The month of May certainly felt more packed with games to play than usual. At least for me. It also feels like it affected my perception of time. The majority of the month didn’t seem to go that fast until the end of it where it suddenly felt like time was going too fast. Although maybe that might be just the realization that we got to the middle of the year rather than the games I played.
Oh, one thing I forgot to mention last month. I decided to leave the XCom 2 Succession game. Honestly I wanted to see it through the end as it was quite a different experience to play the game with other people like this. However since I am thinking of deleting the blog I thought it was best to leave it now as I don’t know what my final decision about it will be or when the succession game will end. If anyone wants to see how it continues, just check the page for it over Time to Loot.
Now back to our usual business.
Cyberpunk 2077
It took longer than I wanted to but I finished Cyberpunk 2077. On the other hand I did all the side missions, gigs and NCPD Scanner missions that I could find so it was self-inflicted.
Anyway, it was well worth the time I spent playing it. I loved the story, the characters and all the little details they put in the game. Which makes me also even more sad that Cyberpunk 2077‘s release was such an horrible mess. Because of that a lot of people will never get to enjoy the game as they have no reason to trust CD Projekt anymore and I can’t blame them for that.
Before the release I was also hoping that Cyberpunk 2077 would be successful and that would in turn help sell the TTRPG Cyberpunk Red. Since the latter didn’t get much beyond the Core Rulebook so far that seems like it didn’t happen. Maybe it might have even damage the brand.
Rambling aside, if anybody else was waiting to play Cyberpunk 2077 now it is a good time to do it. The PC version is in pretty good shape, with only some graphical bugs here and there in my experience. Nothing game-breaking and it is a very good CRPG, one of the best in the last decade in my opinion. Highly recommended.
Find Love or Die Trying
After finishing Cyberpunk 2077 I needed something completely different and shorter. So I decided to give a try to some of the free visual novels I had downloaded a long time ago and were sitting in my HD collecting dust. The first one I tried was Find Love or Die Trying.
All that I expected from the game was some kind of dark comedy. If it was just that the game would have been well worth the time I spent on it. But it actually had some pretty dark moments as well as some touching ones.
I liked it so much that I decided to buy the DLC just as a way to give some bucks to the developers. And now I am wondering if they did create any other game… Hm. Need to check it after I write this post.
Blooming Nightshade
This was another free visual novel I decided to give a try. But while Find Love or Die Trying was much better than I expected, Blooming Nightshade was disappointing.
My problem with this game is that it didn’t feel like it was telling an story as much as it was just a collection of scenes. So everything felt rather aimless.
In the interest of honesty I only tried one route and a half. I wanted to try more to see if there was something I loved about the game but I just couldn’t force myself to keep playing.
Despite all that I still recommend it for anybody that likes visual novels to give it a try. Just because it wasn’t a game for me doesn’t mean it might not be for you. And the game is free.
Astro’s Playroom
I finally managed to snag a Playstation 5 this month. As such I decided to give Astro’s Playroom, a game that came free with the console, a try.
What I was expecting was just some shovelware that they made to show off the Playstation 5 new gimmicks. In reality it is actually an actual fun game in its own right, a kind of simple platformer.
Yes, it does serve to showcase the new console’s gimmicks as well as to celebrate the history of the Playstation. But it also feels like the developers also aimed at making an actual game and just for that it is worth giving it a try.
I only did one stage so far, the fan one, and then put the game on hold. But I intend to play it more again whenever the itch for a platformer comes or whenever I have to install another game.
Persona 5
No, I didn’t forget to add “The Royal” there, it is the original Persona 5. I just decided to stop procrastinating and finish my second playthrough of the game, to see if I can get that last trophy.
Story-wise I am almost done with it. There are just a few things I want to finish before I try the “secret” boss. Hopefully I will be able to defeat it and then move on to Persona 5 The Royal. Wish me luck!
Fate Grand Order
Let me see if I can remember everything that happened… I finished the Fate/Requiem event. Like I thought before, the game board gimmick was fun at the beginning but turned out to be a pain near the end. By the time I was trying to get the extra copies of the welfare servant, Erice, there were just too many empty tiles that only wasted my dice.
Even with the special dice it was still a pain.
Also, I got confused about when the event would end so I grinded hard way too early and finished the event sooner than I had to. That also burned me out a bit.
Those problems aside, it wasn’t that bad story-wise and Erice seems to be a decent servant.
Right now we are having a re-run of the 2021 summer event. Story-wise it might still be one of my favorites just because of how bonkers it is (even for FGO standards). My only nitpick is that the enemies feel like they have a bit too much HP, which isn’t helped by the fact we have to stack CE’s both for the event drops and QP to advance.
On the other hand we might end up with a lot of QP by the time the event ends, if I recall correctly. And I sure could use some QP right now!