What Did We Play Yesterday?

While I'm enjoying Mass Effect: Andromeda, a space exploration game recently shelved by the publisher, I'd like to talk about a space exploration game that, against all odds, wasn't shelved.

I have been watching No Man's Sky for some time. Not just because it's My Type of Jam, an expansive procedurally-generated space exploration game described as "first player Starbound," but because the absolute clusterfuck of a launch is also my type of jam.

I doubt I need to rehash the story here, but for those who missed it, No Man's Sky was a hugely anticipated Kickstarter game that launched to myriad bugs and issues and was swiftly and mercilessly annihilated by its angry fan base. It's failure at launch was important for the medium, I think. No Man's Sky touches all kinds of issues in the industry: pre-release hype, pre-orders, crowd funding, developers shipping broken or half-baked games, player retaliation, and even--gasp--actual honest-to-god gaming journalism, be still my beating heart.

Most developers would have burrowed into the center of the earth after a launch like that. I have little doubt a publisher like EA would have cut it loose, but Hello Games believed in their vision. They kept developing the game, and as of the most recent update the game is receiving positive reviews. It took a year after release, but they're getting there. RPS revisted the game, arguing it was an entirely new game at this point and therefore warranted a second look. The Steam reviews tell a happy tale--too often, I see the reverse, a game with positive ratings overall that has mixed or negative ratings as the result of a recent update.

So NMS is back on the list. Throw in MEA, Starbound (which still receives content updates), and Astroneer, and that's a lot of space exploration. In recent years I've developed a tendency for open-world fatigue, so I have to space [erassflaj;ds] them out, but NMS might be the Christmas game I've been looking for.

Playing DAI has prepared me for this game experience. None of this is spoilery IMO, this is mostly game mechanics discussion and my general crustiness.

The Mass Effect team fooled me once in ME2 with a brilliant video game trope subversion and I decided they aren't gonna fool me again so I did my due diligence make sure the Eos colony was reasonably advanced in the event of, oh, I don't know, a massive invasion or something? I got the viability up to 80% but that's not what I'm going to talk about today.

I was checking out the map and saw how huge it was, and how the side quests were piling up, and said to myself, oh. This is their Hinterlands*. And as we all know, attempting to complete the Hinterlands leads to madness. I resolved to play the main quest and loyalty quests and just ignore anything that didn't sound super-interesting (that guy who broke into my comm channel did pique my curiosity). MEA doesn't go out of its way to make side quests terribly interesting.

The map is a designer's nightmare, a dozen symbols are on the legend. Side quests, ruins, mining, caches, ?, whatever. This is actually a significant problem with modern open world games. The player is supplied detailed maps to the extent completing an area becomes a matter of going down a checklist.

The backbone of MEA is a spreadsheet. The game dutifully tallies all manner of points--research points, Nexus points, resource points (quantities of various metals generally), something or other points--and the player is tasked with dutifully shifting these numbers to different columns in the spreadsheet.

MEA has a hell-inventory and a crafting system. I cannot be assed to figure out the weapons and whatnot beyond "Is it a sniper rifle?" and "Does it shoot good?" You spend points to research a blueprint, then spend a different kind of points to make the thing in the blueprint. I need different resource components, which I must mine or find in random boxes. None of this shit means anything to me and I refuse to care.

The planet scanning mini-game once again returns. I actually don't have a problem with it, now that you can skip travel cutscenes, but it's an example of a somewhat pointless franchise feature that most players dislike. It exists so you can at least do something with the other planets in a system. And you know what? At least it's legacy bloat, and not godawful Skyrim/DAI-inspired genre bloat.

The planets are interesting and fun to explore, even though the way enemy camps are strewn about breaks immersion in some areas. (Oh, look, another mini-base doohicky. It looks almost exactly like the one I saw a half mile back, and the one I will see a mile ahead.) The Nomad is great, it's a lot of fun to drive, and I think taking more of a Hissing Wastes approach would have worked well here. The environments are one of the best aspects of the game for sure, and I would gladly remove most of the side quests and simply keep important colony-related quests and have a few interesting unmarked enemy bases and leave it at that. Seriously, a tiny camp with 2 enemies or a tiny sliver of a ruin doesn't do anything but cramp my style.

I'll take a moment to add I love scanning with my omni-tool. They added this feature as a way to get research points but I just like getting the additional lore and I'd happily do it for that reason alone. It adds to the exploration feel.

I've put the idea of a Hawke-eque protagonist behind me. MEA feels a lot like DAI in that I suspect dialogue choices don't actually matter. Instead of three boilerplate choices, I'm often given two. A serious one and a emotive one. Pick one. Those choices work fine for roleplaying Ryder and I don't have any expectations about it affecting the relationships with my companions.

If it sounds like I hate the game, I don't. I am enjoying the core game and the crew dynamics. But this game has a LOT of bloat, just like DAI, that does not add anything to the player experience and in some instances it actually detracts. MEA never forgets it's a Game with Things that need to be Done. So far there's a pretty decent game underneath a lot of AAA garbage, and I, a Serious Game Expert, should not have to deal with this nonsense.

I guarantee you, five years from now I'll be griping about whatever godawful microtransaction hell AAA has devolved into and I will look back and say, gee, remember when they made Games with Things that need to be Done? DAI will be the good old days. Fuck my life man.

* Turns out they're all like this.

MEA does a good job of making one feel responsible for the welfare of a crew. I like the crew a lot and so far I think they did a good job of having a communal atmosphere. The Tempest and crew are definitely one of the strongest aspects of the game.

The Tempest is just big enough for everyone to have their area without being a pain to traverse; the ship design is good. Each crew member has their own space and the door to their room is closed if a dialogue scene is ready to trigger. Otherwise they routinely move about the ship. The crew-to-crew encounters are good and the message board system and emails add interesting tidbits. MEA really does feel like DA2 in terms of companions having lives of their own that the player catches glimpse of. This was a feeling DAI lacked.

I really like Drack. Jaal is a tremendously sweet person, I hate to say "precious" because that sounds condescending but he is precious. He also has this hypnotic fluttery cape thing I can't really handle. I get what one of my mutuals said about Vetra having a mom vibe. She does have a den mother quality, but she also has a fantastic smile that is definitely worth coaxing out with a bit of flirting. Cora is A+, if anyone does anything to her I'll rip their head off. Peebee is fun, Liam is sweet in a different way than Jaal (he seems so young), Gil is great. Kallo, Lexi, Suvi are all very likeable.

I actually love Cora's relationship with a female Ryder, but am a little bothered by how I imagine the dynamic would play out with a male Ryder. Hypercompetent, loyal, experienced Asari-commando trained ultrapowerful Biotic female officer passed over in favor of the Pathfinder's inexperienced son without any type of explanation? Uh, yeah, no thanks. Whatever Alec's reasons are, it sucks and Cora is being so professional and supportive about it and I just ugh. I'm sure they'll throw a curve at me, the game has already told me Alec has Secretz, but it rubs me in all the wrong ways.

BioWare's insistence on gender-gating characters means if you're interested in the romance content you have to guess and hope for the best. I chose fem Ryder because I thought I might like to romance Liam, who is straight. Well, surprise, surprise, it turns out I'd actually like to date Cora.

Cora implies she's had relationships with her Asari colleagues, and the Asari present as female and use female pronouns. So, gating Cora makes no Watsonian sense and I refuse to contemplate the Doylian reasons I'm just tired of having to jump through gender hoops to get what I want in these games. Like can I get a break? Even in the virtual world? PLEASE?

Protip: No straights in space, BioWare. Just saying.

I few days after I picked up ME:A BioWare announced they will not be releasing any more patch updates for the single-player campaign and confirmed no DLC. I figured as much when I saw they'd dropped the MSRP to $40 in advance of releasing additional content. I got this game for $20 which is frankly ridiculous.

I will say this about Mass Effect: Andromeda. After having a lot of trouble getting Dragon Age: Inquisition and Fallout 4 to run these past weeks it was REALLY NICE to be able to download a big game and play without having to fiddle with a million things.

Going forward, I'm not going to uninstall any game that I think I might ever return to at some point, regardless of how many gigs it takes up. I'll just buy another hard drive, I'm not even joking. This has been such a PITA. Also, if I use dark arts to get a game to work I need to write the incantation down somewhere.

I spent hours trying to get DAI to work and it's still not running smoothly. I'm really glad I encountered all this trouble now, when I'm dicking around, and not on release. It sapped my enthusiasm for a Hawkequisition game unfortunately. Honestly, FO4 probably works about as well as before, I just happened to crash twice in a row as soon as I started and that put me off. Probably just bad luck but whatever.

Short version: the ending to Danganronpa 2 is exquisite.

Slightly longer version: The last two trials are epic. I realized what happened when Hajime and Chiaki discovered the poison, gloves, and mask in Nagito's room, so the trial was this perfect blend of hope and despair culminating in the Super Twist of Despair and a giant virtual Junko, whose appearance I quite enjoyed. Well played.

The ending to DR1 was a little out there, but in the context of the universe the ending to DR2 was satisfying and worked for me, including the way the trial mini-game mechanics were utilized to tell the story.

Somehow, I didn't realize there was a vending machine on the beach, so I had trouble getting gifts and filling out report cards, but it seems you would have to do several playthroughs to get enough free time to fill the cards out. I will probably attempt to fill out the cards of my faves in island mode, at least.

As with DR1, around Chapter 5-ish I was ready for the game to be over, and then the finale Happened and I am so pumped for Danganronpa v3 now (dropping on September 26th at a fine digital retailer near you). DRv3 has a female protagonist and takes place in a different universe, so I am curious to see where they'll take it.

Now, time for extremely scientific and rigorous cheevos analysis! 74% of Steam players start the game and 45% beat the game, which is a higher completion rate than DR1. DR2 has a lot of content and they make you work for a perfect game. The report card cheev stats loosely correlate with the trials, so those are a spoiler of sorts, but only about 10% of players max the report cards. There are some annoying cheevs like raise every type of pet, so I am unsurprised only 1.4% of players get a perfect game. hltb clocks a completionist game at 59 hours.

Anyway, if you like visual novel hybrids and detective games, I would recommend this series. They're not perfect, I have issues with the mini-games and the trial arguments can be a little tricky sometimes, and some of the characters are definitely hit or miss, but overall these are funny, imaginative games with a lot of heart and I enjoyed them tremendously. Recommended for players who enjoy Feeling the emotions of hope and despair, or a blend of the two simultaneously.

I've been stressed lately. Cat Quest was just what the doctor ordered. It's an open-world RPG filled with cat puns and cute stuff.

It's a good example of how to streamline a concept and focus on a very specific player experience. Cat Quest is essentially silly leisure grinding. The player moves about a large overworld map slaying monsters and talking to townsfolk and undertaking quests, which sometimes lead to underground dungeons. Cat Quest doesn't try to be innovative, it just takes a thing and does it very well.

The equipment system is nice, once you've obtained an item any time you find a duplicate it increases the stats of the item in your inventory. It's a fun autopilot game, but much more active and complex than time-based clickers like Plantera .

The devs are actively working on this game, and at this stage I think the only issue I have is you don't have access to keys early in the game, so there are chests you have to leave for later, and these are in no way marked on the map or otherwise. Backtracking all the dungeons isn't a huge deal, honestly, and the way quests are structured (completing a quest unlocks the next quest in the series, which can have a significantly higher difficulty rating) the player will be traversing the map repeatedly anyway.

A+ will cat again.

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THEy got me. OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooh they got me. The Funhouse!! The EVERYeaytelak;jsdkjadsf. I'm really glad I still have Chiaki but I was just starting to really like Gundam! SONia -_-~~ fall my tears

And may I say that I actually kind of like shitty!passive-aggressive!Nagito? And how he keeps taking digs at Hajime?

May I also say outside Nagito I don't think anyone left is capable of being a murderer?

Have I ever mentioned I are bad at gaem because I tell you what. mmhmmm

what the fuck just happened

In the plus column, I have this thing where I take a screenshot every time I laugh or otherwise have a verbal reaction to something that happens in Danganronpa 2. I have a lot of screenshots.

(apologies for the cut text formatting error, hopefully that didn't ruin anyone's life)

I think I'm to the 'wild ride' portion of the show, where things Happen and I don't question it too much. I'm here for the ride.

The whodunnit for chapter 3 is pretty straightforward, and if you aren't sure Mikan gives a dialogue clue drop at the beginning of the trial that's kind of obvious (but totally in-character, because she's such a nervous wreck all the time), but I found the way to present arguments a little confusing because IIRC there were several clues that kinda overlap. I'm just coming up with excuses for why I won't get the achievement for a trial with no misses, that's all.

Turns out my waifu has her own waifu [or husbando] and our love was never meant to be, even after she crawled into my bed. I'm sure being half-choked by her warm body will be the nicest thing that happens to me in this game. I thought Mikan's execution would be something like her being on a dart board and being hit with a barrage of full syringes like darts. The phallic rocket arm didn't work for me but it was Danganronpa Weird (tm) I'll give them that.

I'm already into the weirdness of Chapter 4 and we haven't gotten the murder announcement yet but I am upset because the game wouldn't let me spend free time with Chiaki and she wouldn't let me play the death game and these are the kisses of murder in Danganronpa 2. Previously when I was unable to talk to someone that person was involved in the trial. So I'm gonna put my cards on the table and say that Chiaki got the ultimate weapon and killed Mechanaru with it, and his clock and whateverbits will be clues and so on, and now we can't have soda on demand. I believe Monokuma not-so-subtly set Mechanaru up by reminding the group that even though he was a robot his death would count as a murder.

I realllllllllly like Chiaki. Fuck my life.

I feel like the only way Chiaki would do this is to save the group from starvation, and if that's the logic it doesn't make sense that she'd try to "win" the trial, so I'm half-wondering if Nagito will engage in shenanigans to mix things up. Obviously I'm getting ahead of myself however.

I'm just now getting around to talking to Gundam (because I can't talk to Chiaki anymore w h y) and I really like him. I like Sonia, and if they are a canon couple that is ridiculously cute. I'd ship the hell out of that.

So that happened.

Though the mystery in this chapter did not work as well for me mechanically, the outpouring of feels at the end was top notch. A++ WOULD FEEL AGAIN

My snek laid an egg and left me. So much for never being alone.

I liked having a different character team up with me for detective work, hopefully that will continue each chapter. As usual, I picked up the gist of what really happened but there were some nice surprises during the trial. I kind of hated the video game bit. I liked the fourth-wall aspect of it, and I even liked that it was a shitty video game, and I appreciated I had to actually play it, but I hated playing it, if that makes sense. That was the only section of the chapter that dragged, so it stuck out.

For me, the big weakness of this mystery was the serial killer fakeout. It was a weak and kind of weird complication for me, and I wish they'd come up with a better way to fabricate a motive for Peko. This is pure headcanon, but I felt like Monokuma respects Peko. If Fuyuhiko hadn't intervened, her execution would have been oddly appropriate considering her personality and history, the Ultimate Swordsman fighting against an army until she is finally cut down. It was Fuyuhiko's attempted intervention that made it tragic and I don't think Monokumo could have anticipated that.

It was impossible to talk to Fuyuhiko during any of the free time periods, he wasn't on the map, so I mostly talked to the Nurse (I'll eventually be able to remember the names). I like her a lot but I have a feeling its only a matter of time before she is pushed too far and kills someone, she's like a powder keg waiting to go off. I'm going to go out on a limb and say Fuyuhiko's survival is now ensured.

Okay, that was awesome.

I was suspicious of Lucky after he drew the "unlucky" straw, but for the wrong reason--I thought he lied about his Ultimate talent and the MC was the Ultimate Lucky and he had some other nefarious talent. Of course, during the investigation he acts obviously suspicious several times, so while I concluded he must have been involved and there was one other person working with him, the trial still threw surprises at me. It was a satisfying blend of got-it and gotcha and I felt the complexities worked rather than detracted. Very nice.

I still don't have a handle on the trial minigames but I managed to bumble through it. I hate the sword one but the others aren't too bad.

Teruteru had actually started to grow on me, in part because he has a great VA. I liked his motive and how he was manipulated by Lucky. His execution was so awful.

I REALLY like that Lucky is a psychopathic shit-stirrer. Because if he really is the Ultimate Lucky Student, that means he's a preternaturally lucky shit-stirrer, and he'll probably be around a while. He's a good wildcard. Byakuya sort of filled that role in the first game at various points, which was part of why I liked him so much. Genocide Jack was unpredictable but not self-destructive.

I don't know if it's possible to get all of Byakuya's friendship gems or whatever on the first PT, I talked to him a couple of times and he told me he would tell me about his backstory, and I was hoping that would shed some light on how he ended back up at Hope. I am considering travel shenanigans or something to do with alternate dimensions. Obviously with this series you can't rule any possibility out.

I think I've figured out the Ultimate Yakuza's deal, so I'll probably focus on talking to him next. And the Ultimate Nurse, who I have a crush on for purely wholesome reasons. Aaaand I accidentally saw a spoiler for the Nurse, maybe. I have got to stop curious-googling these games before I've finished them.

ME: I should save Danganronpa 2. I'm working on a few different games right now anyway and

ME: *installs Danganronpa 2*

It is fitting that the sequel to such a weird game is somehow even weirder. The exploratory mode partly changes to a side-scroller perspective, and all it really does is exemplify that I'm WALKING PLACES, so I'm not convinced it's a good design change. I'm not sure if they were just trying to add to the game-esque vibe or... I dunno. It does seem like the island maps are larger.

I have a neopet now. It shits a lot? At least I'll never be alone.

They use the same VAs and there's overlap between the character designs. This was disorienting, which I found appropriate. It just works. So imagine my delight when...

This could not be more perfect. I'm going to be pretty crushed if they kill Byakuya. I think I like this cast more overall so far. The only one I really dislike is the Ultimate Cook, who I thought would be some loveable foodie and instead is a disconcerting, predatory creeper, fingers crossed that guy goes soon.

I think the decision to have Ultimate Lucky Student/blank slate character be an NPC is a good one. Yes, the MC is pretty blank-slatey in his own right, I assume he's the Ultimate Detective. My guess is Ultimate Lucky will be the first down since he's buddy-buddy with the MC.

I was wondering how far the friendship thing would go, I thought maybe it could continue for a few days as underlying creepiness seeps in over time, but, nope. No rest for the wicked.

Business as usual, cue hideous cackling.