Postby zinger » Mon Jan 14, 2019 7:51 pm
I can barely remember anything from the little I played of Dino Crisis back when it was released. I love the Biohazard series, I love Shinji Mikami games, and I love dinosaurs, so I guess it must be a pretty good match for me... then again, every time I look up videos or screenshots from the series, it just looks so drab? And ugly? But like I said, I've barely played it at all, and that was almost 20 years ago. What is it that you like about it, CTN?
I've played a bunch of stuff over the past months, and speaking of Biohazard, I finally gave Biohazard 0 a try, which was the only game from the classic series I hadn't tried (and the single one I haven't beaten). Not impressed, but I gave up fairly quickly. Maybe I'm just fed-up with the formula, having played so many of them. It looks pretty good overall, but the characters are ugly and annoying, and the plot and setting weren't very intriguing either. Another important factor for why I don't care much for it is probably that the only innovation it brings is the dual-character system, which feels gimmicky, annoying, and breaks the immersion.
Red Seeds Profile: I call bullshit on this game. It's actually not all bad, but it's definitely not "so bad it's good, it's bad, it's amazing" or whatever its fanbase want you to believe, lol. The idea of a Twin Peaks-inspired version of Shenmue (with more focus on action and driving) is interesting of course, but I absolutely hated the "regular" action segments of the game, and you have to endure countless hours of them if you want to play through the entire game. Also, I'm a huge fan of Twin Peaks (especially the final third season), but mostly, RSP just feels like a cheap imitator of the series. I really didn't fall in love with any of the characters or environments in the game (the atmosphere in Silent Hill and Biohazard is so much cooler), although the actual story is pretty good for game I guess. The one thing I absolutely loved about the game though, strangely, was the QTE segments. I normally dislike QTE stuff, but in RSP they are absolutely incredible, and have to be experienced in order to be believed. Some of the most nerve-wrecking, exciting experiences I've had in a game for a while! So bottom line: drab game overall, with a couple of amazing segments that account for maybe 1% of the total play-time.
Sine-Mora: shitty euro-shooter. Looks good, but terrible in all other respects. Omega Five: pretty damn solid horizontal STG from Natsume on the 360. Looks good, amazing soundtrack, solid mechanics and top-notch stage design. It's very short and very easy, but very much worthwhile regardless. Nin2-Jump: this is a bit more like what I had hoped Dynamite Headdy would be like, in terms of how it allows you to get much more creative with the grappling mechanics. Too bad there are so few stages. Too bad the stages are so short. And too bad the graphics are so simple and unvaried. Feels like a mini-game in the end, but a pretty solid one no doubt.
I also started playing the La-Mulana remake which is super-cool, but... I had to take a break, because I'm stuck, and it's pretty much driving me insane. Love everything about this game, except that the puzzles are perhaps a bit too hard. I'm guessing I'm roughly half-way through the game, and I have absolutely no idea how to progress from there. I think mapping out every single room including all their clues and murals and so on with regular pen and paper might be helpful (I did that in order to solve one of the puzzles), but I wish I had done so from the start, because I've already done a ton of exploring, and the world has grown pretty large.