What games have you been playing lately?

[Ravenfreak]

What games have you been playing lately? I started playing Wild Arms on my PS5, I upgraded my PS+ membership and this is one of the PS classic games available. I've been meaning to give this old PS1 rpg a go. Fun fact, the normal battle theme from this game is hidden in my favorite RPG on the PS1, Legend of Legaia! I'm not entirely sure why that song appears in a completely different game, but it does.

[WolfofWords]

I've been playing Witcher 3 (first playthrough), Steam Dig 2 (fourth playthrough), Hypnospace Outlaw (second playthrough), and Slime Rancher (second playthrough).

[CrazyCraftLady]

I've been playing phone games - Empires and Puzzles, and Matchington Mansion.

[WolfofWords]

I've also been playing Dislyte and Marvel Strike Force on my phone.

[WolfofWords]

[WolfofWords]

[WolfofWords]

Tom Clancy’s The Division (2016)

I remember seeing some gameplay of this online when it came out but nobody I knew was really playing it. I ultimately decided to pick it up because I was searching for looter shooter games similar to the Borderlands series. I am not a huge fan of first-person shooters but games like Borderlands and the later Fallout franchise have changed my mind a bit. The “looter shooter” has the player run around in a more or less open world and collect loot to slowly get stronger. I really like the ability to give up on a hard part and grind elsewhere. It helps with the frustration of difficult areas.

I have not played a lot of Tom Clancy games as they are usually too difficult or are outright propaganda for the military-industrial complex. This game did not push either of those buttons for me so I felt comfortable playing it. This game takes place in a New York City that has been hit with a bioengineered smallpox variant virus called The Dollar Flu. The sickness has quickly eradicated much of the population leading to a rapid breakdown in society. Your player is part of a civilian sleeper agent who is called up by the Strategic Homeland Division to assist a joint task force (JTF) of the military, police, firefighters, national guard, disaster relief organizations, and civilians.

The city has been divided up by the JTF and three gangs. The Rioters are garden-variety citizens upset by the state of things and are taking advantage by looting and hurting people. The Rikers are escaped prisoners from Rikers Island who are trying to take over sections of New York to establish a territory to prevent their return to prison. The Cleaners are disgruntled sanitation workers who have decided that the only solution is to burn anything and anybody deemed to be unclean instead of actually curing the virus. Eventually, the player discovers an independent militia run by JTF defectors called the Last Man Battalion. The player must fight everyone to obtain data on the virus to help find a cure.


Alba: A Wildlife Adventure (2020)

This is a super cute game that came out during the perfect time. There is no danger in this game and nothing physical to fight. You play as a young girl named Alba who is visiting her grandparents on the Spanish island they live on for the weekend during summer. As soon as she arrives, she finds that the local wildlife sanctuary is going to be bulldozed for a new high-rise hotel. Alba and her friend Ines resolve to save the sanctuary and get signatures for a petition. The game is played by searching for wildlife to take pictures of. Alba can also clean up trash and rescue wildlife from the folly of man. By repairing things on the island and raising awareness, Alba is eventually able to get the town to rally around the wildlife sanctuary and shame the mayor into rejecting the hotel. It has a great environmental message and accurately displays the majesty of nature and the ultimate goodness of human beings.



Dying Light (2015)

I believe I had seen gameplay of this one online and I actually got this game for free on the Epic Games Store. This is a first-person action survival game that pits the player against both humans and zombies. The main draw of this game is its commitment to its parkour system. The majority of zombies lack the cognitive and physical ability to climb so staying safe is often as easy as jumping from roof to roof. It takes some getting used to but the system really flows once you get the knack for it. The game also has a rich crafting system as you have to scrounge up items and weapons and sometimes combine them for more power. Your fellow survivors also need items that you can get as somebody able to survive outside of safe shelters.

You play as an undercover government agent of the Global Relief Effort (GRE) named Kyle Crane, an American dropped into the fictional Middle Eastern city of Harran. You are tasked with retrieving a file stolen by a rogue agent that could be used for blackmail. On arrival, Crane befriends the main group of survivors who are good people who are struggling to keep going while also helping a doctor amongst them study the virus. The virus causes people to become hyper-aggressive zombies until they devolve into slow-shambling zombies. Crane finds out that the local warlord has the file he was supposed to retrieve and sets out to take him out and retrieve the file.

I have not yet completed the game but Crane slowly rejects his posting and sympathizes with the good people of Harran. I am running into the GRE now turning against Crane in favor of a better deal which will probably end up being the warlord. The game had an amazing, slow progression which allowed me to adjust to new gameplay mechanics. It just recently threw me for a loop in the best way. The game predictably has a lot of great emotional beats that are terrifying, exhilarating, and touching.

[WolfofWords]

Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart (2021)

When I was a kid, we got ourselves a PlayStation 2 which was a great and formative period in video game history. Games suddenly had story and voice acting along with fun gameplay. One franchise that I gravitated toward was Ratchet and Clank. I was directed to that franchise from Jak and Daxter, a game that I loved and still love. While the Jak and Daxter sequels were kind of disappointing, Ratchet and Clank remained consistent.

The franchise follows a Lombax named Ratchet who is an engineer and reluctant hero. He is paired with Clank, a small, nebbish robot who is often the voice of reason. The game is a third-person shooter and its strength is in the buttload of fun and innovative weapons in each game. I played Ratchet and Clank, R&C: Going Commando, and R&C: Up Your Arsenal on PS2. Each has a large amount of charm and fun gameplay built on constantly evolving weaponry and humorous stories. I never played the games between 2004 and 2016 because I never had a PS3 or PS4.

When the new game came out in 2021, I was blown away by the game’s visuals and innovation of the mechanics of the original games. I saw a little gameplay on Barry Kramer’s stream but I really wanted to play the game. I had no desire to purchase a PS5 though. I haven’t bought a console since X-Box 360. But lo and behold, the game came to PC fairly recently and then it went on sale.

The game was just as fun as the ones that I remembered but even more so because everything was just so much smoother. The graphics are gorgeous and the gameplay was very sweet. In this adventure, Ratchet and Clank have a parade thrown in their honor (along with allies they have made throughout the games) but it is interrupted by their nemesis Dr. Nefarious. The battle goes awry when Nefarious’ Dimensionator is hit by an errant shot from Ratchet’s gun. This sends the pair of heroes into a parallel universe where they encounter dimensional counterparts Rivet and Kit.

The player controls experienced hero Ratchet and resistance member Rivet in a darker version of the universe previously seen. A world where Nefarious won and became Emperor Nefarious. Worse, there are now two Nefariouses in that universe. The heroes must team up to gather power and allies to combat this new yet familiar threat. This means that the player must travel to all new planets with some new mechanics. My favorite mechanic is the inclusion of Blizon crystals. These crystals have absorbed dimensional energy and when struck, send Ratchet or Rivet into an alternate timeline version of the planet they are on. This leads to some great puzzles and even better stories.

I actually ended up beating the game over the course of a week. It took an even 40 hours to beat the game and then go on to 100% the game by getting all of the achievements. I thoroughly sucked the marrow from this game. My only complaint is that it felt so short. I have heard rumors of yet another sequel and I will be there (as soon as it ports to PC).



Ducktales: Remastered (2011)

You better believe that I was a fan of the original Ducktales cartoon as it provided a more action-packed take on the classic Disney characters. It also revitalized a lot of those characters in my mind. The original game came out on NES back in 1990 when I was still a wee lad. I do not remember it as much as the show but it was well-received. When I heard about the remastered version, I was intrigued but I never purchased it. Luckily for me, it has recently become super cheap on Steam. I misremembered and thought that the remastered version was released in tandem with the 2017 series but it was not and has a different style.

This was a nostalgia ride as it maintains all of the simple Nintendo gameplay. You play as Scrooge McDuck as he travels the world to retrieve treasures along with his nephews, Abigail, Ms. Beasely, Launchpad McQuack, Fenton Crackshell, Gyro Gearloose, and Bubba the Caveduck. They face off against Flintheart Glomgold, the Beagle Boys, Magica De Spell, a yeti, a statue, aliens, the Terra-Firmians, and Dracula Duck.

The gameplay is simple as Scrooge attacks by using his cane to either pogo jump or golf swing. The pogo jump is most of the movement of the game. Most enemies are defeated by jumping on their heads with the cane. The only other movement is the use of minecarts and climbing ropes.

I finished the game within maybe two hours and it was a lot of fun. The game looked way better than the original as new sprites and backgrounds were hand-drawn for the game. The game also included a voice cast which was not possible when the original was made. It was a cheap game but a fun game and one I might go back and beat again. It also included Scrooge’s iconic dive into his money bin which can be done anytime between levels. The reason to replay the game is to continue to unlock beautiful concept artwork.

[WolfofWords]

I suppose with the way that the Internet is obsessed with cats, it would be inevitable that cats would be the stars of various video games. So, of course there are plenty of games where you can play as a cat or a cat-like creature. Probably the most recent is the game Stray where you play as a realistic cat in a post-apocalyptic science-fiction setting. Super Mario 3D World’s Bowser’s Fury DLC has Mario dressed up as a cat with cat abilities (something they put in the movie). Persona 5 has a cat-like creature named Morgana. But I’m not here to talk about any of those games. I’m here to talk about the first two Cat Quest games both of which I recently beat. I have not bought Cat Quest III yet but I highly recommend it without playing a moment of it based on the first two games.


Cat Quest (2017)

The game is a hack-and-slash role-playing game where you play as a nameless cat who can wield a sword and wear armor. Like a lot of RPGs, one of the main mechanics is to collect different armor sets and weapons. The main way to do that is through a Gacha system with the blacksmith Kit Kat. Along with swinging a sword, the player character can cast spells and do a tactical roll to dodge attacks. The enemies in the game are monsters with an emphasis on slaying dragons. The NPCs (except two) are all cats and, predictably, the game is full of cat puns.

The game begins with a yellow cat on a boat with his sister. A white cat appears and steals the sister away and wrecks the boat. The yellow cat is your nameless and silent protagonist and he washes ashore on the cat-ruled island of Felingard. The white cat, Drakoth, appears and taunts you with an illusion of your sister. The only way to get your sister back is to become more powerful. The hero is joined by his guardian spirit Spirry who provides running commentary and most of the dialogue. The hero is informed by the island’s mages that his birthmark means that he is a Dragonblood, a magical bloodline that vanquished evil dragons long ago.

Drakoth appears again from time to time and goads the hero into slaying the three surviving dragons on Felingard. Doing this requires the hero to go on quests for the citizens, often involving breaking curses on various towns or defeating monsters. With the backing of the Governor of Pawt City (Port City, get it?) and the King of Felingard, the hero learns to walk on water and even fly. The mages teach the hero various offensive and defensive spells. The hero is able to slay the three dragons.

It is then revealed by Drakoth that your sister was never real and was instead an illusion created by Drakoth to convince the hero to become more powerful. It is revealed bit by bit that the Dragonblood were created by a race called the Old Masters by literally infusing cats with dragon blood. The Old Masters are heavily implied to be humans. The main creator of the Dragonblood, Aelius was betrayed by the other Old Masters and imprisoned in the Zero Dimension. The Dragonblood then rebelled and both the Dragonblood and the Old Masters were wiped out in the ensuing battle.

Drakoth draws the hero into the Zero Dimension and reveals that Aelius can be set free by the death of a powerful Dragonblood. It is revealed that your guardian spirit Spirry is actually working for Drakoth and was meant to goad you into getting more and more powerful. The flaw in that plan was that Spirry actually grew to like the hero and is now on his side. However, Drakoth’s plan is good. Since both the hero and Drakoth are powerful Dragonblood, if either one falls in battle it will unleash Aelius. Of course, the hero is able to vanquish Drakoth but before the hero and Spirry escape the Zero Dimension, they witness Aelius escape into the world. Spirry promises to stay with the hero come what may.



Cat Quest II (2019)

The gameplay of this game is much the same but definitely improved. The protagonists are once again unnamed and silent but this time there are two of them. The game takes place in the same location as the first game (Felingard) but also in the nearby island of the Lupus Empire. The two protagonists are a cat and a dog. They can be played separately in two-player mode or controlled like a tag team in single-player mode (I did the latter). The game also introduces magic wands that can be used in place of a melee weapon and provide long-range attacks. The NPCs are all cats and dogs and this time they are also sometimes the enemies.

The protagonists wake up on an island off of the coast of Felingard and are informed by a spirit named Kirry (similar being to Spirry) that they are both kings of their respective nations. However, while they were in magical slumber, usurpers took their thrones spurred on by an evil force. Kirry urges the protagonists to take their kingdoms back. The heroes set off to do just that by slowly accomplishing quests for the people of both nations. The heroes must also convince blacksmiths Kit Kat (from the first game) and Hotto Doggo to help forge the Kingsblade, a legendary weapon. The heroes eventually are forced to stop war between Felingard and the Lupus Empire, which is a ruse to allow the usurpers and their master to accomplish their true plan.

Before the Kingsblade can be completed, the heroes and Kirry are pulled into the Zero Dimension. The master of the usurpers is revealed to be the Old Master Aelius. More than that, the usurpers are not actually usurpers. They are the true kings, Lioner and Wolfen. The heroes are Lioner and Wolfen pulled from an alternate timeline by Kirry with their memories erased. Kirry was trying to get the alternate kings to take out their corrupted counterparts. Upon escaping from the Zero Dimension, Kirry apologizes and the pair of heroes once again set out after Leoner and Wolfen. They are able to defeat their counterparts but must now face Aelius.

Aelius proves at first to be too powerful for the heroes but Kirry, Kit Kat, and Hot Doggo appear with an army made up of both cats and dogs. The unity between cats and dogs causes the Kingsblade to suddenly reforge itself so it can be wielded against Aelius. With Aelius defeated, the heroes agree to have their memories erased once again so they can be returned to their own timelines. In the end credits, Aelius is revealed to have survived and takes up the Kingsblade and vows to use it to start the Apawcalypse.
Wrap-Up

Both games definitely have their comedy but also quickly dive into serious territory. The first game has the hero solving and breaking many curses that are really neat. Each one has a quirk worthy of The Twilight Zone. The first game also has plenty of sidequests including a pretty touching Christmas quest that tells the story of two feuding brothers named Santa Claws and Santa Paws. The second game has a lot more politics and deals with xenophobia and racism between cats and dogs. Characters have morality that is not fully black and white with some fairly poignant dialogue. There is also a lot of lore if you want to spend the time really reading the dialogue and reading bits that you can find during side quests.