[KaioShin]

Beat Zelda - A Link between Worlds.

It is a decent handheld Zelda, certainly better than that abomination Spirit Tracks. Nice exploration and freedom, nice art, nice music (the original themes are still the best). But I dunno, it never rises above "pretty nice". I borrowed it from a friend and I'm glad for it, for 40€ I would have felt let down.

[Next Gen Cowboy]

I bought, and beat Metal Gear Rising (when it was on sale a couple weeks ago for $15 U.S.). The game's much better than I thought it would be. From a gameplay standpoint, it's fun as heck, and Platinum did an excellent job at making combat that was extremely smooth. There are some rough edges, given the lack of development time, but those mostly show up in reused assets for the environments.

From a story standpoint the game was actually solid (and probably the best in the genre). I have to say I was impressed, especially given how much I (though not everyone) enjoyed the Metal Gear franchise. The game did a good job with some of its characters. The music and boss battles were the standouts, and the final boss is one of my favorites of all time. The perfect blend of absurdity (poking fun at Metal Gear, and the genre as a whole), and an epic and interesting fight. The music is also simply fantastic during all stages of the boss battle, finishing up with a song that really blew me away.

All things considered it's a really fun game for fans of the genre, or MGS fans, and I beat it twice (Hard and Very Hard) on fresh runs of both. The NG+ system is also excellent, allowing you to carry over your unlocks via level select, or start over with all your collectables intact, plus the two major story DLCs came free with the game. It's a short game if you just run through, but if you're like me, and listen to every codec call you can, it will last you twice as long (I got about 11 hours out of my first run, and 12 on my second due to dying a lot). Keeping with the trend of the genre, the game is very difficult.

[Lilinda]

A minor quibble: Only the PC version has the DLCs included. The other platforms have to buy them separately.

[Next Gen Cowboy]

I bought in via PS3, and I got Bladewolf and Jetstream Same for free. My understanding is that they were made free after the PC version came out. The VR missions DLC however, were not included for free.

[Lilinda]

Well, then I'm full of shit.

[Next Gen Cowboy]

It's all good, but it is messed up. Everyone that ended up buying the game when it came out got royally screwed if they bought the DLC. That's a wasted $30 U.S. unless you're serious about getting your trophies, or seeing content as soon as it comes out.

[Gideon Zhi]

Speaking of Metal Gear, I beat Peace Walker last night. Chapter 5 was super annoying, but the final boss was fun. Game was decent on the whole, but eh.

[Next Gen Cowboy]

I never technically beat the game, as I never got all the way through Chapter 5.

The game is fun, and I have to admit the squad building/RPG elements make for a really fun experience, but it has the same problem that a lot of PSP games with systems like that have. You have to grind out hours, and hours worth of the same mission to get the unlocks. It's extremely frustrating. I had a great time with the HD version, but I don't envision myself ever dedicating 100+ hours to unlocking all the missions, weapons, etc.

And that's to say nothing about things like Emblems which require you to do stuff like have an all-female staff. If I had to fire everyone, just to regrind missions for the best staff members for one single emblem, then I'd lose my mind.

[Gideon Zhi]

I never technically beat the game, as I never got all the way through Chapter 5.

The game is fun, and I have to admit the squad building/RPG elements make for a really fun experience, but it has the same problem that a lot of PSP games with systems like that have. You have to grind out hours, and hours worth of the same mission to get the unlocks. It's extremely frustrating. I had a great time with the HD version, but I don't envision myself ever dedicating 100+ hours to unlocking all the missions, weapons, etc.

Basically this. I barely had the patience to do chapter 5, let alone grind out all the extra ops. The boss at the end of 5 was a lot of fun though, and it took me less than half the amount of time that Peace Walker itself took - mainly because it couldn't, you know, hide behind buildings for lengthy periods of time. But I played this mainly as prep for Ground Zeroes.

... On that topic, I've beaten Ground Zeroes. Took me 75 minutes for my first run. Went back through to get all the XOF patches (about two hours, with a guide), and there are still a fair number of unlocks to find, plus I haven't done any of the side missions either and the main mission is short and open enough that it feels like sequence breaking is encouraged, so I want to experiment with it some. But yeah, it's definitely a really short game.

[Next Gen Cowboy]

Would you reccomend a purchase, or should I wait for the inevitable MGS5 complete package? I'm a huge MGS fan obviously, but it's hard for me to justify paying $20 U.S. for something that really sounds, from reviews, and people online at least, like a glorified demo.

At the same time, when DLC for games is $15 a pop, and most of them last 2 hours, this sounds like something that can be replayed a lot of times.

[Jorpho]

Finished Super Mario 3D Land recently.  This game seems to be tremendously overrated.  I will admit it picked up nicely in the second half, but then playing through all the levels again as Luigi just hammered home how simplistic and limited it is.  Also, the Leaf is positively game-breaking and makes everything way too easy.

I'll admit the final level sure had me screaming for a little while – mostly because I was, at first, determined to finish it without a Leaf.  But I abandoned that idea eventually, mostly because (unlike the last level of Super Mario Galaxy 2, which seems like a good comparison) I just could not seem to do the first parts of the level consistently and because doing the Boom-Boom fight over and over again was getting very tiresome.

[Jeville]

The Sword of Hope II. A solid RPG for the platform it's on (GB).

[Isao Kronos]

Ending D of Nier? Ending D of Nier. Well like a few weeks ago. And Pokemon Y run 2 yesterday.

[Next Gen Cowboy]

Ending D of Nier? Ending D of Nier. Well like a few weeks ago. And Pokemon Y run 2 yesterday.

Ending D of Nier is pretty much perfect. I just hope, unlike me, you didn't name your character Nier.

[Isao Kronos]

I didn't. I named him Maxwell apparently. Now he's Donnie.

[KaioShin]

Beat Saints Row 4. I loved the writing, the humor and the voice acting, but the gameplay was pretty eh. Being super powered was fun but a) it makes the game stupidly easy at times and b) half the time you are forbidden from using them and then things get terrible. If you have to use a car it's like you are forced to play with both arms tied behind your back and a 5t weight attached to your foot.

[MegamanX]

I finished Watch_Dogs a week ago or so.  The game is worth maybe $25 IMHO.  There's tons of side missions which is great and all, but the main story can probably be finished in 4-6 hours.  Fixer missions are repetitive after doing each type a couple of times.  One of the best side missions dealt with a serial killer as it was generally creepy.  I wish that was a bit longer, but it's pretty much find the marked location on the map and move on.

Money is absolutely pointless in the game and you accrue it so quickly.  There's a service provided to you to get cars you've stolen, or unlocked through level progression, delivered to you, but why bother to use it?  The car gets delivered a block away and there are five cars between you and it which you can steal.  Weapons are easily gained from people you've shot removing the need to go to a gun shop.  Ammo is plentiful as are crafting components for items like grenades and hacking aids.  The only time I really used money is when a guy opened a store which sold those items.  It was a quick refill that ran a few hundred dollars which doesn't matter when I'm withdrawing $70,000 from ATMs.

The best stuff is online tailing and hacking missions.  The tailing is just fun because the other player has no idea you're there unless you screw up and stop acting like the AI or they happen to scan in your direction.  The hacking gets intense as the progression meter fills and you see them narrowing down their searches towards you.

I have it for Xbox One and I like my achievements.  There's only two that are annoying.  One is to be tailed five times by other users and you have no control over that.  The other is complete Level 10 on all three drinking mini-games.  Only one of the three guys is problematic.

So yeah.  That and I finished Angry Birds Rio.  It was a free download on my WP8.

[Jeville]

Finished Glover, though not 100%. Good game.

[Lilinda]

Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance.

If you like action games based around hitting people, just go fucking buy it. Like right now.

[Isao Kronos]

100%ed Guacamelee: Super Turbo Championship Edition.