So another month has gone by and wow! That went faster than last month, it's as if there were fewer days or something...
Anyway, bad jokes aside, let's see what I managed to play and beat last month:
Games CompletedSenran Kagura Bon Appétit! Package A (Hanzo x Crimson) (Vita) Trophies*** Spoiler - click to reveal ***
Right, let me just get something out of the way first after the reaction to last month's blog...
BOOBS!!!
There, now you can concentrate on reading the rest of the blog!
I managed to tie up this game last month. Man, the grind on this one was pretty bad but buying the DLC sure helped relieve the boredom somewhat.
It's not a terrible game by any stretch, in fact, pretty fun when you play on Hard difficulty but it just lacks a certain spark, can't really put my finger on it.
The Hatsune Miku Hatsune Miku Project DIVA Series and Persona 4: Dancing All Night (EU) (Vita) Trophies are much better choices imo, though if you were to see this on a pretty good sale and like the other Senran Kagura games, I'd say give this one a go!
Personal Difficulty Rating: 4/10 Personal Game Rating: 3/5
Ginger: Beyond The Crystal Trophies*** Spoiler - click to reveal ***
It's safe to say when I first saw this game, I was pretty eager to play it as it's certainly very reminiscent of old school platformers such as Banjo-Kazooie or Jak and Daxter.
However, sadly, the execution of this one was somewhat flawed.
In any event: the core gameplay is pretty good. The idea is that you go through a few hub worlds collecting small crystals (for currency/saving residents/building houses) and purifying larger ones as part of the main storyline.
There are also missions you can do in the hub worlds in between doing the main level ones, plus some more hardcore platforming challenges (which are mostly pretty simple imo).
However, while the developers have made some big strides in patching the game so far, some problems still persist.
I had to go through the entire game again because I quit out of it when I hadn't done all the available hub world missions, only to reboot it and find that the missions had disappeared and there was no way to trigger them again. :(
Pretty annoying when they were the last ones I had to do. It was late and I thought the final boss/credits might've taken some time, of course...that proved to be wrong...because neither of those things happened!
Seriously, a real letdown!
Also, I found that the hub world missions really started to get repetitive pretty fast as they amounted to the same 3 things: a race, collect a certain item or beat up a few enemies and no real variation besides...
It's a real shame as I think there's a lot of potential here and I'd quite like to see a sequel putting a lot of these issues (and others) right but as it is, I can't wholeheartedly recommend this game right now. Maybe once they've patched it/it's on a big sale.
Personal Difficulty Rating: 4/10 Personal Game Rating: 2.5/5 (3.5 w/o glitches)
Monster Jam: Crush It! Trophies*** Spoiler - click to reveal ***
There comes a time in every trophy hunter's life where he/she needs that fix of easy trophies...
Fair to say this and the next game were indicative of that for me.
Best way of describing this probably is that it's the bastard child of Rock 'N Racing Off Road DX Trophies and Trials Fusion Trophies, only not nearly as good as the latter and not even as good as the former, worryingly. :P
It plays well enough but aside from that, it's pretty limited. You don't get all too many tracks or modes and some of them feel outright redundant (the: "races" in particular). Collecting the: "CRUSH" letters could've proved fun if not for the fact that some of them seem literally impossible to get (of course, they're not but w/o some weird exploit or another).
Plus the trophies mean you don't even need to collect them all so I would imagine most people won't bother.
I'm honestly amazed that this is a series, tbh as I've played 2 of them and they're both pretty rubbish imo.
It's also probably the 2nd most overpriced title on the store after Adam's Venture: Origins Trophies, though at least that game, I thought was pretty enjoyable. Definitely do not get this unless it's a PS+ title or on a huge sale would be my advice!
Personal Difficulty Rating: 2/10 Personal Game Rating: 2/5
Monster Jam Battlegrounds Trophies*** Spoiler - click to reveal ***
So this is the other one I played and this one pretty much has the opposite problem.
The content on offer is more acceptable but playability in some parts leaves a lot to be desired.
The construction of the career mode is vastly more interesting than its PS4 counterpart, though. A bit more varied with the challenges on offer but there are still better alternatives out there imo.
However, it is VERY laggy! Seriously, I can't think of a game that's had such shoddy framerate as this one off the top of my head. Literally Stutter City Centre!
The Freestyle mode is a complete joke too. You pretty much have zero control over the stunts you pull off while trying to beat those challenges.
As such, I can only really recommend this as a means to get a relatively easy Gold Rush Plat!
Personal Difficulty Rating: 3/10 Personal Game Rating: 1.5/5
Starwhal (EU) (PS3) Trophies*** Spoiler - click to reveal ***
Having already beaten the PS4 version a year or so ago and seeing as this was free via cross-buy, plus as it was (and still currently is) a PS+ title, I figured now was the time to go back and do this version. :P
My assessment of the first game was that it was decent but could've been vastly better.
This version is definitely worse. Not nearly as smooth while playing but besides that, pretty much the same game.
The biggest sticking point for many will be the wonky controls. Seriously some of the worst I've come across in a game.
However, IDK why but when you manage to lick each Challenge Mode level and get that Platinum Medal, there's something quite rewarding about it. Maybe it's just a sense of relief, IDK.
We had a discussion not too long ago on the forums about what constitutes difficulty: How Hard is Hard? and this game makes me think of one aspect that seemed to have been missed (though I might be wrong as I only skimmed through that just now)
Artificial difficulty.
The luck argument being one of them but imo, having deliberately bad controls designed to hold you back on purpose rather than making the controls tight and asking for insane time requirements, this is not something I'm a fan of, really.
The mulitplayer grind was a real chore, though thankfully, they seem to have finally fixed it so you don't need to do it all in one session like I did when I first did the PS4 version.
Finally: thanks to the awesome Harris59 for figuring out the problem with the
his solution applies to both versions!
In any case, as this was free, I'd say add it to your library (you have until Tuesday before the new games come up) and then you can always play it if you feel like it later but just be prepared to get a bit frustrated with the controls at first.
Personal Difficulty Rating: 5/10 Personal Game Rating: 2/5
Söldner-X 2: Final Prototype (Physical) (Vita) Trophies*** Spoiler - click to reveal ***
Fun story with this one.
I originally saw this game crop up on PSNP a while ago and wondered why this version had a Platinum trophy and the others didn't.
Turns out that this, along with Rainbow Moon and a few others has its own separate trophy list.
I then noticed that it had another run for some reason on PlayAsia so I had a look and thought: "£20, not too bad!" so I decided to get it.
Of course, as it was coming from Hong Kong, I knew there'd be a pretty big shipping cost and I was prepared to pay it, however, I didn't foresee the insane amount the courier company would charge for it...
In the end, I ended up paying about £55 for it when I could've paid £10 for a PS3/Vita cross-buy with 2 separate lists albeit without Platinums! So yeah, not doing that again.
Thank goodness, then, that this game is actually pretty darn good!
It's a side-scrolling shooter, which has a few neat tricks up its sleeve.
Probably its bread and butter is the dynamic rank system, which increases/decreases depending on your performance. On Rank G, it's pretty much Baby difficulty. Once you get to Rank S, though, it becomes borderline bullet hell!
The other differing aspect of this one is the secret keys, which equally brings about the only major negative I found with this game, will get onto that in a bit. These keys are required to unlock later levels (you only have the first 4 available at the start) and also some of the challenges as a by-product of accessing these levels.
The other main mode is the Challenge Mode, which as you would expect ranges from pretty darn easy to borderline impossible!
The actual core game I would say is probably the most fun shooter I've played since Velocity 2X Trophies or Geometry Wars³: Dimensions Trophies, really great level design and varied bosses!
However, I feel that some of the challenges are a little bit unfair or certainly borderline, mainly
This requires you to get 600,000 points in a small amount of time and I could only consistently get about 500,000, the only reason I beat it was because I got 2 extra score bonuses (worth 50K on C Rank) that aren't always guaranteed!
However, it was this challenge that really highlighted the major problem I had with this game:
This requires you to get all 5 keys in Stage 9 in one run. The biggest problem with the keys is that they don't all appear 100% reliably.
Some of them require you to be a certain rank (D or Higher for earlier keys, B or higher most of the time for key 5), which in itself wouldn't be too bad...except even if you get through the level and keep your rank fine (or even use a continue exploit by playing on Very Hard or above, killing yourself off and using a continue just before a key location), you still might not get it due to the fact that some keys have a 50% spawn rate!
This is the biggest problem I have with the game. It's really annoying to be skilful and get to that point and technically deserve the key, only for the game to be like: "F you! You're not getting it this time!" and you have to fail a few more times before finally getting it!
Despite this, however, overall, this is a fantastic shooter, which I would highly recommend, though not for the insane price I paid for it.
Personal Difficulty Rating: 7/10 Personal Game Rating: 4/5
So, that does it for the games I completed last month! 6 Platinums again, still on course for my target of 200 total by the end of 2017!
Onto the one game I played but didn't complete:
Games PlayedFinal Fantasy XV (EU) Trophies*** Spoiler - click to reveal ***
The end is in sight, I think! After last month, where I barely did any of the story, I am now all but finished with it.
Obviously, I'm not gonna give too much away nor really give my final thought on it as yet but safe to say, I've been pretty impressed with the game overall! It might even get the full 5 stars but we will see.
There have been a couple of humourous occurences while playing.
While doing a quest for this fisherman guy (Nawyn or something, I forget lol), I was talking to him about catching this fish he'd asked me to get and he was like: "oh well done!" etc. During the conversation, Ignis suddenly appeared above him and was hovering on top of his head!
However, the funnier story was when I was driving along to some quest or another, IDK which and I was listening to some FFXIII music in all likelihood. While I was waiting to reach my destination, I was browsing on t'interwebs, likely replying to some of you in the friend feed. Everything was going smoothly.
All of a sudden, I heard a sudden change in noise coming from the game and my gaze was averted to what was happening.
I was greeted by Ignis saying: "It appears we've run out of gas" LOL!
So the moral of the story is: don't get distracted by anything while driving!
So that concludes last month's activity! Now onto the stats!
5 games started, 7 games played, 6 games completed (All Platinums!)
180 trophies for 6,990 XP worth 12,718 TT!
Milestones achieved:
Playstation Level 33
150 completed games
330,000 TT score
5,750 trophies won
Games I'll possibly play in MarchWell, it's a given that
Final Fantasy XV (EU) Trophies will feature and should hopefully be one of my completions.
Other than that, well...
I'm thinking of possibly moving onto another JRPG once I'm done with FFXV, which one, I haven't decided yet.
Besides that, I'm pretty sure I'll be completing
Grim Legends: The Forsaken Bride Trophies. another Artifex Mundi game, though with a lower Gold trophy amount than usual. :( Lol.
Also thinking about
Chime Sharp Trophies as I enjoyed the original on the 360,
Typoman: Revised, maybe finally
Shantae: Half-Genie Hero Trophies and I daresay there might be one or 2 games I play this month that surprise you but you'll have to wait and see what those are. ;)
Final thoughtsSo another month has ended and the big releases keep on coming! People have been enjoying
Horizon Zero Dawn Trophies and
Nioh Remastered Trophies and with more potentially great games coming up, such as
Persona 5 (JP) Trophies and
Yooka-Laylee Trophies, it's safe to say our wallets could be worse for wear before long. XD
I also learnt something awesome last month.
Rabi-Ribi Trophies is due to come out this year and I tell you, it's probably my favourite indie game to date! So epic!!!
Possibly the only time a trailer has actually sold me on the game outright! The only other time I can think of that came close was the Xenoblade Chronicles one and you know how much I like that game if you've been on my list for a while! :D
I can't wait to talk about Rabi-Ribi in my blog in the future, I hope it has a Plat but even if it's a stinky All Bronze No Plat, I shall still play it! I'd guess it will have a Plat, though!
Seriously, as long as they don't mess up the port, I HIGHLY recommend you check it out when it comes out!!!!!!!!!!! There, fangasm over! XD
Other than that, not much to say except thank you for reading if you did.
So, sexy commenters (I guess this might be the ongoing joke from now on) XD, what games did you play (and hopefully enjoy) and what are you looking forward to now we are into Spring? I look forward to hearing from you in the comments!