I rarely play fighting games for fun, but I've always been curious to see what's going on in the genre. And, I think I hit "gold" with this game - bought completely blind.
It's a fighting game featuring only female-presenting characters. A bunch of them, I didn't count nor did I bother to unlock a bunch of ones presumably also available for play. As far as I can tell, and I did play around with a four or five of them, they're all strange/weird in what seem to me unconventional ways. For example, one of the characters is a "cat lady" - by this I mean that the character has lots of cats as pets and that the attacks are mostly done vie the cats rather than the character herself. All of the buttons work just as they do for other characters - it's the animations that are different (as far as I can tell), and funny.
I played a few campaign runs with the characters- just to see what was going on and how the game worked. As expected the difficulty ramps up but I was able to make progress despite my meagre skills. I then realized that there's an option to alter the difficulty (10 different options if I recall) so I played on the easiest just to see how the campaigns ended and what happened.
Also, perhaps more importantly for me - the game has a crazy story that I was not able to make any sense of other than it being heavily HP Lovecraft inspired, but modern sci-fi with magic and...well, lots of nonsense to be honest. I was surprised by how much story there is - visual novel style presentation, lots of screens and so on. Like, LOTS of reading.
Once you finish the campaign, you unlock a NEW campaign - and this is where the reading/visual novel stuff goes all-in! Like I said, it really made very little sense to me - there's the necronomicon, there's demons, and so on. But all in the context of cute sexy female characters. But, the game's rated T (teen), so it's not really creepy in that sense.But still, I keep going back to the fighting game thing and here's an example with all female characters. But, who are they for? (I'm thinking representation - is this a game for boys/men as the intended audience?) I don't really know - but the game's lore heavily suggests that the characters are all from different places (other games I presume) and that they've sort of come together here in a special game - with the story even playing with the cross-over idea (and how they're all trapped in the game just for you to play/mess around).
Anyways, I don't have much to say about the gameplay because - well, I didn't explore it all that deeply - there's counters and stuff. Super bars AND two teammates that can tag in for an attack. The games tutorial features are good enough for me - but, like I said, I don't play fighting games for fun personally, so I wasn't particularly interested or motivated in learning all the characters (though I did try to do some cool stuff with one at least).
Wow, they really nailed the (imagined) experience of being Iron Man as seen in the movies. You basically do a similar thing with your hands to what Iron Man does to hover, fly around, attack and more. You have to use the PS Move controllers (the "lollipop" ones) - and I have a hard time remembering to charge - and keep them charge (I charge everything off the PS4, so I can only charge one things at a time).
The game is definitely more tiring for me to play than other PSVR games I've been playing recently - I think it's mostly because there's more hand movements and more turning around and stuff. I almost want to say I also lean forward and back as Iron Man but that is probably just the natural response (that has a name, but I'm forgetting it - e.g. same as when you lean over when playing a driving game)
I appreciated the narrative parts of the game - but there's a lot more of them than what I expected and they're also a lot longer than what I expected. To the point I was starting to feel tired just from standing there listening to the characters chit chat and stuff. There's also more depth to the game's systems and mechanics than I expected - more than I was willing to engage/indulge in - mostly for time rather than interest.
Is the game any fun? Well, it nails the Iron Man experience and can feel quite exhilarating at times - for all the good reasons. So, yes - definitely an good example of using VR in smart ways - I guess the more I think about it, the more I realize that I really wanted to just play missions and not have (most) of the story stuff - which I get is important, but also felt it was less interesting and tiring?
I think I played 3 campaign missions? (before deciding to shelve the game). I didn't get to experience the full depth of the upgrade and options system - but that's ok.
I like going into a game blind and then being surprised. Especially when my expectations are low (here, a game that I picked up in the "discount" bin).
I must have played 2-3 hours last night? I stopped playing when I got to what is probably (should be?) the "real" beginning of the game. (it was also getting late).
So, what's the game - I have really strong assassin's creed vibes, though the game features none of the acrobatic stuff, also strong Dishonored vibes - but I think also without the wild combat and movement? It's 3rd person, so that's also different.
The setting is dark fantasy age of discovery? So, conquistadores - but there's magic. You start the game in a city on the eve of your departure to an exotic island that everyone is excited about, they complain about the savages, and there is treasure to be found and hopefully a cure for a disease that is killing everyone (slowly). I think it's called malichor (the disease).
The game really has lots of RPG stuff happening - so, maybe I should be more reminded of the Dragon Age game I played? The setting is strong - which I think goes to the Dishonored vibes - and the movement feels more Assassin's Creedy? (less elegant in animation, and less populated). BUT, the world/vibe is really strong and I'm enjoying that. I've been promised crafting and potion making (my character is a "mage") and there's loot/equipment upgrading as well. It seems like a AAA game that flew under the radar for many?
Oh, there's also supposed to be giant crazy beasts and stuff (Monster Hunter vibes?). For now I've been limited to a small city where I wandered around, talked to diplomats from the other two major players in the game, did favors, screwed one diplomat over (told them why I did not to them a favor), and noticed there's a faction allegiance/support system as well.
I'm playing on easy - so I'm not too worried about the action-based combat - I do like that there's a pause system so you can do stuff, like trigger potion drinking to heal, swap weapons, and so on.
I'm also intrigued about the game's name - Greedfall! There's obviously all the colonial/imperial stuff happening - I'm guessing things will go south because of our greed in plundering everything? Demons on the island?
I played this some 5-6 hours last weekend. Most of that was across two sessions - so, a fair amount of time with the PSVR helmet if you ask me. The game was that much fun that I really didn't notice the time fly. I was tired by the end though.
The first big session I played without updating the game (it was a huge download and it was pretty slow) - so I was not able to play online. I would for the second session, but more on that later.
As expected you play a tank - and you shoot stuff, and there's different types of tanks with different weapons and armor/weight/speed, etc. Everything is low-poly stylized such a way as to be purposefully retro-looking. There's different types of missions and enemies, and an overarching progression system wherein you unlock the kinds of weapons and things you could get from enemies and at "resupply" points.
It's pretty fun. I enjoyed it!
I was surprised to learn (perhaps I once knew and forgot) that the game's a rogue-like, you choose how long and hard you want your campaign to be! A campaign is basically a large map made up of hexes. You're supposed to get to a volcano on the last one - along the way you can scan (to see what's in the hexes) and then plot your path through the map. There are a variety of location - e.g. shields that are harder fights but will result in the final boss (volcano map) being a little easier, places to resupply (chance to buy new weapons/upgrades), and so on. There are even narrative/story type events! These often ask that you make a decision (e.g. there's a busted tank, do you investigate? It might be a trap...). Some of these are even multi-stage - I did one where I first rescued some scientists, then I could escort them to safety as a separate mission.
As you move across the map an "enemy tracker" (it's not called that, I just don' remember what it's actually called) keeps on going up - making the enemy stronger. It sometimes spawns a nemesis - that is a super tough tank (it often one-shot killed me) you can presumably defeat (I never did) so you should mostly avoid if possible. It moves around on the hex-map - so you can see where it might go, but depending on the hex map you just might have to face it.
In addition to the possibility of hex-map special location upgrades (these were mostly underwhelming, but maybe that's because I hadn't unlocked enough of them)? You can upgrade your tank directly - improving shields, reloading (I think this was mostly an ever-improving active reload system where you can reload faster and get boosts to damage), healing for allies, and better range for picking up credits/loot). On a short run I don't think it's possible to max out your tank, but this might be doable on a long campaign?
I failed miserably on all the short campaigns I played solo - mostly 'cause I died to the nemesis! But also because I was figuring out a bunch of things and how they worked.
Then I installed the update (game changed to Battlezone Gold Edition) - this version no longer required a PSVR! (but I still played in VR). Now I could play online...and it looks like there was something like 3 other people playing online? I joined a game - it fell apart, then I created a game - or joined another one. Eventually we got a group of 3 strangers and we played two campaigns! Died on the first, but beat the second one! It's definitely more fun with other tanks - you can revive fallen opponents (within a time window), you can heal each other (maxxing out on the healing ability is a good idea), and you can see other tank weapons in play. It was fun - and it was nice to learn from other more experienced players (one already had the platinum trophy for the game).
I've been trying to play my PSVR games (in anticipation of PSVR2)....and I'm hesitant to call it done on this one (to move on to another) just because it was...well, fun!
