Topic: Games You Recently Beat?

SteamWorld Dig 2 (PC/Steam) - Not my first time finishing this game - last time was on Switch - but it was certainly worth replaying. This is still my favorite SteamWorld game with its addictive Metroidvania style: upgrades, a positive feedback mining loop, secrets galore, and some genuinely challenging platforming sections. Some fun boss fights too, though they're a little on the easy side outside of the final boss sequence (understandably).

Definitely an easy recommendation for Metroidvania fans.

I also finished Humanity on *PlayStation 5*and scored the platinum last night. That game had some very unique design elements, and I loved the soundtrack. Very fun games for those who enjoy puzzle games, though specifically calling it a puzzle game is selling the game short.

I am still playing Splatoon 3 but since I finished the campaign not to long ago I thought I should write a few sentences. This is easily the best and most fun campaign of Splatoon so far. Interesting atmosphere. The only real negatives of Splatoon 3 I can think of are the disconnects. They are really as bad as people say. Thankfully the game is so much fun to not let it bother me.

Not really sure but I feel like the maps feel more agressive, as in more fighting instead of inking the turf.
Even so I like them. They have a warm and sunny feeling. I feared this game would start to feel more like Salmon Run in tone.

This game has so much stuff to collect and complete, but I feel like they went quite a bit too far with the level 5 leveling of the weapons.

It is a great game. Maybe my favourite Splatoon game so far.

Edit: I do feel a little bit like this game is guilty pleasure to me though.

Finally finished up Sparks of Hope. Definitely worse than Kingdom Battle. And a lot easier. But still a good game. My biggest complaint about it is that there was almost no strategy required compared to the first game. In the first one I would almost always try out a battle with my preferred team, sometimes lose and learn, and create a new team that would be best. In this game, I used the same team practically the entire time and never needed to change them. Used each character once just to try them and never went back until I had to in the final battle.

Finished "Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order" with all achievements a few days ago. Couple of friends had been raving about it when it first came out, and since I've gotten into Star Wars now figured I'd check it out on Game Pass.

Yeah, I need to pick up Survivor soon...

I was gonna pick up a disc copy for PS5 until a friend told me he'd seen it on sale digitally recently. Good thing I went to check. Turns out I already have Fallen Order in my library thanks to it being a PS Plus monthly back in January! Gotta go get a Platinum!

Loved the game enough to go for it, but I am not looking forward to tracking down some of those secrets and chests again...

God of war! Please play it, it’s an amazing story about Norse gods, and father and son, the story really does a great job staying on track and the characters are wonderful! And of course the gameplay is dynamic! I loved he cinematic scenes like uncharted did it! And the way they did it was so good!

9/10 game for me!

finally beat Metroid Prime 1 for my Gamecube an hour ago. Been playing since 9 pm.

frikkin Ridley and the final boss Metroid Prime creature thing took forever to beat

Nintendo Switch Sports. Wow this might be the worst 40€ I spent on a videogame. Now I understand the negativity towards this game. What a shallow experience. Even more disheartening since this is a Nintendo game. The only thing I like about it are the visuals. I feel like Go Vacation is a masterpiece compared to this.

This game has a metacritic rating of 72, which means it is 22 points above average. To me it sounds like reviews are just an extension of the marketing. Thanks for the lesson I guess. I will be more careful from now.

Edit: Seriously I feel like I lost a good portion of my faith in Nintendo after this game.

@Jhena I believe the average critic metascore for games is above 70; I know it calls 50 'average' but if you literally take the average you get closer to 70. Granted, a lot of the very worst games don't even get enough reviews to have a metacritic score. Regardless, 72 isn't impressive for metacritic and is definitely significantly below the average for Nintendo games.

Note that the metacritic user score for Switch Sports is 59 but it's pretty typical for user scores to be around 10 lower than critic scores - even for BotW user score is 87 versus critic score 97. I read somewhere that the average gap between user/critic scores was 9, at least when the study was written.

@FishyS
Thank you, this is interesting to know. Metacritic sounds very inflated to me but looking at the score feels like a bad habit anyway. The only experience I can trust is my own, so I will be more critical when I watch the stream of a game next time.

Back to topic: I beat another very short game but thankfully this was a good experience. Smurf Racer is a charming kart game for the PlayStation 1. This game is better than the new Smurf Kart for the Switch.
The music is not as catchy but more classy and fitting in the old one, which makes it more harmonious. To me even the visuals of the PlayStation 1 game look more appealing. The biggest improvement though is not to be hit by bees every 15 seconds and hearing that annoying sound like in the Switch game. Just being able to enjoy the driving is great. I had good fun and I think I will play a few more rounds.

Maybe I should play more old kart games. I heard good things about Diddy Kong Racing.

Warhammer 40k: Shootas, Blood and Teef

Developed by Rogueside. These fine Belgium folk know how to make fun run'n'gun games. Coming off of the Guns, Gore & Cannoli games, Warhammer 40k SBT feels like a proper WH game from the perspective of the Orks. The quality of the voicework and the audio design make this game feel like a high AA-quality game. Unfortunately, the framerate on Switch begins to dip when the action gets too intense.

If it weren't for that issue, I'd think even more highly of this game.

7/10 - Recommended for fans of the genre and/or fans of Warhammer.

I just beat a cute little indie game called 7 horizons. I would describe it as a mega man-lite in the sense that it is a platforming and shooting 2D side-scrolling game and you unlock different characters you can swap to with slightly different abilities. Each region has a few levels and a humorously easy boss and then you save a friend with a different shooting or jumping ability (double jump, freeze ray, etc). You'll need to occasionally use all the characters if you want all the collectables, although I used the double jump character for the majority of the time. If you want to you can buy more health pellets once a region, though it's a pretty easy game so you don't really need to. Occasionally you get weapon power upgrades as well but you immediately lose them if you get hit even a single time so you can challenge yourself to try to keep them or live without.

Pretty much just a simple but cute retro action platformer. It was very worth the $2 price I paid. Although it was easy, the levels differed enough to keep it interesting and the collectables were not hard to find/get but still made you keep your eyes open. It was unfortunately very short with only 30 levels and the few extra levels you get for 100%-ing it were disappointing. It would have been a great game for either more (and more challenging) levels or else a new game+.

Overall, I would rate it 7/10 which is higher than I would usually rate such a basic game, but I enjoyed it, the controls felt good, and there were no big negative besides the game ending too soon. If you are ever in the mood for an easy relaxing game you can play for a few minutes at a time with a bit of mega man vibes, this game is pretty satisfying.

Note: In 2021 they announced 7 horizons in a less retro art style and as a longer and somewhat fancier game. I can only assume that project died for some reason and they resurrected it in a simpler format. Kinda odd.

I have been reviewing games on Pure Xbox, this is the equivalent thread:

https://www.purexbox.com/forums/px_other_gaming/last_game_you...

Many are Nintendo games because most of my consoles are Nintendo's. This time I wrote a lengthy review when I was planning to write just a few lines about Metroid Prime Hunters.

I have beaten the trilogy twice on Gamecube and Wii/Wii U (100%, normal difficulty), so I thought why not celebrate the full-priced Switch remaster... by playing Metroid Prime Hunters on 3DS instead? 🤣

So that's what I did and I have to say that it wasn't a smooth ride. Clunky and crippled Metroid Prime Federation Force aside, Metroid Prime Hunters is disappointment and even torture. It was released when a plastic thimble that permanently scratches the screen was included with every Nintendo DS. I used it a lot while playing Super Mario 64 DS. Perhaps the permanent damage and replacing the screen would have been justified this time.

Metroid Prime Hunters was released for Nintendo DS, that doesn't have any analogue buttons. Nintendo 3DS has one, two with a gigantic add-on that I also purchased. New Nintendo 3DS has two, the same sliding button that is like a flat joystick and a new analogue nub on the right side. Sometimes, the left sliding button helps even if it works as digital input when playing Nintendo DS games and this is one of those cases. We have to choose between using the right buttons, D-pad or the touch screen for aiming and we can adjust the sensitivity. After some tests, I decided that the only way to play properly was with the touch screen at maximum sensitivity.

Having been developed by Nintendo of America and not Retro and for a handheld console with a small screen, I thought, "Oh, well, it will be easier to play than the three hardcore masterpieces that Retro crafted." Well, no. For starters, I was barely able to read the squared and tiny font and while the scale of the visual elements is similar to Retro's titles, the resolution is much lower and makes more difficult to see what's going on. Have you ever mixed bananas and coins up in Mario Kart DS? This is much worse.

The environments and enemies in Metroid Prime Hunters are fewer and smaller but some graphics and the maps use Retro's work. You are forced to fight tons of annoying guardians during your playthrough but you also fight the same bosses over and over, each time being more challenging. The music is new but as good as in Retro's trilogy and it really sounds clear with no apparent compression, so I think that it uses midi instead of recorded clips. The composers are not the same but I appreciate what all of them have created. Audio is one of my favourite parts of Metroid Prime and its sequels.

Metroid Prime Hunters looks and sounds great but the controls are abysmal. I tried holding the console with one hand, the other holding the stylus, and resting the console, the smaller New Nintendo 3DS, on my body or somewhere else. I stretched a finger out of my right hand while holding the stylus with the other fingers, trying to stabilise the system. I tried everything but keep in mind that you have to hold the console and also be able to move the sliding button and the L button, so you have to hold the console while using two fingers to hit a shoulder button and using the front sliding button. It's frustrating, moving being the most difficult action. You can't just leave the console on a table because you need to control the slide button and the L button. With the other hand, you control the cross hairs while accidentally touching the buttons for changing weapons in the heat of the battle but changing the ammunition-consuming weapon requires triggering an extra menu. It's all too much.

With all that, I really thought it will be easier to play than the Gamecube games. Let's see. Aim assist? No. Lock-in view? No. Camera assist? No. Slower enemies? No. Checkpoints? Yes, and that's what kept me playing although they are not so generous in the second half of the game, when things get too complicated. You revisit the same maps but you have to reach additional areas using newly-acquired projectiles and rays. The problem is when you realise that guardians start spawning every time you enter a room, when the map doesn't tell you where to go like in other games and when the triggering elements that let you reach the next room are remotely hidden or apparently out of reach. Then you realise you have to be scanning all the time just to be able to advance, reducing the visibility of the room that you are exploring. Remember, the resolution is 256x192 and the game uses the visual style of the home console games.

On top of that, enemies are super fast, some are ridiculously fast and erratic and they will hamper your controls more, if that was possible, by freezing yourself and by causing graphical interference on the visor. If that wasn't enough, then you have to deal with frustrating platforming on tiny platforms that are not coordinated, so you don't know when you are supposed to jump, with lethal magma below, floating enemies around that don't leave life cells floating in the air after being destroyed and with a checkpoint before but not after the torture. Bosses are hard, by the way. You will die many times, while platforming, while exploring, while fighting bosses and the sad thing is that it will not be your fault. That's why I almost gave up the game at the final boss but I persevered and even triggered the second form (using a guide) and beat the game, not caring about collecting all the scans and lore like I did on Gamecube and Wii. Half of the lore is describing the final boss, by the way, so it's not that fascinating.

I don't usually rate but I will this time: 5/10. Five points for having such impressive graphics in a Nintendo DS game and for the clean and satisfying audio. Zero points for everything else that I have explained. It's a pity that they didn't remake it for Nintendo 3DS with analogue controls and outsourced a messy title to Next Level Games instead.

@Banjo- Urgh...I couldn't even finish Metroid Prime Hunters for the life of me. Yet, I was able to beat Prime 2 for the GC. If I remember correctly, isn't the Spider-ball Guardian fight easier in the Metroid Prime Trilogy?

Since i'm here, I finished Astal on Saturn about 4 weeks ago. Lemme tell ya, it was not smooth sailing. Usually the US version is more difficult due having three life points. Meaning 3 hits and "YOU'RE OUT!" kind of game over. the JP version gives ya 5 life points that help mitigate the difficulty but not by much.

But the boss fights do force you to use astal's abilities against them. Plus, you gotta have good timing on dodging. but it was worth it. it's an amazing game with great sprite-work and phenomenal music. but the platforming and level design could use some polishing.

Clockwork Knight is far more forgiving by comparison.

@DanijoEX Like you, I'm proud to say that I beat Metroid Prime 2 on Gamecube but yes, you are correct, on Wii the difficulty was lowered. Metroid Prime 2 on Gamecube is hardcore. How did you play Metroid Prime Hunters? What console, what controls? I guess it's much easier to play on a PC emulator. I had that plastic thimble but I got rid of it after it damaged the touch screen of my first Nintendo DS while playing Super Mario 64 DS.

I love the three home console games but I would never blame you for not finishing Metroid Prime Hunters 😁. You are not missing much and the story can be read elsewhere as cutscenes are scarce and really brief.

@Banjo- Yeah, I beat the GC version of Metroid Prime 2. But it felt REALLY fulfilling & it didn't stop me from loving the game any less.

In all honesty though, I would've bought Prime Trilogy but at the time I already had the 2 GC titles & the stand-alone Prime 3. So it wouldn't been worth spending the extra moolah.

But, anyhoo, I basically gave up on Prime Hunters. Funny but true.

@DanijoEX I felt the same, beating Metroid Prime 2 on GC was satisfying! I also have the games separately but the trilogy was like ten pounds on Wii U back when Nintendo was good value LOL.

After beating Hunters I asked myself, what have I done?

@Banjo- I attempted Metroid Prime Hunters on the Wii U VC last fall. I think I made it four missions in before dropping it. The neat visuals (for a DS game), different bounty hunters, and interesting lore couldn't make up for the abysmal controls and repetitive boss fights.

As someone who played the entire Metroid Prime Trilogy (also on Wii U), I REALLY wanted to like this game. It was alright for its time, and perhaps I would've had a better time using an actual DS unit. But at the end of the day, it's just a side story with no bearing on the other Metroid Prime titles...though rumor has it Prime 4 when/if it materializes will change that. In the meantime, I watched a no commentary long play on YT since I at least had to learn how everything turned out. XD

@Tyranexx I don't know how I beat it without the plastic thimble but you are not missing much, honestly. Probably, the Prime nostalgia of my very young self kept me playing. As you know if you watched a playthrough, the cutscenes are scarce and a few seconds long. Sylux's importance is exaggerated. I heard Nintendo saying that they wanted to develop that interesting relationship between Samus and Sylux. What interesting relationship? They don't interact at all. Samus doesn't interact with anybody in Hunters except for the quick battles. I read that he briefly appears in the special endings of Metroid Prime 3 and Federation Force but I don't remember the special ending of Metroid Prime 3 and I refused to play Federation Force. Imagine if Sylux was a woman and hated the Galactic Federation out of jealousy because Samus is better. That would be epic 😂.

All you learn in Metroid Prime Hunters is that all the hunters are going to the same places because they have also intercepted Gorea's telepathic message and they want power and half of the lore files are about Gorea.

Pikmin 4 and Metroid Prime 4 were the two Nintendo games I was more excited about. Pikmin 4 was teased for Wii U and Metroid Prime 4 was believed to be a Wii U game until it was announced for Switch but it will be released for Nintendo's next console at this rate. Pikmin and Metroid Prime are unusual Nintendo franchises, just like Wave Race, they have just a few games but they are original and excellent. Three of my favourite franchises, actually.