The Backlog Check-in Vol. 287: 7/1/23: The Legend of Heroes: Trails into Reverie Edition
Posted: Sat Jul 01, 2023 1:20 pm
Played: Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China, A Juggler’s Tale, King’s Bounty II, The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel, Twogether: Project Indigos, XEL, Yoku’s Island Express
Finished: A Juggler’s Tale, King’s Bounty II
Playing: The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel
Added: Nothing
After finishing A Juggler’s Tale, I played Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China, Twogether: Project Indigos and Yoku’s Island Express. Unfortunately, despite liking a lot about each of them I had issues with them that made me stop playing them.
Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China is a 2.5D side scrolling action platform stealth game that looks and plays pretty good, but unfortunately the trial-and-error stealth aspects hurt the experience. The combat, platforming and silent takedowns are all satisfying, but unfortunately the bulk of the game requires you to be stealthy which is slow paced and often leads to trial-and-error which is frustrating. You have to sneak, hide and wait constantly to figure out how to get past enemies, and it becomes a repetitive slog. Fighting enemies is not encouraged despite the combat being pretty fun, but you’re almost always outnumbered and die by only a couple of hits while the enemies take several hits to defeat. The game is designed for you to be stealthy the entire time, and sneaking, hiding and waiting isn’t much fun. I stopped playing the game because I wasn’t enjoying the stealth which is the majority of the game.
Twogether: Project Indigos is a cartoonish third person sci-fi puzzle game where you switch between two different characters to solve environment puzzles, but I barely played it because there’s no option to invert the up and down camera movement which made the game essentially unplayable for me. It completely baffles me how any game now with camera controls doesn’t offer the option to invert the up and down movement as it has been a standard option in every game for generations now.
Yoku’s Island Express is a colorful and cute 2.5D side scrolling Metroidvania pinball game that is creative and different. I was really enjoying it at first when it was a good balance of traversal and pinball with somewhat linear progression, but it wasn’t long until it opened up more and became almost all about pinball challenges. I like a good game of pinball, but I was expecting a little more traversal that utilized pinball mechanics such as flippers and bumpers in the environments to get around instead of primarily being continuous enclosed pinball areas. And the pinball challenges become somewhat difficult rather quickly which I wasn’t expecting from a game that seems aimed at a younger audience. I started to get frustrated with the non-stop collect-a-thon gameplay and constant pinball challenges, so I stopped playing. I would have liked the game more if it was less about needing to continuously collect fruit and play enclosed pinball challenges, and more about traversing the world like a platformer utilizing pinball mechanics.
After playing those games I got in the mood to play a JRPG, and I started playing The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel. I’ve been enjoying it, it’s very anime which I like since I’m an anime fan. It’s story driven, and features an all voiced cast. Despite the graphics being somewhat blocky with simple textures since it was originally a PS3 and Vita game, I find them appealing since they’re colorful with a certain charm. The game runs at a smooth 60fps as well which is nice. The turn-based combat is good, too. It somewhat reminds me of Wild Arms. The game isn’t an adventure RPG where you embark on an epic journey, but instead it takes place primarily at a military academy with a large campus and different facilities where you interact with NPCs and take on quests/side quests. There’s a small shopping district on the outskirts of the military academy as well that has shops, and other things. However, you also sometimes go to different regions for field studies that have quests/side quests for you to do too which add variety to the locations that you go to in the game. The game in general is kind of slow paced with a lot of story and character interaction, but I’ve been finding both interesting enough to stay invested.
Games releasing this week
Beetle Elf
Bruxa
Catch & Cook: Fishing Adventure
City Limits
EchoBlade
Full Quiet
Gimmick! Special Edition
Gylt
The Legend of Heroes: Trails into Reverie
Necrosmith
Safari Pinball
Scarf
Sentimental Death Loop
Silent Paws
Synapse
Tad the Lost Explorer
Tyrion Cuthbert: Attorney of the Arcane
Finished: A Juggler’s Tale, King’s Bounty II
Playing: The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel
Added: Nothing
After finishing A Juggler’s Tale, I played Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China, Twogether: Project Indigos and Yoku’s Island Express. Unfortunately, despite liking a lot about each of them I had issues with them that made me stop playing them.
Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China is a 2.5D side scrolling action platform stealth game that looks and plays pretty good, but unfortunately the trial-and-error stealth aspects hurt the experience. The combat, platforming and silent takedowns are all satisfying, but unfortunately the bulk of the game requires you to be stealthy which is slow paced and often leads to trial-and-error which is frustrating. You have to sneak, hide and wait constantly to figure out how to get past enemies, and it becomes a repetitive slog. Fighting enemies is not encouraged despite the combat being pretty fun, but you’re almost always outnumbered and die by only a couple of hits while the enemies take several hits to defeat. The game is designed for you to be stealthy the entire time, and sneaking, hiding and waiting isn’t much fun. I stopped playing the game because I wasn’t enjoying the stealth which is the majority of the game.
Twogether: Project Indigos is a cartoonish third person sci-fi puzzle game where you switch between two different characters to solve environment puzzles, but I barely played it because there’s no option to invert the up and down camera movement which made the game essentially unplayable for me. It completely baffles me how any game now with camera controls doesn’t offer the option to invert the up and down movement as it has been a standard option in every game for generations now.
Yoku’s Island Express is a colorful and cute 2.5D side scrolling Metroidvania pinball game that is creative and different. I was really enjoying it at first when it was a good balance of traversal and pinball with somewhat linear progression, but it wasn’t long until it opened up more and became almost all about pinball challenges. I like a good game of pinball, but I was expecting a little more traversal that utilized pinball mechanics such as flippers and bumpers in the environments to get around instead of primarily being continuous enclosed pinball areas. And the pinball challenges become somewhat difficult rather quickly which I wasn’t expecting from a game that seems aimed at a younger audience. I started to get frustrated with the non-stop collect-a-thon gameplay and constant pinball challenges, so I stopped playing. I would have liked the game more if it was less about needing to continuously collect fruit and play enclosed pinball challenges, and more about traversing the world like a platformer utilizing pinball mechanics.
After playing those games I got in the mood to play a JRPG, and I started playing The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel. I’ve been enjoying it, it’s very anime which I like since I’m an anime fan. It’s story driven, and features an all voiced cast. Despite the graphics being somewhat blocky with simple textures since it was originally a PS3 and Vita game, I find them appealing since they’re colorful with a certain charm. The game runs at a smooth 60fps as well which is nice. The turn-based combat is good, too. It somewhat reminds me of Wild Arms. The game isn’t an adventure RPG where you embark on an epic journey, but instead it takes place primarily at a military academy with a large campus and different facilities where you interact with NPCs and take on quests/side quests. There’s a small shopping district on the outskirts of the military academy as well that has shops, and other things. However, you also sometimes go to different regions for field studies that have quests/side quests for you to do too which add variety to the locations that you go to in the game. The game in general is kind of slow paced with a lot of story and character interaction, but I’ve been finding both interesting enough to stay invested.
Games releasing this week
Beetle Elf
Bruxa
Catch & Cook: Fishing Adventure
City Limits
EchoBlade
Full Quiet
Gimmick! Special Edition
Gylt
The Legend of Heroes: Trails into Reverie
Necrosmith
Safari Pinball
Scarf
Sentimental Death Loop
Silent Paws
Synapse
Tad the Lost Explorer
Tyrion Cuthbert: Attorney of the Arcane