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Post by Sarge on Jul 5, 2023 18:12:02 GMT -5
I've started it many, many times over the years, but never stuck with it for whatever reason. But I've been on a run of beating some games I didn't stick with lately, like Robotrek and Shadowrun. I think I just need to get more invested in it and get my bearings beyond the opening. My brother did beat it back in the day, and enjoyed it a lot. Weirdly enough, I stuck with its sequel, Musashi: Samurai Legend, which a lot of folks didn't seem to love, and thought it was a great time. (That's a low-key good one for sixth-gen Club Retro.)
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Post by toei on Jul 5, 2023 20:26:42 GMT -5
I loved Magic Knight Rayheart on the Saturn, it's a great, classic 2D action RPG. I don't care for the anime (I tried it after the game, didn't like it), and I thought the SNES turn-based MKR flat-out sucked. But MKR Saturn was made by the Phantasy Star IV team at Sega and it's a lot fun.
For me Musashi is just so-so at me, but then it's more of a weird 2.5 platformer than an action RPG. That's not the game's fault that it's not what I wanted it to be, I just wish it wasn't advertised (and bizarrely, discussed by players) as what it's not. It's a series of action setpieces.
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Post by Xeogred on Jul 6, 2023 14:31:23 GMT -5
Think I'm going to hit this one up this weekend. Think a few people here liked it? Ukraine Quake basically heh. I do have the new Steam release. Looks slick.
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Post by Ex on Jul 7, 2023 1:01:36 GMT -5
I put an hour and a half into b.l.u.e.: Legend of Water this evening. Wow is this a unique game with plenty of innovation for its time (PS1 1998). You play as a teenage girl visiting her scientist father on an oceanic research ship. The ship is full of other scientists of varying disciplines. They are researching recently discovered undersea ruins. Inevitably the girl gets involved with the exploration of said ruins (she has mysterious dreams about them), this involves diving and swimming underwater in real time. The girl is aided by a dolphin that helps solve puzzles based on commands given it. There've been lots of puzzles already, some on the ship, some in the water, some in the first ruins I explored. The ruins are kind of like exploring a dungeon actually, except with limited air supply. On the ship the girl goes around talking to scientists to advance the plot. I keep calling her "girl" but her name is Maia, whatever. Her air supply is also her life bar, so if you get hit you lose air. So far I've only been hit by falling rocks, but there may be sharks or jellyfish eventually, who knows. The only enemy fish I've dealt with thus far was a disagreeable sunfish blocking my path, so I had the dolphin shoo it away. Definitely enjoyed my first session with this highly original game.
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Post by Ex on Jul 8, 2023 10:13:07 GMT -5
Made more progress in b.l.u.e.: Legend of Water last night. Currently in Chapter 2 (of 5), the protagonist was tasked with exploring a sunken ship for relics. To get there I had to blow up an underwater wall, find the ship, fend off a shark guarding the ship, use the dolphin partner to push a crate out of the way of a hole in the ship, then enter the ship through the hole. Inside the ship was a bunch of puzzles as well. The first part last night involved finding the crew corpses of the ship, getting numbers off their uniform insignias, and using those numbers to solve a door code. Another puzzle involved shining a light on a particular painting in the ship, then pushing a statue next to that painting to open a secret safe to retrieve a keycard. All while navigating underwater with limited air supply. I'm now saved at the second part of the ship. This is a very puzzle heavy action-adventure indeed. I still enjoy this one a lot (especially the OST), but my big complaint is the camera. The camera can be a beast in tight quarters, I bet it made some Japanese players a quarter century ago.
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Post by Xeogred on Jul 8, 2023 11:12:07 GMT -5
Definitely an Ex game... at least the setting and all.
I'm going to hold on Chasm: The Rift until I'm done with Cyberpunk 2077.
So it's finally time for, according to many forums I've scoured, the hardest Tomb Riader of them all: (and TR1-2 are freaking hard. Gotta love the 90's when devs respected the player more)
Yeah, I already had to look up two things in the first level. One might have been a rare thing I forgot about in the past two, -walking- through spikes. Landing in them is an instant death or running through them sheds your health instantly. Had to -walk- through a set of spikes to progress later in the level. The other thing is, I couldn't see a key near the end of the level that I needed. This is a DARK game, so it's a little hard to see in spots. I remember TR2 having this issue too and I employed DuckStation to use some post-processing gamma boost. I turned it up a notch here until the level looked good to me. Feels amazing jumping back in. For as complex as the CORE TR games control, I'm a little impressed that I can jump back into these between a year gap or more. Typically I do jump into Lara's mansion though, basically a training stage you can do in all the games to learn stuff. That said, TR3 really doesn't hold your hand at all with teaching you much from what I saw. And the very beginning of level 1, is you sliding down a steep hill and having to jump over some spikes or you die. Certainly was a devilish welcoming.
Hard as in level complexity? Probably. Hard as in instant death traps and tough things to navigate? Probably. The one issue I had with TR2 compared to TR1, is that it had a LOT of human enemies, who can really mow you down. It felt a little odd after awhile. I think they got the fan feedback on this one from what I know and it's back to more pure hardcore exploration and platforming. So the levels are probably the ultimate enemy and obstacle (not to say TR2 levels were easy though).
Lara can now sprint, hang on climbable ceilings, and go into a crawling position. So probably going to be a lot of new tricks and stuff to figure out with the new mechanics.
Very excited for this one.
Now I remember when I played TR2 awhile back some of you guys thought the aspect ratio I was playing at was pretty wack. Yeah it was... for some reason it wasn't regular 4:3. But this continues to be a strange thing with the TR games. The PSX renders various games at different resolutions and with TR, even different across the territories, or the PC version, etc. I cannot for the life of me find a definite answer on what the aspect ratio should be. NTSC is apparently 512x240, but I think 512x256 might look better.
First is 4:3 Second is 512x256
Let me know what you guys think of those looks in the comments below. Smash the LIKE button and follow me for more updates across Xeoitter, XeoTube, and Xeobook thanks.
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Post by Ex on Jul 8, 2023 11:42:51 GMT -5
Definitely an Ex game... at least the setting and all. I think some of you would enjoy SCUBA action-adventure games* if only you ever stepped out of your comfort zones. * That's not a 4:3 aspect ratio, but 640 x 480 is. So is 800 x 600, 960 x 720, 1024 x 768, 1152 x 864, 1280 x 960... 8192 x 6144. I'm not sure what emulator you are using. If it's Duckstation, this is how I've got it setup on my old laptop: This configuration doesn't cause PS1 games to look wonky for me. I think these classic PS1 TR games have a nice concept, in that the lonely exploration of old ruins turns me on in the vein of King's Field and Thief. But the crude platforming mechanics and probably loads of switch/plate puzzles not so much. I've beaten some modern TR games and they are fun, although they focus too much on combat. I think these older TR games likely have a better balance of exploration/puzzles VS combat. I intend to beat TR1 via the 360 remake, but for TR2-5 I would play the PS1 versions. Looking forward to seeing how the third entry goes for you. If you enjoy my answers please consider subscribing to my Patreon and don't forget to ring that bell!
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Post by Xeogred on Jul 8, 2023 12:05:29 GMT -5
Native isn't always going to be accurate. That's what I'm getting at and people noting here (last post) that the game is a different resolution for NTSC, PAL, then PC, etc for whatever reason. So maybe there just simply isn't a definite resolution setting for these, that's that hangup.
This is all those settings. I don't know, does it look "accurate"? Not as skinny as the first one I posted.
>But the crude platforming mechanics and probably loads of switch/plate puzzles not so much. I've beaten some modern TR games and they are fun, although they focus too much on combat. I think these older TR games likely have a better balance of exploration/puzzles VS combat.
But you're the guy who likes Flashback, SNES Prince of Persia, etc. CORE TR is basically that in 3D. I find the complex control scheme to be half the fun, having to intricately perform jumps, manually hold buttons to grab ledges and climb, etc. Contrast to modern crap where you just hold up and the game does all the climbing for you. How boring. The puzzles are like a Zelda temple, nothing ever too crazy. It's more just figuring out what to do, where to go, then it kind of seems obvious and is just executing things. I'd say these games are like 90% exploration, 10% combat. The combat is really just an afterthought and not why I'm playing them. It's fun enough to jump around and shoot stuff with infinite pistols though.
> I intend to beat TR1 via the 360 remake, but for TR2-5 I would play the PS1 versions.
I can just envision how much you'd be scolding me if I played System Shock Remake and skipped the original. Or Metroid, or the Resident Evil's, etc. But I'll just chalk this up to TR not being a priority for you. But that's fine, wasn't until 2019 when I beat TR1 and realized how amazing these games are when they click. The post CORE games... are okay (Rise is pretty good). These are something else. Now I liked Anniversary a lot too but having played both in recent years, the original still sticks with me a lot more.
I forget how you put it with King's Field. But you probably shouldn't judge these until you put a few hours/levels into one of them. And yes, as you're alluding, the newer games really aren't representative of the older ones at all. So just keep that in mind.
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Post by Ex on Jul 8, 2023 12:58:09 GMT -5
the game is a different resolution for NTSC, PAL, then PC, etc for whatever reason That's because these games were designed for 4:3 CRT TVs. The 4:3 CRT TV would just stretch whatever the incoming image resolution was into a 4:3 image regardless. So if you've got Duckstation setup to output to a 4:3 aspect ratio (meaning your not stretching the image to 16:9 to fill your modern monitor) the image should look correct. Unless you're doing some weird internal scaling/preprocessing before hand. >But you're the guy who likes Flashback, SNES Prince of Persia, etc. CORE TR is basically that in 3D Yes but adding a third dimension to the mix compounds the complexity tremendously. Not that I'm adverse to complex 3D platformers, mind you, I have beaten many 3D platformers. It's just I have sampled the original TR. Lara controlled like a robotic tank, not a fluid and dynamic human such as Flashback or PoP's protagonists move. I understand why Lara controls like that given the age of her original game. At least she controlled better than Conrad in Fade to Black. But compared to how smoothly Mario controls in Super Mario 64, Lara's movement is ridiculous. And Super Mario 64 released before Tomb Raider, mind you. >I'd say these games are like 90% exploration, 10% combat. That sounds ideal given the old ruins aesthetic. The forlorn and somber exploration is what would get me to play them. >I can just envision how much you'd be scolding me if I played System Shock Remake and skipped the original True, but I have played the original TR on both DOS and PS1, both for at least an hour each. I know what the original game is like, so I've got a frame of reference. >I'll just chalk this up to TR not being a priority for you. TR is no priority for me, but that doesn't mean I personally have no interest in the PS1 TR games. I am legitimately intrigued by the ruins exploration aspect. And I do have these games loaded on my Super Console X PRO. And maybe other HRG members would be interested in these original TR games. >the newer games really aren't representative of the older ones at all That's probably why I'm not super keen on TR. I've beaten a few modern TR games and sampled some other 7th gen TR games. At its best TR has been an 8/10 for me, though usually closer to a 7/10. They are fun enough while playing, but the experience never sticks with me (like say KF does). I understand that my TR opinions are based on post-Core games, though. That's a good point. Let's see how TR3 pans out for you.
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Post by Xeogred on Jul 8, 2023 13:11:43 GMT -5
I know AR's man, it seems like PSX stuff back in the day could be different per game itself, not just based on a TV and region. I think it was toei here who doesn't mind playing stuff stretched to widescreen. I can't do that at all... for old PC shooters that you can play in widescreen without morphing the AR on objects, I'd do that. But yeah I'd always favor playing 4:3 or whatever for older stuff if that means retaining how it was intended to look.
So yeah, I think I'll stick to native with TR3. I think it looks good personally.
> But compared to how smoothly Mario controls in Super Mario 64, Lara's movement is ridiculous. And Super Mario 64 released before Tomb Raider, mind you.
That doesn't mean Mario 64 is the correct way to do it. A good way. But let's just say Lara's movement is "different". You're not some fat 4ft plumber jumping 20ft in the air doing back flips around in some Disney world on shrooms here. I'll mention that I was appalled by the TR controls even as a kid. But I just hadn't simply given it enough time, now I wouldn't change a thing. Just like you and King's Field. If those had maximum native mouse support, 60FPS, smooth as buttery controls and everything... it would lose a lot of soul.
Apparently CORE thought this could work for 6 games up through 2003 though, now yeah that is just wrong. Angel of Darkness sounds like the worst TR because it's a clunky relic with bad level design. I wonder if I should play that one next to save some of the older ones to wash that away, though Chronicles sounds iffy too. I hear that one is short and more action. I only have three more TR's after this one.
Found my old TR reviews:
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