Playstation 4 Games Catch-All

Jeez I missed that when I was skipping through the Gamescom stuff, that's shot right into my most anticipated games coming in the next couple of years.

DokeV seems really ambitious with all those methods of traversal, the combat looks like a fast paced Ni No Kuni but more visually impressive. All those little animations are so intricate & very specific to certain actions, which shows the care & attention going into what looks like every aspect of the game. The Just Cause style glider that seemingly must be in every open world game, but it usually does make exploration better to be fair. The art style is gorgeous, the little black kids hair bobbing about at the start, the character models in general are so standout. The visuals overall are just beautiful, that confetti gun shooting out the hundreds of little bits of different coloured paper, the effects of roller skating, jet skiing, mid air grappling, the ultra realistic grass looks something like a high fidelity modern Skyrim mod. There's so much to love in that trailer.

This is another case of please let this live upto anything close to it's potential. Black Desert was well reviewed I take it?

I agree that it looks stunning and like it could be lots of fun.

Regarding Black Desert, I remember thinking it looked cool a while back, but never got it. Now that you guys have mentioned it, I've watched a video about the new class "Corsair," and I have to say I'm struggling to stop myself from clicking the "add to cart" button. Since it's not a free game I'm guessing there isn't a lot of annoying monetization... am I right? I see lots of currency packs for sale on the PS store, and it makes me worry. Is it riddled with microtransactions? Is it an endless grind? Do you guys know?

I don't have that much familiarity with it myself. I know it's an action-oriented MMO that has a solid following, but the most I got from it was Shamus Young's four-part series on the game. He discusses the monetization in part three. Note that he wrote that in 2018, and in the world of MMO's and live-service that means it could be way outdated. It also means it could have gotten worse instead of better.

It also depends on one's personal tastes. Regardless, in part one he played enough to level three characters to 40, so he liked it enough to devote that much time into it, at least.

Thank you, ccesarano! That was a very interesting article. I don't know how things have changed in the past three years, but it has definitely made me not want to get it right now. Maybe later...

That made me smile front beginning to end. That's a good sign.

Local Fred Meyer has a couple of those back buttons for the PS4 controller. Anybody have thoughts about them?

JohnKillo wrote:

Local Fred Meyer has a couple of those back buttons for the PS4 controller. Anybody have thoughts about them?

I never bought one, but all the reviews were/are pretty favorable. Only thing to keep in mind is they only duplicate the buttons you already have. In other words, you can program them to be any button on the controller, but they don’t support multi-button macros or provide any other new functionality. So, it’s more of a convenience/comfort mod than anything.

JohnKillo wrote:

Local Fred Meyer has a couple of those back buttons for the PS4 controller. Anybody have thoughts about them?

Yeah, I got one and really liked it. It's the only thing I'm missing from moving onto the PS5 controller. Like vypre said, it just duplicates existing button inputs, but that can be really nice in certain games, like moving dodge or jump buttons away from X or O when it would normally require you to take your thumbs off the sticks, or removing the annoying need to click in the left or right thumbstick to sprint or crouch. It's not a game-changer by any means, but it's a really nice QoL improvement once you get used to it.

If they release a version for the Dual Sense, I'll pick it up day 1.

Dyni wrote:

removing the annoying need to click in the left or right thumbstick to sprint or crouch.

Probably the dumbest thing that's ever become standard in gaming. Especially in games where the click is a timed boost or a sprint with stamina... accidentally hit that sh*t all the time. I hate it so much. Anytime I'm able (on PC mostly) I move it to a different button.

Huh, I guess I'm not as tense a gamer as you. I don't think I've ever press the thumbstick buttons on accident... I actually forget they exist most of the time.

I'm pretty prone to clicking the thumbsticks in a tense situation, and a good friend of mine is even worse about it. Second Sight, two generations ago, was a particular offender - it was a third-person game where clicking the left thumbstick would put you into a rooted first-person mode, so when my friend and I were playing couch co-op we were constantly finding ourselves rooted to the spot, unable to move, when enemies startled us by popping out of cover and shooting at us. Instead of run-and-gun it was stand-and-die.

I am also super prone to pushing the thumbsticks in panic situations.

Enter the Gungeon seems to have been a gateway drug to Devolver titles in general. I find myself playing and enjoying the heck out of Broforce of all games. I’ve been looking for similar titles and it seems that Katana Zero is likely heading to the PS4 soon. Can’t wait if it’s true. Pixelated heroes ftw.

In my ongoing search for quirky little gems of PS Plus to play I recently reinstalled Galak-Z. It’s art style appealed to me at the time and it’s from the same developer as Skulls of the Shogun, which I enjoyed, so I was keen to check it out on release. The fact that it was revealed to be a rogue-like (you have to play through a season, which I think is four or five missions, in a rogue-like fashion) though dampened my enthusiasm and I only played the tutorial before uninstalling it. Firing it back up yesterday I discovered that two modes had been added, Endless, with no saving at all, and arcade, where the game saves at the end of each mission, which is exactly how I’d prefer to play. Hopefully I’ll get into it this time. Here is an idea of how it plays:

Couldn't find another thread. If someone has a better spot, let me know if I've missed this game discussion...

Fired up Plague Tale Innocence this week. Enjoying it so far. Seems like stealth, puzzles, minimal combat. Thankfully very frequent save checkpoints when you do mess up. Not wasting much of my time.

And either R3 prompts or companion suggestions if you're unsure what to use next or where to go. Overall a pretty chill gameplay experience combined with a very intense and unnerving story.

Think I'm about halfway through. Hopefully can stick with it to finish. Pretty graphic so hard to get TV time for it when the kids are asleep.

You've pretty much summed it up; there's a bit more combat towards the end, but you're a kid who can't really fight, so it's always going to be mostly stealth. There's a final boss fight that I absolutely could not figure out after over an hour of beating my head against it, so I eventually looked it up on YouTube to find that I had the right idea, I just needed to be better at it. Once I got some distance from the game, I really enjoyed it, but in the moment the last bit of combat + boss fight really soured me on all the enjoyment I'd gotten before then.

It certainly is gorgeous, though, especially for a AA, as opposed to AAA, budget game. I was really looking forward to the sequel, but I have a vague recollection that it was announced as an XBox exclusive at some point.

Hell I guess I'm playing the PS5 version from PS+. Forgot it got upgraded. Maybe I should have posted in that thread. Anyway load times are super fast so that's been really pleasant too. And yes it looks great.

Loved the game, hated the last boss. Overall, a very enjoyable experience.

Fury Unleashed just added online co-op with the latest update (it was only couch co-op until now). If anyone is interested in trying it out, just let me know!

Finally got back to Plague Tale after nearly 2 weeks break. Through ch 10, 11, 12, last night. Back to manor for alchemy stuff. And whoa, story reveal from the thief siblings. Some cool stuff there. And the rats new tornado move, wtf.

A break was probably good. Didn't take me long to remember the controls. The crafting is a bit frustrating. I have all but one ingredient for a tier 3 upgrade, but don't have enough storage for some other parts. So had to pass over ingredient after ingredient while full. I'm trying to only craft the upper ammo, not the lower stuff that shares ingredients with the bigger upgrades. Maybe I just did some things in the wrong order, but seems like I'm not going to get full upgrades at this rate?

Anyway, story still fun, mostly enjoyable gameplay. And at least AI seems competent, unlike a lot of other games with escorts.

Glad you're still enjoying it!

Were y'all complaining about the Ch 15 boss fight or Ch 16 of Plague Tale?

Because 15 was bullsh*t and got bugged on me and I had to redo the whole chapter.

Spoiler:

Kill Nicholas

I took out the first side torch and hit him with rats. Then the other. Then in phase 3... no side torches were lit. Not sure if I knocked one out in phase 2 and didn't know it. But I was stuck in an autosave, and could not get the 3rd wave of rats to spawn. Did it over and over for about 15 or 20 minutes. I even tried reigniting the torches with my weapon and then putting them out but that didn't work either.

Really sucked. Can't decide if I want to try to finish now or if I need another break.

My complaints were about Chapter 16. I don't remember having a particular hard time with the one in Chapter 15, but then again I don't remember many things... I hope you go back to it and you fare better this time around!

My most anticipated game of the year, Ruined King: A League of Legends Story, surprise launched today! And here I was thinking we hadn't heard anything about the game in months because it was going to be delayed!

This looks cool, and kinda like my jam... until I remember that I have never played League and know little to nothing about the game or its setting.

I wonder if I can still play this though.

UpToIsomorphism wrote:

This looks cool, and kinda like my jam... until I remember that I have never played League and know little to nothing about the game or its setting.

I wonder if I can still play this though.

This is precisely why they're releasing games in other genres (as well as that Arcane Netflix series). For people that don't play League of Legends. Or, at least, to draw more people into their universe and world that otherwise would never get into it by not playing League.

I have never in my life played a single second of League of Legends. I was interested in this game because I adored Battle Chasers when I played it last year (or was it two years ago?), so I will get it. Also, not knowing absolutely anything about the LOL universe has not prevented me from immensely enjoying Arcane on Netflix. I would say that if it looks like you'd like it, go get it!

Mario_Alba wrote:

My most anticipated game of the year, Ruined King: A League of Legends Story, surprise launched today! And here I was thinking we hadn't heard anything about the game in months because it was going to be delayed!

Oh nice! I really enjoyed Battlechasers. From the developer talk after, it looks like they made some interesting changes to the combat system. I'm knee deep in several other games at the moment, so this might be something I dive into over the holidays.

UpToIsomorphism wrote:

I wonder if I can still play this though.

As covered above, I'm sure you can. Virtually all of the LoL lore and storytelling exists outside of the game. If you want to dip your toes in for cheaper, I highly recommend checking out a few episodes of Arcane. Based on the 6 of 9 episodes I've seen so far, it is easily my favorite video game to TV/film adaptation to date. I actually think it may be better experienced knowing nothing about the world, since you won't have certain character fates spoiled for you in advance.

I’m really enjoying Absolver at the moment. The combat if fantastic.

Higgledy wrote:

I’m really enjoying Absolver at the moment. The combat if fantastic.

How far in are you? I remember bouncing off it after a while, because I couldn't understand how to work the combat system properly. I would like to go back to it though.