I mean you could totally watch one of the thousands of game play videos and try to figure out if it's for you or not, rather than taking the word of people that may or may not translate to reality when describing the action of a game. I mean what kind of question is it to ask why a video game is appealing? It seems like it's sort of self-evident. I don't really know what sort of answer could be given to that question that would be satisfying in any degree. It's a good game, try it out if it looks cool to you--or not.

"Just Google it" thanks chief. I was hoping someone who enjoys using their words might take a shot at it.

It's just like asking why is Tetris fun? You stack blocks against a pressure mechanic. Why is Mario fun? The platforming action is very smooth and it hits the right difficulty. Why is DooM fun? You blow up demons with badass guns.

All the reasons for why a game might be appealing are pretty obvious if you just look at a little bit of gameplay action. I don't think any amount of words will change this fact. Me telling you that people find the game fun because you're fucking Spider-Man swinging through the city beating up bad guys isn't exactly some sort of revelation that couldn't be gleaned from a cursory glance. Whether you think that's fun or not doesn't change that this is the appeal of the game.

I think lots of people could go into detail about what they like/love/hate about Tetris or Mario. I'm sorry that you think I've asked an impossible question. I promise I didn't.

Yeah but you asked what the appeal of it was, which isn't really something that requires an essay or a deep dive analysis.

This is the craziest semantics go-round dude. What the actual fuck are you even talking about? It was simply a general invitation to talk about/describe the gameplay. I'm sorry I didn't phrase my question correctly. Mostly I'm sorry you felt that since you couldn't answer me, no one could. Let me try again!

Hey guys, the Spider Man PS4 trailer looks really bad to me. I've heard there's tons of hype and I wondered if this goes beyond just "Spidey in an open world". If anyone, besides rexxz apparently, could tell me if you've played it and maybe some positives and negatives that you found? Did it live up to the hype? Is the combat fun? Mechanics solid? I know I could watch some gameplay on YouTube but this is the video game thread and I like hearing from people who like using their words to describe things.

Don't mind rexxz, he can be really obtuse sometimes.

I don't get the appeal either myself, but I am biased against all superhero games to be fair. Still, this looks like an Arkham reskin with QTEs *shudders* and a more boring world, so :shrug:

I know that's not helpful, sorry.

From what friends have told me, it's the best Spider-Man game to date. The graphics are great, the gameplay is very Arkham-like but with a slight cartoonish slant (because Spider-Man), and the web slinging mechanic is virtually perfect. If you're a fan of the character then you'll probably enjoy the game.

Ahhh okay. My old roomie had all the Arkham games. I never got into the main game much (so repetitive) but the combat was definitely a silly-good time. There was some kind of beat-em-up horde mode where they just throw you in a room with progressively tougher waves of enemies. Pretty fun.

Thanks players. I also have kind of a built-in wariness of superhero games. Just so many bad ones. But I heard the hype for this one was super crazy so I thought maybe they were doing something innovative. I do enjoy Spidey as a character.

Last Spider-Man game I ever played was Maximum Carnage for Sega Genesis.

(Gameplay starts around 14 minutes)

Honestly, I kinda dig it. Gunplay looks solid, graphics are fine, it runs well on all platforms. It's cool to see a Soulslike adapt pure action game shooting.

I played a lot of Spider-man games as a kid. If I buy a PS4 someday, this would probably be one of the first games I pick up for it, for the nostalgia if nothing else.

It seems like one's enjoyment of the Arkham games is completely make-or-break depending on whether they like the stealth gameplay. For me, setting up traps and stealthily taking out criminals is endlessly fun.

I'm sure someone will have a lot better reasons for playing this game, but as far as I'm concerned:

"Me dumb. Love superheros. Lots of hype. Buy game".

I bought the Spider-Man game Friday morning and played it for a dozen hours this weekend. Rexxz speaks the truth. It's great fun. The web slinging and movement mechanics are perfect, and I mean literally perfect. I've gone around NYC slinging around as Spider-Man doing nothing but that for 10-20 minutes at a time before even realizing I'm just doing that, and only that, it's so fun to do.

NYC looks good, the graphics looks good (not quite God of War levels though) and the Spider-Man animations are top notch. Beautiful animations.

The dialogue, story and characters have been interesting so far and I like how they are woven into the open world gameplay. I've not even gotten to the bigger bosses yet and I'm having a blast.

There's some RPG elements regarding Spider-Man's suits, gadgets and moves. This is perhaps the most Arkham like. The gameplay itself though doesn't feel very Arkham like. In Spider-Man you must use active abilities and moves to defeat enemies, making the fighting much more challenging. You can't simply button mash a counter over and over.

I played Arkham City, and despite loving the dark nature, characters and world of Batman, the combat was boring and got old fast for me. Spider-Man is different.

So to sum it up, I recommend it. I'm enjoying it and having a blast. And I've not even been a very big Spider-Man fan in the past. Now I'm singing....Spider-Man....Spider-Man....

Dope, thanks guys!

I've got mounting hype for the new For Honor expansion. 4 new heroes. Shaolin monks and Nuxia assassins. My god I love this game.

Someone gets it. Nothing more needs to be said, really.

This is right up my alley and will be the next buy.

I am hopelessly addicted to Octopath. Can't stop playing.

Turns out I didn't actually outgrow JRPGs like I once suspected. I had some doubts at some point because modern JRPGs were so dreadful, and while I still enjoyed the classics, it occurred to me that it could be nostalgia. But I had a feeling that it wasn't the case, and Octopath is solid proof of it. Sure, there's some incredibly cheesy story moments, and the dungeons are fairly simple, but the combat is ridiculously good and the production values are so glorious that it keeps pulling me in. I dare say, it's the best combat system in a traditional JRPG that I've seen.

Just took down my second divine class guardian (Sorcerer and Starseer down). Great boss fights, very tense the whole time, I love how you gotta play them almost like a puzzle.

Best soundtrack of the year so far, too.

I wish I had a Switch. That game looks real good.

That and the new Smash Brothers might push me over the edge. It's only money. Fuck it.

If I ever get a Switch it will be for Octopath Traveler and Zelda. Those two games (and Xenoblade Chronicles 2) rule.

Any video game recommendation to listen to music to? I love playing Banished and Cities: Skylines to new bands I find or just-bought CDs, but I don't want to burn out on those games, so any recs will be welcomed!

HOLY SHIT YOU GUYS I'M FREAKING OUT

http://teamcherry.com.au/hollow-knight- ... mber-25th/

Anyone have a recommendation for JRPGs, actually? I really like JRPG turn-based combat (though I'm not totally averse to real-time input mechanics, either) but I'd really like a more gritty art style and story without trillions of hours of cutscenes of angsty anime teens and cutesy princesses. It's been a pretty long time since I played one...I think my most recent was Blue Dragon, which I did like gameplay-wise but the aesthetics and lame story and characters were the pits.

I don't own any consoles so I'd prefer something on PC.

JRPGs without anime AND with a gritty art style? lol, good luck... I can't think of a single JRPG art style I'd ever call gritty tbh. Maybe Panzer Dragoon Saga, at the most...

Not quite "gritty" but Cosmic Star Heroine might be good for you. It's on Steam, it's fully turn-based, it's strongly inspired by Chrono Trigger and Phantasy Star without just being a rip-off, the combat system is pretty amazing and the pacing of the story is quick and snappy. It's also not that long, 10-20 hours depending on how completionist you are.

Or you could just pick up Phantasy Star IV on Steam if you've never played it. It's dirt cheap and it's a fantastic little classic. It's a little cheesy at times, being a 90's JRPG and all, but still less insulting than the recent shite you see around (no cutesy princesses or moe blobs either!).

Oh, long is totally fine.

It doesn't need to be "gritty" as in The Witcher or something (although that would be cool...) but just not cutesy anime bobbleheads with spiky hair and giant eyes. Actually, anyone play DragonQuest XI? Reviews say it does have a lot of cut scenes but the art style is decent.

Not a JRPG... but you should get Lisa.

I played and currently play Dragon Quest XI and it is a classic JRPG if you consider the mechanics - turn-based battles, a character-specific skill tree (actually a board), crafting, sidequests etc. However everything is done with gusto and perfection in my opinion. Every JRPG fan should play it.

As for a JRPG (at least mechanically) that has a non-anime art style and is somewhat gritty - try Battle Chasers: Nightwar. HEAVILY inspired by JRPG's with a great combat mechanic and very stylish comic book graphics.

The Shin Megami Tensei series contains pretty much the grittiest JRPGs ever made. The Persona off-shoots are the closest things you get to the more traditional anime style, but even then they're more reined in and down-to-earth about it.

And of course, Digital Devil Saga and Nocturne are as bleak as you could want a JRPG to be.

None of those are on PC.

Dragon Quest XI is still real pricey so it's on the wishlist. Battle Chasers had a dumb looking thumbnail so I ignored it, but this looks pretty neat!

I dunno about Lisa...doesn't really look like what I'm after at all.

Derp.

Well, I guess they'll just have to fish around for some Western RPGs that are kinda sorta similar to JRPGs, like Darkest Dungeon.

Yeah, pencil those in if the day ever comes where you get a console. SMT/Persona is pretty much every single thing you're looking for (apart from Persona's odd love affair with giving you a really stupid tutorial character like Teddie and Mona). Even fuckin Yahtzee put Persona 5 in his Top 5 of the year and he has literally every single complaint with typical JRPGs as you do.

Is it actually good? I don't know much about that series but it always struck me as super weeb and annoying in the worst possible ways. Granted, I haven't played it or even seen much apart from memes and screenshots but what I have seen looked obnoxious. I suppose I should check out some videos...

It's only weeb if you want it to be. It's got the anime art style (not really obnoxious though, no huge cutesy eyes (outside of the aforementioned Teddie and Mona) or dumb moeshit) and the plot of P5 can be seen as something of a nerd power fantasy, but the stories are incredibly engaging and well written, the party characters all feel very real and sympathetic, and the games as a whole are just hopelessly addictive. There's so much shit to do in either game (I say either because I've only played 4 and 5 but to my knowledge the first two aren't exactly easy to get a hold of outside of Japan anyway), it's insane. Also P5 has one of the best soundtracks in eons.

Nice. I dunno, maybe it's something about the UI design and just the general presentation of visuals that puts me off. Really loud and in your face. And from personal experience and history, I usually do not mesh with anything in that aesthetic style.

P4 is just super slick with the design and I've always taken P5 to look something like a ransom note (which is really important to the story actually). Yeah it's loud but I look at it like a comic book or something, that's the vibe I've always gotten.

Right I can see where you're coming from with the manga comparison. Perhaps I've become jaded through Persona meme overexposure. Damn you internet!

Nerd power fantasies...and it also seems like it rides sort of an edgelord schtick, no? Isn't it the game where you kill yourself constantly to summon some inner demons to fight in the ultimate of weeby Korn videos? Yeahhh....I've got the same reservations as rexxz. I'd still play it though, based on all the praise, but alas, no consoles for me so it's a no-go anyway.

Not really--each of the modern Persona games has its own method of summoning your Persona, tied into the game's main theme.

Persona 3 has the characters committing mock-suicide to summon their Persona, which matches the game's general theme of "memento mori"--coming to terms with their mortality in the presence of a world where death is omnipresent. Persona 3's story and characters kinda suck balls, though, and the game as a whole is massively overrated.
Persona 4 is all about piercing through lies and artifice to seek the truth, both in general and about themselves, so they summon Personas by shattering Tarot cards--the Tarot cards representing dumbed-down and simplistic personality traits, signifying that their power comes from transcending such limiting labels.
Persona 5 centers around the theme of breaking free from societal restraints and rebelling against a corrupt system, so the characters don masquerade masks while in the shadow world, and to summon their Persona, they rip off the mask and symbolically let their true selves shine forth.

So, one has the mock-suicides, one has shattering cards as a symbolic gesture of shattering labels, and one has tearing off of masks to reveal who they truly are. If you're a fan of Jungian psychology, the series is a gold mine.

Battle Chasers: Nightwar is based on an Western comic book with an anime-like aesthetic but the story is classic fantasy. The mechanic are fairly unique and the most JRPG-like with big attacks and quasi-"limit breaks". Check it out when you have the chance.

Right~

.....
You lost me



Recommending the weebiest shit ever that isn't even on PC. Good job mate


Those games feature teenagers in modern-day doing weeb shit, including picking your favourite waifu, and it features j-pop/vocal themes for battle themes (which mean you hear it all the time).
These games are my worst nightmare tbh.