Bloody Borne

So... Bloodborne.

Those of you who have been reading me for a significant length of time know that I've played the predecessors, Darksouls, Demonsouls, not so much demon souls 2, but... Dark and Demon. And they were okay. I liked them, but never really felt any need to continue to play them. Completed a boss or two, but then I just stopped. I never thought about grinding to get better when I couldn't continue, I never thought about playing for the sake of playing, but with Bloodborne I actually have been doing all of these things.

Whether it's because of the differences or because I'm a different, less easily frustrated person.
Don't get me wrong, I still get frustrated with hte game from time to time, but less because of feeling like the games too hard, and more because I feel like I've done something wrong. It's one of those games that makes you feel like if you die its because you got stupid.

The main differences between Bloodborne and the Souls series are the setting - victorian horror era instead of fantasy castle horror era - and the weapons.
Souls used very traditional swords, axes, heavy weapons, etc... most importantly they had shields. One of the biggest most common tactics I ever saw in Souls was sit behind the shield and pray. Well Bloodborne doesn't have shields.
Aparently the Developer of the games hated that people just hid behind their shields and killed the monsters (though trust me when I say it wasn't bloody easy). So they removed them and replaced them with guns. pistols, shotguns, etc... which made the gameplay all about dodging and attackign when you could. The guns have some uses but they're not designed to replace close range combat.
Rather than the simple weapons in Souls Bloodborne uses 'trick weapons' which basically means weapons with two forms. usually a quick weak form and a slow strong form, which makes for some interesting gameplay. At the time of writing this review I was using a weapon that was both a giant hammer and a quick longsword and one of the most difficult, yet satisfying things I've done is learn to combine the two forms in combat.
Darting in and dealing quick attacks when the enemy is moving fast then switchign to the heavier weapon mode mid attack when he slows down a bit.

In Souls there was a lot less to it, so for me at least it was a lot more boring.

I actually have really enjoyed Bloodborne. Don't get me wrong I get my ass handed to me a lot and i'm not very far through it, but I still like it.

If you want to watch me getting my ass handed to me by monsters weak and strong then you can watch me streaming (or watch old recordings of me playing) Bloodborne at http://www.twitch.tv/dantejcross

Tube
- James

Lootcrate March 2015 "Covert"

Thats right! Loot Crate! I've actually had it for a while now i just kept forgetting to post. Sorry. my bad!

Here it is;

 

So this one wasn't quite as good as the last few, but it did still have one or two things i really liked. I've been a huge fan of Marvel's Agents of Shield for a while now and on multiple occasions considered dressing as Phil Coulson for Halloween when I go to the states in february. Each time I've changed my mind and gone on to work on a post-apocalyptic spiderman design. But the offical Agents of Shield Laminate prop that I got in this box makes me want to do that again!

I also quite liked the idea of the watch (though I'd never wear it) and I do like hte t-shirt, though I don't think I'd buy it if I just saw it in the shop. Also the paracord bracelets cool, but I have a few of them already. It would have been cooler if they'd given the paracord, the clips and instructions on how to make it yourself. but thats just my opinion.

Overall it was alright, but a lot of stuff I'd give away.

There was one more interesting thing about it that I didnt bother with because by the time I got the crate the internet had thoroughly completed it; there was an augmented reality game where they give you clues to solve a bunch of riddles for a competition (I think) which is very cool and I wish i'd gotten the box earlier so I could have taken part, but alas the UK takes way too long to get it and the US aren't about to wait.

Next one should be awesome. it's titled 'Fantasy' and the video trailer is all about DnD.

Bloodborne-tube

- James

Bitter Sweet

I just hit 20000 views. thats a pretty big deal for me! I also got put into a couple of 'great blogger' and 'bloggers to watch' lists, which is pretty cool. I guess they didn't get the memo that I'm not good at updating. Probably I didn't send it.

That's great news for me, but while i was finding that out my friend Rixel/Elizabeth was finding out some really bad news. She wrote a post about it on her Tublr asking for support, and I wanted to help out. This is the only place I really have to get my voice out there, so here's the post;

http://rixelvera.tumblr.com/post/115941631625/dear-tumblr-this-beautiful-girl-is-my-niece

Too Long? Didn't Read?;
Basically Elizabeth's 17 year old neice was recently diagnosed with a rare form of cancer and begins chemotherapy next week.
Liz isn't asking for money, she's simply asking for art. Any kind. Music, writing, pictures. Their whole extended family is going ot Disneyland in june and she wants to plaster the walls with as much supportive artwork as possible.

If you have the time to do something like this it would be greatly appreciated, and you can send it to me at James@minority-opinions.com

Thank you, for reading. anything big or small, intricate or simple would be amazing.

Tubage
- James

Dragon Age: Inquisition In Review

So.

Dragon age: Inquisition.

So the latest dragon age. The latest Bioware game. The Review. I should have done this a while ago, but I kind of didn't want to. Not because it was bad, it wasn't. It just wasn't as good as I hoped. And I don't understand why people think it's amazing.
This coming from an admitted Bioware Fanboy. Speaking of which; there were some moments in this game that did make me fan-squee a little.

So anyway, here it is, my opinion. Minor Spoilers ahead. ;

So I liked this game, really liked it in fact, but I didn't love it. Dragon age Origins, I loved. Mass Effect 1 and 2 I loves, even Dragon age 2 and Mass Effect 3 I loved. I'm the guy who plays Mass effect three, gets annoyed about the ending in private but then defends it when people complain.
Drangon Age Inquisition, however... Okay, let me qualify this. It's a good game, a really good game, but there were just some things about it that bothered me.

For starters, save compatibility;
I played on the PC, I played Origins and 2 on the PC so I wanted to play Dragon Age Inquisition on the same medium to continue my save file, to make sure that my quest continued, but they no longer allowed that. It worked perfectly well in Dragon age 2, I simply uploaded my save from DA: O to DA2 and I was ready to go, all the choices I made carried over and all the things they effected were effected from the go. This worked perfectly well 4 years ago, but when DA:I came to be developped it was impossible. Bioware required that we go to a website and 'upload' our characters then select which choices we made as we progressed through the game. Bare in mind its been about 6 years since I played and I dont remember what I did with every single character. Also worth noting that it couldnt find my main play through characters from DA: O no matter what I did. Not that it really mattered as I had to input all of the choices anyway, it just would have been nice to have my character name and image.
So that put me in a bad mood from the start.

Next thing that bothered me was the control system (I think thats the best way of describing it). DA: O and DA2 controls were designed for PC, or at least they felt more like they were. I could have every single one of my spells available at every moment. there was never a time where I had to choose between 2 different spells. I liked it that way because my character would have a dozen or more abilities, sometimes they wouldn't even be useful, except when going into specific scenarios or specific types of battles, but you wouldn't always knowyou were going into one, so when you did you were always glad that you had that spell sat at the end of your shortcut bar, waiting for it's time to shine.
In DA: I, however you're limited to 8 abilities, and after not entirely too long if you're a mage you have more than that. This limitation is due to the fact that the PS4 and Xbox One controllers map abilities to 4 buttons and then those same 4 buttons while L2 is held. PC doesn't have any of these limitations as it has both the mouse and 12+ keys to lock it all to. In DA: O it had the whole bottom of the screen dedicated to abilities and anything more than the number keys you jut have to press with the mouse. And I like it that way.
With DA: I I had to only use all purpose abilities, no attacks that only really worked in certain situations and no abilities I just kind of liked. Everything had to be streamlined and sometimes chaos works better.

Another bother for me was the necessity of unnecessary side quests.
Now making side quests a necessity has been happenning forever. In RPGs you have to do side quests to level up and move on. It's a part of the gameplay, you need to be stronger to fight stronger things, it makes sense. You're never locked out of progressing, you just might not be able to beat the things you have to face out there.
In DA: I, however, if you want to progress through the story you have to have enough 'Inquisition Power' to do the next mission. Each mission costs a specific amount and the amount gets higher as you progress. Each side quest you complete gives you one maybe 2 points of power, so they literally lock the next story mission until you complete an arbitrary number of side quests which, by definition should not be important. It's extension of game length via stopping you and turning you back.
It didn't bother me very much on my first play through. I'm a huge DA and Bioware fan so playing through every single thing was my goal, I was racking up 2 or 3 times the amount of points needed to get everything done, but when I decided to play through it again with a different character type I felt like I simply could not be bothered with it. I did not want to have to go pick up those 5 tomes again. I didn't want to have to go find 5 iron and a logging site. I didn't want to have to kill 15 mountain goats. I just wanted the story. I just wanted to advance.
I guess this is a pro-con complaint. on the one hand it was good enough I wanted to complete it again, on the other hand it was not as good hte second time because I'd done it before.

The last thing that annoyed me, and this is a really minor thing but it was a big thing to me, was the character archetype of 'comedian'.
What I mean by this is, you remember in DA:2 where you had the option of what your character said. You could say something good, something evil, something serious or something funny. and the game would remember it, then if you did it enough it'd make you say funny things without having to select it in the second and third act. But in DA: 2 you didn't have that option. I get that it was a serious situation. the world is ending and all that, but I feel like even in those situatiosn some people would be able to laugh. I feel like those situations are the best time for those people to do so.
Yes the world is ending, but if we stop laughing then we really are doomed. So I was disapointed by that. However it wasn't as disapointed as I was by a certain other character who was supposed to have a comedian mentality returning and being the dryest most serious character I'd encountered. The way that character was developped he should have been able to laugh in the face of any danger, any peril... and yet he didn't tell a single joke, make a single witty remark. It was disapointing.

Also the characters were a little weak in this one.

That said it was still a very good game. It made a lot of advances in the franchise and is well worth playing.
There are some really nerdworthy scenes where you meet up with characters from previous games, the gameplay, despite the consol limitations, is still thoroughly enjoyable, and the story is top notch. The personal stuff takes a little bit of a back seat, and I'd like it if they made the companion conversations more common, like, a lot more common, but otherwise it's still a pretty fun game.


I'm glad I bought it, glad I played it. Not sure I'm glad I bought it twice... but... Oh, yeah I bought it twice.
I'd bought it on the PC and then I heard it was going to have multiplayer so I bought it on PS4 to play with my friends. The multiplayer was a nice little edition, but not worth a whole second copy of the game.

Anyway, that's my thoughts, its not as good as the others to me, but still a really good game.
7/10.

Tubage
- James.