I’m going against my usual behaviour and playing multiple games at once this week. I’ve almost finished Ninja Gaiden 2 Black (White), and this will probably be my go-to way to experience NG2 going forward. It’s not quite the full ridiculousness of the original (and the added girl chapters from Sigma do kind of ruin the pacing and flow) but it just looks so good and plays so smooth at 120 FPS. And it has full controller remapping like NGB had but NG2 lacked, so I can have light attack on R1 and heavy attack on R2 again. With the fixes and additions from the White mod it comes close enough to a “best of both worlds” version to satisfy me, and I have enjoyed some of the Sigma inclusions like the Enma’s Fang greatsword weapon and the removal of the tunnel worm boss.

Having finally received my package I also started on Ninja Gaiden: Dragon Sword that I’m playing on my N3DS. It was also Itagaki-designed and released between NGB and NG2. It’s a really interesting game, using the DS held in portrait mode like a book and the stylus as the only control input. It looks absolutely fantastic for a DS game, and the gameplay is surprisingly well translated from the mainline titles. It looks and feels just like a proper Ninja Gaiden title, with familiar animations and enemies and fast combat. It also has a fantastic Ninpo system where you draw the sign of the Ninpo you’re casting with the stylus, which is very fun so far. The only issue I’m having with it is constantly worrying that I’ll scratch the touchscreen from all the stylus use.

Just because some developers are bad or lazy at optimisation doesn’t make these tools bad. Unoptimized games have existed for far longer than AI upscaling tools. If I can use DLSS to still get solid framerates in new releases without needing to buy a new $2000 graphics card every two years that sounds pretty good in my book. I get why some people dislike Frame Generation as it does typically come with some input lag and is a bit of a win-more in that you need 60+ FPS in the first place for it to work well. But DLSS/FSR are good tools in my book and one of the best applications of AI.

This was one of those old critics’ darlings that I never got around to playing. Should probably add it to my backlog list.

Lune was by far my favourite to use mechanically, the stains system just made for such fun planning of rotations. There is a lot of fun with various weapon combos too, like the Potierim support build that applies Greater Slow. I personally used her as AP and buff battery with Typhoon giving everyone max AP and refreshing greater versions of all buffs every turn. And then I used Braselim with Storm Caller and Lightning Dance to farm a tier 3 Gradient every turn.

The Genesis build is AP efficient but once you have 9 every turn it gets outdamaged by Lightning Dance (single target) and Hell (AoE). Though you wouldn’t guess so going by the astronomically poor and unclear skill descriptions.

I didn’t get Medalum either but honestly you don’t need it. The one shot builds only need it pre Cheater to start in Virtuoso, after that you can just Last Chance anyway.

I couldn’t beat it “fairly” either, but approaching it as a puzzle fight where you’re trying to figure out how to deal with its bullshit is also kind of fun. I ended up stunlocking it, which in itself you can do in several different ways. The game has a lot of fun things you can do with builds.

Or just Stendhal.

What difficulty setting were you playing on? I think Story mode post nerfs should be manageable even if you get hit a lot - at least as far as main story goes.

If you want to give it another shot, invest in HP and Defense, bring a healer and build Maelle as a tank with Egide to give yourself a lot of margins and sort of grind out encounters safely. There aren’t many DPS checks - if any.

Late game you can stack so much damage on Maelle that she one-shots everything, if you like.

Its a great game and worth trying to finish. Now as far as the optional superboss… Yeah, that’s another story.

Phenomenal game. Great action gameplay and super cool and interesting world building. Must play if you like SCPs. Also acts as a sort of intermediary between Alan Wake 1 and 2.

Make sure you play the Mankind Divided DLCs after! A Criminal Past in particular is probably the best “new Deus Ex” content they ever put out.

Also, congrats on being made a mod! I literally cannot think of a better person for the role.

Completely agree with you.

If the recent pathetic patent filings were not enough to finally wake you up to what an awful company Nintendo are I don’t know what to tell you.

Feels like this is the key part of the article:

But I think the passage of time has obscured just how much most of these critiques also applied to the original (and beloved) Hollow Knight. While Silksong’s bosses might be a little tougher, and its jumping challenges a little more precise, its predecessor was also often unforgiving and gated in almost the exact same ways (though some of this difficulty was eventually rebalanced). Only 22 percent of Hollow Knight’s Steam players have obtained the “Hollow Knight” achievement for reaching the first of the game’s multiple endings, and I’m willing to bet most of the remainder gave up out of frustration rather than boredom.

I’ve said this before but… what exactly were people expecting? I guess lots of people who never played HK jumped on the Silksong hype train just because the diehard fans were so rabid about it, and are now shocked at how hard the game they thought they were supposed to want turned out to be?

The exploration and level design too! Nothing gives you quite the same rush of dopamine as unlocking shortcuts in Dark Souls. The first time you kick that ladder? Priceless.

Cyberpunk modding scene is incredible, the only sad thing is that while 2.0 was an incredible patch it did break a lot of old and amazing mods. Scissors was an absolute GOAT and stuff like Vehicle Combat, Breach Takedown and Drone Companions were just incredible.

I finished Samurai Jack: Battle Through Time and had a good time with it. Short, old-school feeling chill action game. Probably a must-play if you’re a fan of the show, otherwise keep an eye out for Epic giveaways or just pirate it if you think it looks cool. It’s not that long, probably 8 hours or so with some cool looking levels and the combat gets pretty fun once you start unlocking skills.

Being unable to resist my recent hyperfixation I went back and started playing through Ninja Gaiden 2 Black with the White mod installed. Still playing on Warrior to have an apples-to-apples comparison. 6 Chapters in now and it feels like a halfway point between vanilla NG2B and OG NG2 so far. Apart from a handful of fights actually being harder in this version it mostly is easier and less dense in fights. There are still places that are empty where there should be fights, I still turn the corner sometimes expecting a fight I remember and being met with silence instead. Having said that, not every omission is negative - the jellyfish bombs in Venice for example I didn’t really miss.

Also - and I can’t understate this - the game is fucking beautiful. Not only is it visually stunning with the lighting and the blood physics and textures and raytracing and 120 FPS HDR - it is also impressive from an art direction standpoint. It feels just like the original, only sharper. It looks like what the original looked like in my head when I thought back on it. Sometimes remasters or remakes lose the original identity, but here they absolutely nailed it.

So far I’m having a blast with it, even though it doesn’t quite deliver that “playable cocaine” vibe that the original was constantly feeding you.

Let’s hope so, because this sounds like it could be pretty disastrous doesn’t it? But who’s gonna afford challenging Nintendo?

I’ll have to look into that!

That reminds me I need to refresh my backups and prepare for the day the HDD gives out.

Anyone else still use their old clickwheel iPod or just me?

I imagine a non-insignificant portion of Silksong players never played HK and just jumped on the hype bandwagon. Which makes sense considering it was built up like it would literally pay off your mortgage and reunite you with your high school sweetheart.

Literally sackable offense.