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52 Games Challenge 2025!!!

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marvelvscapcom2:

--- Quote from: dhaabi on March 02, 2025, 07:01:00 pm ---12. Life Is Strange: Double Exposure || PlayStation 5 || 02.27.25



Before writing my final thoughts for Life Is Strange: Double Exposure, I referred to my notes about my time playing the previous series entry. My closing statement then was that future entries needed better grounding to be successful, and I think that the game's writers may have understood that too. As a result, the latest game serves as a formal sequel to the very first, which a majority of series veterans consider to be the best.

Set ten years after the events of Life Is Strange, Double Exposures features Max Caulfield who reprises her role as the game's protagonist. Having been scarred from that time, she's departed her home and has since traveled the country on her own. But in recent months, she's settled down on the opposite side of the country where she now acts as some sort of faculty figure on a college campus to teach photography. For a while, it seems as if Max has largely been able to overcome her past trauma while maintaining a more ordinary lifestyle, yet this positive growth fully backtracks as, just like in the first game, she's forced to grapple with the murder of someone close to her. With all this said, it would be in players' best interest to play the preceding entry prior to Double Exposure, as there are numerous plot references and general character development that relies upon the player's knowledge of such context; nevertheless, players can choose to begin with this sequel entry, but they will naturally miss out on a more comprehensive experience.

Moving forward, Max is not your average person as she's able to control time in various capacities. However, unlike her previous ordeal where Max was able to manipulate time by rewinding it, her powers have since changed, much to her surprise. Now, Max has become able to shift between two distinct timelines—one with the murder having happened and the other without—after creating a rift in reality. Additionally, these newfound powers grant her the ability to have a sort of preview sense of what's happening in the other timeline. Despite there being only one difference in how time has moved forward in each timeline, the murder serves as the catalyst, which means that the events following such moment in time vary significantly. With the goal of trying to solve who her friend's murderer is while simultaneously working toward prevent it from happening in this altered timeline, Max freely moves between the two. For much of the game, players will need to gather information in each of the two timelines to solve the mystery. While prioritizing story-focused gameplay that features choice-based outcomes, Double Exposure also incorporates light puzzle and even stealth sections to achieve goals.

Presented as a murder mystery of sorts, there is unexpectedly a lot of information to sift through, and much of it feels superfluous. To the game's credit, though, a high percentage of the game's dialogue and written text is optional as it serves world-building and character development purposes. Nevertheless, there are way too many things connected to Max's phone which serves as the information hub to the point where it obtrusively feels like micromanaging. With nearly every action taken—no matter how inconsequential it may be—some social media post, text message, journal entry, or character profile is being updated. And, to make things worse, the information is nearly doubled as those first two items are unique to each timeline. Apart from information directly related to characters, there is also a high number of items to observe and comment on during any given moment. Again, it's entirely optional, but I imagine many players fond of these types of games will want to seek out as much written dialogue there is. As somewhat of an aside, I also routinely found Max to be annoying. Despite being ten years older than she was previously shown in the first game, there doesn't seem to be much character growth by way of personality. In many circumstances, she comes across as a self-justified and nosy Nancy Drew type character as she decides to delve into the secrets of people's personal lives.

To be upfront, Double Exposure will not appeal to everyone, including those who are more drawn to this kind of story-driven adventure game. The game clearly has its own audience that it's written for, and that fact permeates all throughout the gameplay experience. Perhaps because of the game's setting of a college campus and that the majority of the game's cast are still relatively young, there seldom is a conversation where some sort of romantic issue isn't being mentioned. Alongside this fact also lies the level of writing which, in truth, was regularly cringey and especially so when dialogue concerns personal lives and not the overarching plot itself. Apart from these subjective aspects, vocal performances are generally okay. For some reason, there is a lot of auditory interruptions to be experienced, and it's made worse by just how much plays automatically while wandering about even when wanting to interact directly with something else. At the same time, there are some minor visual issues such as assets not loading in correctly, but these were few and far between.

Ultimately, Life Is Strange: Double Exposure is a game that will immediately alienate many potential players due to its content, themes, and tone, but I think this enables it to be the kind of game it's wanting to be without shame while better attracting more of that niche demographic. It is not without its faults on a more objective level, but I did find it to be one of the more successful entries within the series. The direction that's being taken for the series seems to now be fully grounded in Max's story with this latest entry, and I think that may have been the best decision for it in some time. I'm not particularly interested in extended series with one direct sequel following another, but I am curious to see what the follow-up game will be like, and hopefully this specific story can reach its close then.

--- End quote ---

All the things you listed as things that may potentially alienate people are like a flame attracting me as the moth lol. I love romantic novels centered around coming of age emotions. Soap operas. 90210 and such. I do suggest a free game on PS Plus called Lost Records: Bloom and Rage.  It's well written if you havent tried it. It centers around 4 millenial adult girls in 2022 piecing together their teen memories going through the tumultuous experience of just growing up. And its filmed in a sorta sci fi psychological horror angle. Its neat.

I definitely gotta check out life is strange because I love telltale style games.  Do you reckon you can play double exposure without playing the other entries first? Or do you suggest playing in order?

bikingjahuty:
23. Battle Garegga (PS4)

About a week ago I realized just how long its been since I played some of the best games I've ever played. In short, way too much time has passed since I've played some of my favorite games, as in the better part of a decade for most titles. One of those games was unfortunately Battle Garegga. i decided to do something about it this evening, and boy, am I glad I did!


It's funny how you don't remember how amazing a game really was until you're sitting down and playing it again. That was exactly my experience while playing Garegga tonight. Even blasting my way through the first level, this game's brilliance and specialness became immediately evident. Battle Garegga is simply one of the best, if not the best SHMUP ever made, depending on who you ask of course. I'm of the mind that it's among the best, as its gameplay is nearly unmatched in terms of how smooth and precise Garegga controls. Not only that, but the gameplay depth related to the game's scoring and ranking systems are nearly second to none. Combine this with excellent gameplay balancing and you have a recipe for one of the best playing, most enjoyable shooters ever conceived. But gameplay is only one piece of the puzzle that makes Battle Garegga nearly perfect.


Garegga is virtually flawless when it comes to its visuals and audio, even to this day. Yep, nearly 30 years after this game originally came out and Garegga still outshines SHMUPs released just in the past few years with just how detailed and gorgeous its sprites are, not to mention how awesome many of its bosses are. The only thing that competes with Garegga's visuals is its OST which doesn't possess a single bad track. In fact, the tracks are all amazing; I actually have the entire soundtrack on my phone and its a regular companion of mine in the car or wherever I happen to be listening to music.


It's hard to fault Battle Garegga in any way, but for what it lacks, which isn't a whole lot, it makes up for it in all the ways that truly matter. There was a time when I found myself playing Garegga almost weekly. It almost served as a palate cleanser after playing various mediocre or even bad shmups when I was heavily diving into the genre nearly a decade ago. While it's been quite a while since that time, I'm at least happy I went back and played Garegga again as its one of the best game's I've ever played, and second only to Radiant Silvergun as my own personal best SHMUP of all time. (3/3/25) [44/50]

bikingjahuty:
24. Guilty Gear Xrd REV 2 (PS4)

The Guilty Gear series, as well as most ArcSys games, is one I should absolutely love, at least on paper. Unfortunately, despite my best efforts for over 15 years, I have found practically every Guilty Gear game very hard to engage with even though I consider myself a massive fan of fighting games. I can never 100% put my finger on it, but I think it mostly has to do with all the Guilty Gear games I've played (and most other Arc Systems Works developed games) being mostly flash with little substance. I know there are very dedicated and vibrant competitive scenes for most Guilty Gear games, and I'm certain there's an ocean of complexity that I never even came close to fully understanding, but when I play these games, I'm mostly always waiting for that moment where the series just clicks with me, but unfortunately that has yet to happen. This was the case with Guilty Gear Xrd REV 2 as well.


First and foremost, REV 2 is an absolutely stunning looking fighting game. The in game, cutscene, and character intro visuals are about as crisp, vibrant, and detailed as you could ever want. The stages, of which there are a commendable amount, are among the most interesting and beautiful I've seen in any modern fighting game. I find it very hard to fault anything about the visuals of REV 2, and I tip my hat to the artists who worked on this game. The audio, while not as good or memorable as the visuals, is also pretty good and gives you a nice, healthy variety of music to listen to whole up against the games' impressive roster of characters. Unfortunately the gameplay just isn't up to the same standard as both these more superficial attributes.


Guilty Gear's gameplay mostly feels like all flash with very little substance. That's not to say this game isn't enjoyable to play, because it is for the most part, however the two modes of play you're given either make the game way to easy and almost feel like the game is playing itself as it assists you with crazy combos and special moves, or the mode where you do have full control over your fighter makes it difficult to pull of some of the more advanced special moves, counters, and combos. I certainly preferred to have full control over my character while playing, but honestly it was still easy enough to just mindlessly button mash my way to victory as it was to play more deliberately. The end result of all this was a game I tried to get excited about or at least have some fun with for several hours, but I literally began to fall asleep while playing this game nearly 2 hours into playing its various modes. And look, I will once again admit that Guilty Gear isn't necessarily my cup of tea, but I at least wanted to try and understand why some absolutely adore this series, but once again, I'm feeling like I must be missing something when I'm still just as uninspired and kinda bored with these games as I was in the late 2000s when I first started playing Guilty Gear. Unfortunately, REV 2 didn't do anything to make me more of a fan of this series. (3/3/25) [33/50]

kashell:
25. Ys Memoire: The Oath of Felghana - Normal

I was having an absolute blast with this until the very, very end. It's not because the game got difficult or anything. It was because I somehow missed a treasure chest or two along the way. I mean, I have to do multiple play throughs to get all the trophies but still. WTF?! I was so thorough. Anyways - this is the style of Ys I prefer. I had a lot of fun and if the first run was anything to go by, then the other ones will be swift and speedy.

EDIT: Found the treasure I was missing! Trophy acquired!

dhaabi:

--- Quote from: marvelvscapcom2 on March 03, 2025, 06:55:28 pm ---
--- Quote from: dhaabi on March 02, 2025, 07:01:00 pm ---12. Life Is Strange: Double Exposure || PlayStation 5 || 02.27.25

Ultimately, Life Is Strange: Double Exposure is a game that will immediately alienate many potential players due to its content, themes, and tone, but I think this enables it to be the kind of game it's wanting to be without shame while better attracting more of that niche demographic.

--- End quote ---

All the things you listed as things that may potentially alienate people are like a flame attracting me as the moth lol. I love romantic novels centered around coming of age emotions. Soap operas. 90210 and such. I do suggest a free game on PS Plus called Lost Records: Bloom and Rage.  It's well written if you havent tried it. It centers around 4 millenial adult girls in 2022 piecing together their teen memories going through the tumultuous experience of just growing up. And its filmed in a sorta sci fi psychological horror angle. Its neat.

I definitely gotta check out life is strange because I love telltale style games.  Do you reckon you can play double exposure without playing the other entries first? Or do you suggest playing in order?

--- End quote ---

I actually didn't go into depth about any of Life Is Strange: Double Exposure's themes and tone, but perhaps you may like it. At the very least, you would likely enjoy earlier Life Is Strange titles since they were developed by Dontnod who also developed Lost Records: Bloom & Rage. From what I've seen in trailers, Lost Records seems like a better follow-up the to Life Is Strange series as far as presenting more adult writing. I'm looking forward to play it, though I'm waiting until its second act releases in April to play it all at once.

Like I mentioned, I would highly suggest to not play Double Exposure first. If this specific game interests you, you should begin by playing Life Is Strange. There is also a prequel entry titled Life Is Strange: Before the Storm, but it's not imperative to play. Additionally, there are also two other entries in the Life Is Strange series titled Life Is Strange 2 and Life Is Strange: True Colors, but they both tell standalone stories. Both are currently available to play from the PS Plus Extra catalog, though they're being removed later this month. And if for some reason you decide to play Life Is Strange 2 first, there is also a free demo episode that's worth playing first since it directly ties into the main game's narrative titled The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit.

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