wary of the fact it is a hit or miss: if you don't relate to Lucy, there is nothing else to like in this game.

Looks like I finally managed to totally finish Treasure of the Rudras.

There's pretty much no 16-bit RPG like it, which is highly unfortunate.

I've finally tested AND finished PHANTASY STAR ADVENTURE ! At last ! Not too hard as like everyone know here, it's a game that is very short ! Not too bad but not really a PS game ! But it was a good moment to play it

Lost a few entries:

01/08 - XBlaze Lost: Memories (PSV)
01/14 - Sakura Swim Club (PC)
02/05- Hitman: Blood Money (PC)
04/24- A Kiss for The Petals: Remembering How We Met (PC)
06/17 - Deus Ex: Human Revolution (PC)
07/16 - Lucy - The Eternity She Wished For (PC)
08/06 - Sword Art Online: Hollow Fragment (PSV)

After more than 200 hours of gameplay, I have finally finished SAO: Hollow Fragment. The fact that I managed to stay focused on the game for that long means it was very enjoyable, since I spent more than twice the time the other RPG I spent most time with, so not a small feat. Although the game is not brilliant, it does many things right, so it is easy to lose yourself on it and keep playing the challenges they bring just for fun. I believe I would not enjoy that much the game if it were just the Infinity Moment part, but the Hollow Area from Hollow Fragment is great in exploration, quests, helping building the characters and everything else, with really challenging parts and nice things to do out of the main story. Besides, the Infinity Moment has a big plot flaw. The best girl is an AI. Dat Strea... As for the story, none of the games have deep story or character interaction, and the localization is horrible to boot, but for someone who liked SAO anime despite its flaws, it is nice to see familiar faces, have some interaction between them more in a slice-of-life way, enriching the whole franchise experience. How not to love Asuna and Sinon?

Because of such a long game, my backlog is far worse than it was, but it isn't something I should worry about. Since the long journey through SAO world was fun, it is all that matters. Besides, that was probably the best hours of fun/price ratio.

08/09 - Gal*Gun: Double Peace (PSV)

I'll probably play the routes I didn't care about very much in a short while, but I consider it beaten because I got the best girls' endings. The premise of the game is amazing, probably the best ever. So many nice girls... The fanservice is a bit lighter than I expected, considering the other games targeted at the same audience, but it is fine. As for the gameplay, it is not very deep or anything, just a common rail shooter where you decide if you want to calm the girls quickly, get their measurements or look for extras. The mini-games are simply as well, not very challenging or anything. Even the rubbing thing is very tame compared to other games.

Overall it is just a fun game for people like me who like teh girlz.

Games beaten in 2017:

01/08 - XBlaze Lost: Memories (PSV)
01/14 - Sakura Swim Club (PC)
02/05- Hitman: Blood Money (PC)
04/24- A Kiss for The Petals: Remembering How We Met (PC)
06/17 - Deus Ex: Human Revolution (PC)
07/16 - Lucy - The Eternity She Wished For (PC)
08/06 - Sword Art Online: Hollow Fragment (PSV)
08/09 - Gal*Gun: Double Peace (PSV)
08/27 - Drive Girls (PSV)

A great candidate of my game of the year so far, since it is the only 2017 release I have played till now. But the game was surprisingly good for what it was. Being a low-budget title developed to make use of the Tamsoft engine, it has less less story assets and characters than the other more high-profile games developed using the same engine, like the Neptunia and Senran Kagura ones. There are only five playable characters and another one who is not playable. There aren't also many variations in their portraits, just a few ones, and the dialogue is usually short. The story is very simple, and goes round the motivation for girls to battle and enemies' plans, plus some bullying against the best girl. Even the fanservice is very limited, a few scenes with girls in swinsuit, talking about their body assets and a few words of scrubing each other in showers and baths, without fanservicey images. The game also suffers from limitations of the other Tamsoft games developed with the same engine, which are the lack of variety in scenarios an enemies.

The part that made the game shine for me was the gameplay. In my opinion, it is a lot better than the other games. I am not a huge fan of the hack 'n' slash genre, they are mostly games I play for a change of pace after a streak of RPGs, but Drive Girls gameplay pressed the right buttons with me. The coolest thing is the possibility of turning into a car and playing like that, not only the few racing stages (which unfortunately are very few), but in the battle stages as well, and many times it is really a great strategy. Talking about strategy, the thing I liked most is that all the characters are very resourceful. Unlike most of these games where characters have a specific combat style and you have to choose the best characters for each kind of stage or have a hard time trying with the ones not suited for that kind of enemy, in Drive Girls all the characters are resourceful and can be used in every stage. Some characters are better than others in their main skills, but you have ranged attacks, close combat, special hit-and-run moves and the turning into car thing. It takes some skill to master all the possibilities, but it is very nice to many times having to change the battle strategy completely in the middle of a stage to overcome the challenges, without having to restart the battle or change the character. I had a great time facing the challenges many stages posed, and trying to come up with solutions to difficult parts where nothing seemed to work.

Since these games are mostly about gameplay, I ended enjoying it a lot. Despite being a low-budget game, from a genre I am not very much fond of, I liked it more than I expected I would . Of course there was also dat Lanciera...

Kinda forgot to update:

Games beaten in 2017:

01/08 - XBlaze Lost: Memories (PSV)
01/14 - Sakura Swim Club (PC)
02/05- Hitman: Blood Money (PC)
04/24- A Kiss for The Petals: Remembering How We Met (PC)
06/17 - Deus Ex: Human Revolution (PC)
07/16 - Lucy - The Eternity She Wished For (PC)
08/06 - Sword Art Online: Hollow Fragment (PSV)
08/09 - Gal*Gun: Double Peace (PSV)
08/27 - Drive Girls (PSV)
08/28 - MegaTagmension Blanc + Neptune VS Zombies (PSV)

When I stopped playing MegaTagmension Blanc in order to play Drive Girls, I thought I was only halfway through the game or so, but I was very close to the end, so when I resumed it, it took me only a couple of hours to finish it. From all the Neptunia spin-offs I have played, so far this one seems to be the most rushed game, being too similar to Hyperdimension Neptunia U: Action Unleashed in structure, gameplay, models, characters, etc.

The story is also a mere excuse to throw the beloved characters in silly and humorous situations, much like Action Unleashed, but with the problem of being almost the same thing again. The best thing about the story is making fun of bad plots of zombie-themed movies by making a story about characters filming a terrible zombie movie.

The gameplay is fine as Action Unleashed, but looks a lot more repetitive because it is very similar to the same Neptunia game developed by Tamsoft, with the problem of being too easy and having even less variety than the predecessor. Most of the time I looked at the stage description which kind of enemy was the main target and chose either the character that beat 90% of the stages just using its strong attack, or the other character that used ranged attacks. The online addition is not very interesting as well, it is just doing the same thing with other people.

That being so, none of the Neptunia spin-offs are really essential, but MegaTagmension Blanc + Neptunia VS Zombies is really the less essential, ideal only for people who is a fan of the series and bought in a sale.

09/11 - Atelier Ayesha (PS3)

After enjoying a lot the games from Arland series I have played (the first two), I decided to play another game, but I was not so inclined to start Meruru, so I decided to pick up Atelier Ayesha instead because Ayesha was the prettiest protagonist of the series, so it had to be good in some way. Besides being very Atelierish, I quite liked the way the game progresses and the story is told, with a lot more freedom than the Arland counterparts. One thing that I enjoyed in the game is that you don't depend on the assignments that much, and the progression of the story feels much more seamless than Totori, and especially Rorona.

The game also seemed longer than these two to me, and it took me much more time to finish a complete playthrough even though I had the feeling I spent less time exploring and fighting than in the previous games. The gameplay was very similar than the games from Arland series, with some nice quirks to the alchemy system, but it is very simple to get the most of both systems. I quite liked the Diary system that incentivates you to finish plotlines in order to get some stat bonuses.

The plot was very compeling too, with an interesting main plot, comparable to Totori, and interesting characters with their side stories. I quite like the colorful and down-to-earth characters from Atelier series in comparison to the characters from epic RPG games, and Atelier Ayesha isn't an exception. Some characters are very nice, some girls are great too (dat Linca, dat Nanaca). One remarkable thing about it in contrast to Arland is that the world has some story that is intriguing, but isn't too intrusive.

Overall I had a great time playing it and I am almost sad that the experience has come to an end. Above all... dat Ayesha. To know her is to love her.

09/15 - Touhou Genso Rondo: Bullet Ballet (PS4)

This is that kind of game that is difficult to call "finished", and I considered finished since I have finished all the story mode stories. My overall impression about the game is that it was a nice idea of mixing fighting with shmup, and the implementation was okay. Battles were mostly fine because there is a decent variety of moves among characters and there are different strengths and weaknesses, leading to different playing strategies. There were some mechanics, though, like the spells, there were not implemented very well, since they are a lose-lose situation against AI.

The story mode is, like many fighting games, just something to add flavor to the game. The stories are rather silly, comprising of a main plot explained in a couple of lines that gives motivation for the girls to fight, some dumb dialogue between the characters before the fights to give a reason for them fighting (and most of the time the reason is "no reason"), and a conclusion for the story in a few lines. The stories are mostly attempts at something humorous, but only a few ones are somewhat funny.

The other modes are something you'd expect from a fighting game: battle till you die, battle against another player and online, which is a barren wasteland as always with such games. They are what you expect from fighting games.

As a low-budget game, it is like many of these games: nice idea not fulfilled by limitations on its implementation. As a cheap game, it can provide some hours of enjoyment, especially if you are into Touhou or have people to play against PVP. It is nothing more than that, though.

At last I've finished a very recent game (irony inside) : Castle of Illusion !
Not recent but excellent and I've never finished it ! Only played a lot on my Master System some years ago and tried it on MD but here it was on MD

Well, over the weekend I finished Kid Icarus: of Myths and Monsters in one sitting on 3DS virtual console. It was alright. It was fun. Easier than the original overall. Considering it was $4 I'd say I got my money's worth.

My next goals are finishing my Horizon Zero Dawn Ultra Hard difficulty run before November 7th, which is when the Frozen Wilds releases. Last time I played I finished the last side quest, so now I can basically cruise through the rest of the story content. I'm just deciding if I want to go full on completion with some of the side activities like clearing out the corrupted zones since I did 100% my original play through...in my opinion, that's actually the most difficult thing in the game as one of the corrupted zone features two corrupted Rockbreakers, which are among the toughest and most frustrating machines to fight (even worse when corrupted), especially when there's two of them. I'm also not allowing myself to do any fast travel, and I want to pick up all the highest level gear (one of which requires two Rockbreaker hearts to trade for).

I also want to finish Pokemon Moon's story before Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon release on October 17. I preordered them on Amazon (been AGES since I preordered a game!) for the 20% discount for Prime members. One of them is a birthday gift for my boyfriend, the other is for me. Haven't decided which version I'll keep for myself...waiting for there to be version exclusives list available so I can decide if I want story details to be consistent, or more easily fill out out my Pokedex. Right now I'm learning towards keeping Ultra Sun for myself, because I like both version mascot legendaries but I could only choose one last year. Solgaleo is pretty boss (I mean...sun lion, come on), but Moon only has Lunala, who is pretty amazingly elegant in design. Also I've ultimately come to prefer Sun's overall version exclusives more after trading for some of them, with the sole exception of Moon's version of Lycanroc. An article just came out today that version exclusives are going to remain consistent for US/UM, but there's also going to a lot more legendaries available from previous generations. So we'll see. I have very little interest in the competitive scene, though I may do some breeding of my favorite Pokes post-game just to get perfect versions of them which will be (relatively) easy since I imported Pokes from my Red save, but I am trying to build a living dex in Pokemon bank.

Also seeking to finish New Super Mario Bros. 2 before the end of the year. Again, dunno if I'll just want to defeat Bowser or do any extras/get all the star coins. Got to World 3 last night.

Last night I sat down for a while with New Super Mario Bros. 2 and beat Bowser. I ultimately chose not to get all the star coins or go for the "get a million coins" thing. Sure, the game was fun, but the core gameplay doesn't have the staying power for me to get all the star coins (and then do more of the same with the unlock able worlds) or grind out that many standard coins.