Monday 10 February 2014

Dark Darkness

Not as much gaming went on this past few days, because I had to do work and stuff. However, I did still find time to beat a game and a DLC.

Magic: The Gathering - Duels of the Planeswalkers 2012: Ascend into Darkness is the ridiculously long title of the DLC, which I mentioned last post. This adds a campaign and three new decks to play - Liliana Vess's awful Black discard deck, Ral Zarek's awful Red/Blue control deck and Ajani Goldmane's awful Green/White enchantress deck. I played each of them for the requisite one victory each, because as you can see I don't consider them very highly. The campaign has two duels each with the new planeswalkers, and then a series of Archenemy matches where you're the Archenemy! This makes the game extremely easy, because it's simple to win when you're putting gobs of creature tokens on the field and deploying your deck as fast as you can draw it. Took another 8 hours or so. I did enjoy the puzzles in this campaign; figuring out the board position in Archenemy is a lot more complicated.

The other game I beat is one of the first Xbox 360 games I bought: The Darkness! I'm not sure why I've been putting it off for so long - the brief part I'd played earlier really interested me, but for some reason it's taken years to get back onto it again. I love this game, I think it's one of the best stories I've ever seen in a game, let alone an FPS. Mike Patton's performance as The Darkness is incredible, and he does his very best to unnerve the player. The gunplay is frantic, though if you take your time and shoot all the lights out, it becomes a game of ducking quickly in and out of dark areas to refresh your shield. Not too difficult (on Normal difficulty), I didn't do many sidequests, I did find a bunch of collectables, would like to speedrun some day.

I have Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light in my 2DS to play next, but I haven't started yet. I also really need to get practicing (and streaming) some Ultima Underworld 1 & 2.

Wednesday 5 February 2014

Pokémon in space playing cards

More games to report on!

First is Pokémon X. I really enjoyed this but throughout I had the nagging feeling that it was far too easy. It's hard to pin down exactly why I felt this, but the re-introduction of 'EXP.ALL' probably goes a long way toward it, as well as Mega Evolution. Here's my hall of fame:

Nocturne SIGILYPH Lv. 73 OT/Lag.Com
Shyvana TYRANTRUM Lv. 71 OT/Lag.Com
Maokai VENUSAUR Lv. 72 OT/Lag.Com
Ahri DELPHOX Lv. 72 OT/Lag.Com
Tryndamere DOUBLADE Lv. 73 OT/Lag.Com
Tibbers PANGORO Lv. 72 OT/Lag.Com

Yes I know the genders don't match up with the character names, shut up. I had an extremely wide type coverage; the only type I really missed was something Electric to deal with Gyarados, but it went fine and almost every battle was simple. Also, Maokai would have been a much better name for a Trevenant. Maybe Zyra for the Venusaur?

Next is a DLC, Gratuitous Space Battles: The Outcasts. I've no idea when I acquired this, as I got most of the content for GSB at the same time, but whatever. Each DLC gives you an additional 2 battles to think your way through, but my existing ship designs were enough to get through these new ones. However, I didn't do it with a large amount of Honour, the in-game currency you get for being frugal with your loadouts. I have bought every single upgrade though, so I don't mind too much. If I really wanted to make sure GSB and all its content is Completed, I'd have to beat every mission on Hard, which sounds... difficult. I had another brief attempt at the Galactic Conquest campaign but it just wasn't happening.

Other than that, I thought I'd have a crack at Magic the Gathering - Duels of the Planeswalkers 2012. As I may have mentioned before, this is Wizards of the Coast's introductory a level Magic series and it plays quite pleasantly. The decks are all reasonably balanced, except Karn's, which has Mox Sapphire and Tinker in it. Along with the list of opponents to beat, it also has optional 'challenges', which are insane play setups you have to solve. The first few are insultingly easy, with solutions like 'block, then attack', but some of them are interesting, with many interlocking effects on the board at once. Anyway, I played through all three campaigns (one of which showcases Archenemy, an insane 3v1 game mode) using various decks, mostly the Treefolk one. I do have the expansion campaign Ascend into Darkness yet to beat.