What Are You Currently Playing? 6.65: Neighbor of the Beast

[Markness]

I've been playing both Disgaea 6 and Guilty Gear Strive.

[Mustang]

Hope you're having fun with Strive, Markness.

Definitely regretting not giving BlazBlue a chance back then. This game's potential to shoot up to being all time favorite is through the roof right now. I'm slow playing it though, just to make sure its not because of the "heat" of the moment type of thing. What's setting this game apart from the others is a combination of things. Most importantly is self-expression. I've said it countless of times when it came to GG. Being able to play a character the way you want is a real thing. I can look at 2 Sol's and tell you the difference between the 2 (in Xrd and +R) That same thing can be applied here in BB. Then the game might be just a tad deeper than GG as well. There are some things I'm still learning about too, so I'm not proficient enough to speak on some things. Anyway, then there's the characters. Unfortunately, Strive has no characters I'm interested in. Take it back to Xrd, there's Johnny, Slayer, and Venom. Take it back to +R there's Johnny, Venom, Slayer, Order-Sol and Testament. There are at least 10 characters I'm interested in in BB. I can really get lost in this game just learning some of these characters through training mode and trials. The 1 leg up GG has over BB is Johnny. No one is cool as Johnny (and only Vergil [DMC] trumps him).

I've also been watching all types of people play fighting games. Apparently there's Vtubers (I have no idea what that is) playing and some of them are really good (found out some were already members in the FGC and played/won tournaments). There's this one particular player that's playing on a Crossbox and is playing Nioh 2 on it. She's really good too. Impressed me a lot because she plays it similarly to Xlh Gladiator. Not saying she's as good as him, but she plays a little like him.

[Mustang]

BlazBlue Central Fiction

Started doing Jin trials and having issues right out the gate. Coming from Street Fighter 3-4 to this, I gotta develop some muscle memory for this type of pace. Stand, crouch, stand type of combos always get me for a little because I don't do those type of combos. I start everything with a crouching attack first unless I'm going for an overhead. Anyway, it's going to be an interesting ride.

Edit:

Making progress, but yeah, combos are really wonky for me. Timing is very specific. And then sometimes it feels like my button presses are not coming out at all. Right now I'm playing on pad, but it may be time for a new pad. I've had this thing since 2015 or whenever the PS4 first came out. I'm having some "aha" moments every now and then though, so all is not lost for me yet.

I know I said I'd probably play Spider-man next, but I got a lot of JRPG's I gotta get to as well. Dragon Quest 11 being one of them. I've had this game since it came out and have been glossing over it forever. I also have this Atelier Ryza game I've been curious about along with Tales of Arise (been waiting forever for this one). And I still need to finish my lineup of Persona's in Persona 5 Royal. I also have one of the G.O.A.T series (Mass Effect) waiting in the midst as well, so I have a lot of long running games ahead of me. It's probably for the best that there aren't any games for me coming out so soon. Gives me some time to clear some of the games in my backlog.

Edit 2:

Trial 10 normal for Jin. Damn, this one got me at the moment. Got me feeling like I need a new controller, but at the same time the recovery of this one move got me going as well because I also have to micro-dash in between to get close enough for the attack to connect.  ARGH!   

Edit 3:

And just like that the normal trials are cleared. Hard mode trials #1 though is, well, it's not kicking my ass yet, but it's definitely beating me up pretty good. Crazy part about it is is that I can do it, it's just another weird little micro-dash in there and the recovery timing is getting me. And again the controller. This motion, (anime fighters call it 3 on the number pad) diagonal right/left sucks. I want to learn hitbox for this but the good ole arcade stick might be better for it. I am having fun though.

Edit 4:

Not about BlazBlue. So I have Roku TV and IGN has a channel so I leave my TV on it all day. Apparently they do walkthroughs that I wasn't aware of, but I've seen 3 walkthroughs now. Spider-man Miles Morales, Monster Hunter Stories and Life is Strange: True Colors. And that last game, Life is Strange; it's not a game I would ever play, ever. But I respect it for what it is. I was entertained from when it started to pickup all the way to the end. The first hour I was definitely bored though. Anyway, thought I'd bring that up since it's been on so many folks top 10 list of gotys of last year.

Edit 5:

Back to BlazBlue. I made it to hard trial 3 and I know I can do it, but it's definitely giving me a beating. All the while doing these trials I am getting a few ideas on combo routes. Whether they're optimal or not, who knows. I mean I will look at of some of Jin's basic BnB's but from the looks of it I think I already know at least 2 of them. I will eventually take Jin to the lab and start working on different scenarios and whatnot in the future. Do I think I can take on others right now, yes and no. That damn diagonal left/right motion will be the end of me in an actual match, but at the same time say I can actually get things going right, yes I can definitely take on other people right now with some basic movement and a basic combo from his trial.

Edit 6:

Had to call it quits for today. Hard trial 4 is got me. High jump cancels, yeah, they're in USF4 but I was never able to use Ibuki or Viper for that matter, let alone pull of their super jump cancels. I am happy with my progress for sure though.

[Markness]

Are you looking forward to playing Baiken in Strive, Mustang?

[Mustang]

Yessir. While I've never played Baiken in +R or Xrd, I am looking forward to her in Strive. I'm hoping she's fun, too, because, if she's not I won't be sticking with the game (Unless they bring in Johnny in season 2).

[Peanutbutter]

Enjoying Lost Judgment at the moment. The School Stories are just as intricate as the Side Stories, nevermind the main plot. Looking forward to Cuphead's DLC later in June.


Speaking of Cuphead, that trailer for its Netflix show = 

[Mustang]

Guilty Gear Strive
Day 3 of Baiken and I'm not sold. I'm not sold at all. If anything she bores me. That being said the combo trials keeps me coming back. I'll also say that the hate Strive is getting is unwarranted. Like SF5 it is a fun game. I'm only waiting for a character. The Johnny's, Slayers, Testament's, I'll settle for any of them, but I can guarantee that people waiting on those characters wouldn't say Strive is bad. But yeah, combo trials, I'm a happy camper. I can get to know a character even more with trials. Anyway, Baiken's not for me, but maybe in time they'll fix her up enough to interest me if I don't get a character for me.

Edit 1:

Disregard everything I said about Baiken. Day 4 everything is starting to click now. I'm not a RPS (rock, paper, scissors) kinda guy, but she's exactly fitting to my style. Like take Dudley for instance. The way I like to play him, even though he's a rushdown character I play him on the defensive side and wait for my chance. Baiken is actually that character in a nutshell (although, I'd rather do this stuff with a rushdown character than a character who plays like that outright), but she's fun. A lot of fun now that everything is clicking.

Dragon Quest 11
Kind of just started this. Still having a hard time getting into it. I'm not going to give up on this yet, but this one is definitely one of the harder ones for me for some strange reason.

Edit 3:
I give up on Dragon Quest. Which is unfortunate because I really wanted to like it, but I figured out what's keeping it from appealing to me. I'm going to bring Trails of Cold Steel 4 and Persona 5 into this. These 2 games specifically, I can make my character/party the way I want and have fun doing so. Dragon Quest gives me specific branches and routes to take. Take the hero for instance. Swords and Greatswords is his strongest area (or so I hear), but what if I wanted to make him advance in hand-to-hand and turn my claw guy into my sword wielder? I can't do because of these select branches. Back then with DQ8, I would've loved every minute of it. Nowadays, I want that freedom to customize however I choose. Games like Nioh and Dark Souls, as daunting as they are, I still get that freedom to go whatever route I please. I gave up on JRPG's once before because I was tired of the main character being tied to swords (which was how I was introduced to Jade Empire and Mass Effect). Fighting games and RPG's are all I have really going for me at the moment. I do not want to burn myself out on main hero and swords right now (which is why I'm not firing up Tales of Arise anytime soon)

BlazBlue Central Fiction
Jin's hard trial #5 is kicking my ass. This game is top 3 material for sure.

Edit 2:

This trial, damn. The link between the kick and them falling down is crazy. Like right now, I can't even get the kick button to come out as they are falling. You would think it's easy just by adjusting the timing and whatnot but damn. Can't practice my timing because the buttons not coming out at all. I got the combo otherwise.

[Mustang]

BlazBlue Central Fiction
Hard trial #5 with Jin. Still kicking my ass, but I'm getting the timing little by little. I will have this trial beat by this coming Sunday (I say Sunday cause I don't guarantee playing every day).

I also tried Hazama's trials, WOW. He's going to kick the crap outta me.

Edit1:

Hard TRIAL #5 COMPLETE! HOLD DAT!!!
Hard Trial #6...... shit. This is gonna beat me down for a while.

Persona 5 Royal
Finally decided to jump back into this game. I was going to start my game over but I that'd be too much progress loss, and I did a lot of grinding to get to this point now. I'm currently in the 6th palace I believe. My party is at lvl 60 (overpowered for sure. I remember Skadi giving me the business in the original version) and I think I'll have Yoshitsune made during this playthrough. Now my next playthrough I'll have to work on stats and whatnot. I have a lot of the abilities (like fire amp, fire boost) already and I have a lot of cards. It's just a matter of putting things together at this point.

Anyway, I'll probably start Atelier Ryza (maybe) next weekend depending on how far I am with Persona.

Streaming wise. I have a rant coming soon about fighting games, but at the moment I watch Chilledchaos, Aplatypuss, Chickzama, AutoMattock, and Ban Anya. I have other people that I follow but like I said there's a huge rant coming soon.

[Markness]

I am playing Indivisible on my Switch after learning about it last month. I missed it when it originally made a scene and it's making me play my Switch more!

[Mustang]

King of Fighters 15
I'm watching people play it. If I'm being honest I'm not feeling this at all. I understand that SNK is on a budget, and it don't look bad, it just looks kinda dull. Like, the impact on some of these moves are there, but at the same time this look just don't vibe with me. I know they're trying to get away from the 2D sprites, but they need to go back to the drawing board until they can get the 2.5D/3D down. Game play might be fun and like Mortal Kombat, it gets hindered because the animations don't look good to me.

I gotta get my hands on Sifu. I've been hearing it's very hard, but that's the game I've been looking forward to getting my hands on for quite some time now. Getting a lot of Raid/Ip Man vibes from the little bits I've seen.

People have been trying to talk me into getting Yugioh: Master Duelist, but I'm on the fence about it. I know its free to play, but I can easily spend over hundreds of dollars in this game and I don't want to do that. Not to mention there's too much netdecking and I want more going into single player.

[Mustang]

My nephew is completely hooked on fighting games now. At least for the moment, Street Fighter.

Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike
I'm going to play top tier, but I'm learning Makoto and Yun at the moment. I'm in this mode where I want to learn mixups and resets. Yun don't really have resets except for when Genei Jin is activated. Makoto is Dudley but cranked to 11 and she has resets. Her slow movement will mess me up for sure, but I'm looking forward to learning her. My nephew's become somewhat of a shit-talker so I'll only pull out the shoto's and Dudley when he start trying to talk bad.

Ultra Street Fighter 4
My nephew's really into this game though. I've been teaching him how to play Ryu, but I gotta change the way I teach him. I want him to have fun and push buttons first and foremost, but I'm also in the middle of learning newer characters so, yeah. Right now I'm staying away from Ryu and Dudley (only use for warming up my hands). Like I said I'm in this phase of wanting to learn resets and mixups. Yang has some mean resets, Yun has powerful resets and Ibuki is just a mixup and reset monster. The thing with Ibuki is her vortex, but that's too cheap and she's actually pretty strong without the vortex as well. I may try to use Makoto in this as well. She's less dangerous in this compared to 3rd Strike (all of 3rd Strike characters are less dangerous in this except Ibuki, Ken and Akuma) and that's saying something considering she can end the game touching you twice. Maybe once depending on how much meter you have. Anyway, her reward for how hard she has to work is worth it. I won't touch Cody or Ken either. They're too simple for me and too much for my nephew to handle.

I'm may introduce my nephew to Street Fighter 5 Championship Edition. No reason really not to considering it's easier than USF4. The only problem is me finding a character to stick with so I can enjoy the game with him. For sure I'll be using Karin, but other than that I'm not sure.

Guilty Gear Strive would be too much for him to handle. At least with games like Blazblue, Dbfz, UMvC3, etc, etc there's autocombos, but strive, I don't know. Too much to try and teach him (especially when he don't even understand FADC)

Now in terms of single-player games I'm going to give Y's 9 another shot. I remember I got up to a certain point but got lost because of a glitch or something and I gave up after that.

Y's 9
Yeah started playing this yesterday and I'm 10 hrs in. Like I said, I don't know what caused me to give up the last time but I'm enjoying it now. Maybe it was the mood I was in at the time, I'm not sure. I know when it comes to certain portions in the game I just don't care for, but I didn't even pay attention back then that I can skip portions of the dungeon when I die. But whatever on that. Like I said, I am enjoying it. It's keeping me occupied that's for sure.

[Mustang]

Ys IX: Monstrum Nox
I think I just got the final character that belongs in the party. If I had to compare this to another game, I'd probably say Kingdom Hearts or any Tales game, at least in terms of combat. Falcom or whoever is behind this and Trails, I swear they deserve a gold medal for characters. This is the 2nd series I've played where none of the characters annoyed me. Not even one comes close to annoying me either. The only fault I'd give this game other than its graphics is the bouncing back and forth between the different POV's. You're at a huge disadvantage in one whereas you have access to everything in the other. If it weren't for how it's connected to the story I'd cut it out completely. I don't know if this game has a NG+ or not, but I'm not sure if it's worth going through it again. I don't play these type of games for the thrill of a challenge. 1st playthrough is always for the story and the 2nd playthrough is trying to see how broken I can make these characters. I don't know if you make a busted character in this game like you could in Trails of Cold Steel. Anyway, I am enjoying it though.

Edit:

Watching people play Elden Ring. This would probably the only souls game I'm interested in, but looking at people play I can definitely tell you that dodge rolling don't sit well with me, especially after experience movement and dodging in Nioh. Other than that I can definitely dig this game and its world. It did take seeing a samurai type to actually win me over though.

[Mustang]

Elden Ring
Only watching people so far. I don't have a copy of the game yet. But I'm watching 2 people play. I don't plan on watching them play the whole thing, but I'm trying to get some ideas on the kind of build I want to go for. 1 of them is going for a Vagabond Dex build. No idea what that means. I think the other 1 is going for some form of Dex build as well. Again, no idea. Both ran into an invader that was a samurai build and my eyes sparkled. I'm thinking I want a samurai magic welder or something like that. Kind of Sephiroth-ish in a way. Anyway, the more I watch people play Elden Ring the more I get the urge to fire up Nioh 1 and 2. I have unfinished business with 1. And I never even started 2. Today I was sort of binging XLH Gladiator videos (slow work day) and I was watching a little bit of Xenoswarm builds for Nioh 2, and I'm like, oh yes, I want to attempt some form of a dual weld poison build. Not sure what kind of build I'd go for in Nioh 2 though.

Street Fighter 5 Championship Edition
I missed out on a lot and have a lot of catching up to do. I don't plan on playing this seriously though, but I do want to be competent in it. I mean now that some of the whiners are starting to dwindle (hopefully) I get to enjoy the game. The nephew is coming by and he's asking to try it out. Might be a good one to learn together.

Ultra Street Fighter 4
My Yun is coming together pretty nicely. Although I'm thinking of making Yang the main (not intended) and having Yun and Ibuki as backups. I don't particularly care about tier lists and whatnot and considering people would consider Yang a mid tier character, his mixups and resets are brutal. And overall he's just more fun to play. He's a lot more fun in this than he is in 3rd Strike. In 3rd Strike Yang is more of a footsie based character and we know how I feel about footsies and neutral, whereas Yun is more fun to play in 3rd Strike. Anyway, none of my characters are competent yet.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

I've been playing Elden Ring. Haven't gotten very far outside of defeating the first main boss and being somewhere in the middle of Stormville Castle. Interestingly, there seems to be at least some necessity to invest in magic no matter what kind of build you go for.

[Mustang]

Hmm. So far the 2 people I've been watching play Elden Ring, I don't know if they've done anything with magic yet, but I do know neither has used magic at all. The other person I thought was doing a dex build is doing a strength build.

Nioh
Oh man, the rust is there for sure. I died once but it was me doing something stupid. I'm also trying to get used to the controls as well. It's not a weird feeling or anything, just taking some time getting used to all over again. The camera is sort of messing with me but it hasn't been too much of a problem. I'm currently at the first boss, and might make my attempt at him in a few, but more than likely it'll be tomorrow.

That's pretty much it. Probably will alternate between Nioh and some fighting game.

Street Fighter 5: Championship Edition
Doing trials. Going through Ryu's trials at the moment. I'm on Vol. 2. The one issue I always have, even in earlier Street Fighter games is doing Shoryuken from a crouching position. I've always had this problem and I hate it. I understand there's a shortcut, but it encourages mashing and I try to stay away from mashing. My hands are shot right now. That being said, my problem area is getting used to motion inputs in this game. There's definitely something weird going on. USF4 motion inputs (outside of dp) are easy for me. Obviously 1-frame links were what did everyone in. Myself included. I don't think there are 1-frame links in the game outside of microstep combos and even those might be 2-frames. Just going through Ryu's trials, light kick into tatsu should be easy mode, but for some reason the moves aren't coming out. I'm probably doing it too fast, but that wouldn't explain why the light kick's not coming out at all. Anyway, Ryu's boring but more exciting in this game than he is in USF4, I'll give Capcom that. The stiff animations on his moves throws everything off though, but he's definitely a lot more fun here (3rd Strike and Street Fighter x Tekken is where he's the most fun at).

I don't know if I'm going to play Nioh today. Like I said, my hands are shot right now.

Edit 1:

Nioh
So I fired it up afterall. Onryoki is beaten. I'm still a scrub, but I did manage to beat him on first go around. I beat the stage twice now. I may go for a 3rd run. Beat the little side mission that's in place of that as well. The one I know is going to give me a hard time is Hino Enma (sp?) along with Tachibana. Man I'm not looking forward to these fights lol, but on the plus side I still appreciate human-size bosses. Giant bosses is "meh" to me.