The NEW Game Journal

[Bytor]

I spotted Jeanne d'Arc for $4.99, so I bought it. I always heard it was good, so I figured, why not.
 

Great game! Challenging and except for the escort missions and occasional stupid ally AI not control bashing aggravating.

[Ranadiel]

I completed all of Asura's Wrath yesterday!! Just a few hours short of the the new year too.... What I will say is this..... It may have been short.... but I couldn't stand to perform another 5 minutes of QTE's if you paid me by the end of it..... so in light of that fact, I think it was alright... visually impressive title for certain.... Asura himself bothered the hell out of me though, and the overall "ma'-cheeeez-mo" level of this game got to me as well.... Happy to have seen it through.. doubt I will EVER come back for seconds though....

I have to ask, when you say you beat it, did you also beat the Act 4(or w/e it is called) DLC? Because that DLC is quite fun, although you do have to put up with a bit more QTE. I mean one of the enemies you fight in the DLC throws galaxies at you! Plus it actually concludes the plot.

I have no idea how I feel about Commander Keen. On the one hand the levels are very good at creating a sense of place -- in terms of looking like actual places. The game is supposed to take place in various cities, and while there's obvious concessions made for being a platforming game, they mostly look like what they're supposed to be -- as well as creating a sense of scale -- the levels are either large and have lots of optional stuff, or do various things to look a lot larger than they really are. Both of these combine to create a really... evocative, mysterious atmosphere.

On the other hand, the actual method for getting through the levels can be pretty straightforward, and most of the optional areas in them can be ignored, and exploring them doesn't even really grant good rewards a lot of the time. They're like made to have INTERESTING designs but not necessarily PLAYABLE designs.

Oh now that is a nostalgic title. I remember playing through all 6 Commander Keen titles back when I was in 2nd-3rd grade. My mom bought them for me online from id Software's web site. They were going out of print at the time or something so they were out of the game on 3.5" floppies, so I ended up with the game on giant floppies. Man that was a ways back.....oh right the game. It has been a long time since I played them, but I recall liking the latter games better but they were all enjoyable.

[Mickeymac92]

My son is constantly looking for new games to play. He played through Ys Seven and Oath in Felghana on PSP, then tried out Ys I & II. He gave up on that one, though. I gave him tales of Symphonia to play thinking he'd love it, but he couldn't get the fighting mechanics and claimed it was too hard. If I can play through a game, it is NOT too hard.
Anyway, he got some money for Christmas, so, on my recommendation, he bought Okami for the Wii. He's loving it so far, so I figure he's set for awhile. That's a long game.

I remember Tales of Symphonia being too hard when I was a kid. Managing parties in real time takes some getting used to, as does the battle system, especially after a game like Ys. There's also some light strategy required for boss battles. Not to mention he may not be used to keeping up with equipment (buying the best in every town) and staying very well stocked, even if it requires some money grinding. You might want to ask him what's so hard about it and provide a few basic tips, if you haven't already.

Still, I'm sure he'll be fine with Okami for now.

[John]

I remember Tales of Symphonia being too hard when I was a kid.

Tales of Symphonia release date: July 13, 2004.

when I was a kid.

God damn it, I feel old today.

[Dice]

I remember Tales of Symphonia being too hard when I was a kid.

Tales of Symphonia release date: July 13, 2004.

when I was a kid.

God damn it, I feel old today.

I remember walking my dog that Summer morning, my dad was gonna drive me to go get it after I took her out.  I just finished Grade 10.  I was so happy a Tales game was coming out, and for me to sit down with and enjoy during the summer time ...I wanna be young again....!!!!!

[Tomara]

Don't complain! You're younger than me and you have such ahppy memories. I associate ToS with heartbreak! D: The characters my former boyfriend and I picked for our playthrough told us more about our relationship than we could ever figure out on our own... Though I guess it's kind of funny in hindsight, heh.

[GrimReality]

My son is constantly looking for new games to play. He played through Ys Seven and Oath in Felghana on PSP, then tried out Ys I & II. He gave up on that one, though. I gave him tales of Symphonia to play thinking he'd love it, but he couldn't get the fighting mechanics and claimed it was too hard. If I can play through a game, it is NOT too hard.
Anyway, he got some money for Christmas, so, on my recommendation, he bought Okami for the Wii. He's loving it so far, so I figure he's set for awhile. That's a long game.

I remember Tales of Symphonia being too hard when I was a kid. Managing parties in real time takes some getting used to, as does the battle system, especially after a game like Ys. There's also some light strategy required for boss battles. Not to mention he may not be used to keeping up with equipment (buying the best in every town) and staying very well stocked, even if it requires some money grinding. You might want to ask him what's so hard about it and provide a few basic tips, if you haven't already.

Still, I'm sure he'll be fine with Okami for now.

He'll be 12 next month. He's played through all sorts of games, although I think this would be his first real time action rpg. That's probably the real issue. Managing the characters, and figuring out how to properly battle it out. It was my first Tales game, so I'm sure I had trouble at first, too.

I remember Tales of Symphonia being too hard when I was a kid.

Tales of Symphonia release date: July 13, 2004.

when I was a kid.

God damn it, I feel old today.

Yeah, thanks a lot there, Mickey.

[Aeolus]

My son is constantly looking for new games to play. He played through Ys Seven and Oath in Felghana on PSP, then tried out Ys I & II. He gave up on that one, though. I gave him tales of Symphonia to play thinking he'd love it, but he couldn't get the fighting mechanics and claimed it was too hard. If I can play through a game, it is NOT too hard.
Anyway, he got some money for Christmas, so, on my recommendation, he bought Okami for the Wii. He's loving it so far, so I figure he's set for awhile. That's a long game.

I remember Tales of Symphonia being too hard when I was a kid. Managing parties in real time takes some getting used to, as does the battle system, especially after a game like Ys. There's also some light strategy required for boss battles. Not to mention he may not be used to keeping up with equipment (buying the best in every town) and staying very well stocked, even if it requires some money grinding. You might want to ask him what's so hard about it and provide a few basic tips, if you haven't already.

Still, I'm sure he'll be fine with Okami for now.

He'll be 12 next month. He's played through all sorts of games, although I think this would be his first real time action rpg. That's probably the real issue. Managing the characters, and figuring out how to properly battle it out. It was my first Tales game, so I'm sure I had trouble at first, too.

If he's every played a fighting game and an RPG then he'll be fine. It's not like its rocket science nor was it like that for us when we were 12.

And if we're sharing our first Tales of Symphonia experiences then mine involved being on anti-depressants and hanging with an old friend from grade school and his pals.

[MeshGearFox]

I remember Tales of Symphonia being too hard when I was a kid.

Tales of Symphonia release date: July 13, 2004.

when I was a kid.

God damn it, I feel old today.

I remember walking my dog that Summer morning, my dad was gonna drive me to go get it after I took her out.  I just finished Grade 10.  I was so happy a Tales game was coming out, and for me to sit down with and enjoy during the summer time ...I wanna be young again....!!!!!

Also finished tenth grade, the summer Tales of Symphonia came out.

That was the summer my grandpa was in the hospital dying of some... weird lung disease. The entire summer and part of that fall. One of the cats died in August, too.

Played the hell out of ToS. That and the Myst games -- I was pretty much living them. It felt like some kind of normalcy.

:|

Everyone was still alive back then...

I think tenth grade and 2007 were the only times in the past... decade where I was really unreservedly happy. I've spent my entire adult life being fairly miserable and I don't even care.

[Yggdrasil]

Yeah, thanks a lot there, Mickey.

Aww~ someone is jelly. :3

Just kidding.

[MeshGearFox]

Dark Souls - THINK I know how to defeat the hammer boss guy in Undead Burg.

The Last Remnant - Did some sidequest Emma gave me. Lost to the boss the first two times, because I had three unions, which meant each had lower health, and I'd optimized them for either attacking or magic. After losing the first two times, I decided to learn from my mistake and have two units optimized for defense, so that I'd be taking less damage and be able to take more damage anyway.

Two unions also meant that I could get more attackers up against the non-boss units helping the boss out without getting interceped so much Downside is that the non-boss units had some mass stats-effect attack, which are more painful against large unions -- however, they could also multi-deadlock so they were basically hitting everyone on the field anyway.

That was neat.

Also David keeps getting less ambiguously gay and I'm just waiting for Rush to admit his undying love to him I mean good god I'm like three hours in and they've almost kissed once. Far more believable stab at gay romance than when they tried it with Rinoa and Squall in FFVIII.

Actually that reminds me, I'm... maybe this is silly but I'm seriously impressed that you can play a gay male character in New Vegas. Fallout 2 only having lesbians sort of bugged me (and it was a very minor thing compared to everything else that bFUCKING RAT DUNGEON)

[Klyde Chroma]

I have to ask, when you say you beat it, did you also beat the Act 4(or w/e it is called) DLC? Because that DLC is quite fun, although you do have to put up with a bit more QTE. I mean one of the enemies you fight in the DLC throws galaxies at you! Plus it actually concludes the plot.

I got true ep 18, then moved onto Act 4 Nirvana (Dlc).... beat that.... then it was on to what I thought was some of the coolest fan-servicy DLC I have seen in awhile, the Ryu and Akuma episodes!....... Finally after completing all that a message popped up on my screen that my disc melted from tapping O too many times over the course of the weekend... no joke...

[MeshGearFox]

Klyde what did your tonsil thing end up being.

[Klyde Chroma]

Klyde what did your tonsil thing end up being.

That is odd..... I don't remember mentioning I had a problem with my tonsils here..... although I did recently have quite a bit of throat/sinus problems.... do you have some sort of sixth sense you've been keeping to yourself mesh?? LoL

Anyhow since you asked.... I scorched the hell out of my throat, esophogus (sp?) and sinus' from consuming too much capsicum (the hot stuff in chili peppers).... couldn't taste or smell for like a week straight.... to top it off it made the bottom of my feet burn for days as well (oddly enough)

[Annubis]

Finished X-COM:EU on classic.
Good game... but I won't touch it for a while now. I'm going to need some time to get over it.

---

I also played "don't take it personally, babe, it just ain't your story"  (a Visual Novel made by the person who made "Analogue: A Hate Story".
For a game that was made in a couple of days for a speed game making contest... it is really good.

Actually, I'd go so far as to recommend the game to anyone that doesn't understand modern youth and their attitude to online privacy.
It explained the theme in a manner that really made me understand why younger folks just don't care about it.

(Also, the game is totally free -> http://scoutshonour.com/donttakeitpersonallybabeitjustaintyourstory )

EDIT: I guess I should add

WARNING
The game discusses mature themes such as sex, homosexuality and relationships.
The game is not erotic, but the themes are present as discussions.