Grand Theft Auto V

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July 2020 Free PS Plus Games

Posted by John Klein III on June 30, 2020
Posted in: Fun With YouTube, Games, Websites. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

To celebrate PlayStation Plus turning 10 years old, the July 2020 Free PS Plus Games are :

NBA 2k20, Rise of the Tomb Raider, and Erica!

Apparently NBA 2k20 was recently four dollars, but I bought NBA 2k19 when it was three dollars, so I must have missed that other sale.  One basketball game would typically be enough for me, but I’m looking forward to playing the latest version of NBA.  Apparently 2k21 is slated to come out soonish.  Which I forgot it was announced during the PS5 Future of Gaming event.  To get back into the game, I redownloaded 2k19 and tried to get some of the easier trophies in MyNeighborhood.  Once I got my character from Preclude to the Phoenix Suns, I’m pretty sure I didn’t even play one game as a Sun.  Just having the jersey was enough for me.  Looking into it, it is a real shame that 2k20 doesn’t have a Prelude, as I saw 2k18 did.  It is a nice free DLC tutorial, but I get incorporating it into the game itself, if that is what they even did.  My gaming goal for 2k20 will be to start a new character and get him to the Suns again.

Rise of the Tomb Raider is the second sequel to the rebooted trilogy.  I have been having Tomb Raider on my mind, since replaying Uncharted 4, and wanting to watch the Tomb Raider films again, especially latest one that I have never seen.  Neither of the three films are available for streaming, but hopefully that changes relatively soon.  I added 2013’s Tomb Raider to my psprices wishlist, and I see the Definitive edition goes on sale for five dollars, but I wouldn’t mind playing Rise prior to the first game, as that’s what I have.

Erica is a game I bought when it was five dollars.  I had remembered it as I had completed two playthroughs and had been forced into making a decision I didn’t want to due to not getting the cursor to land where I wanted to in a third playthrough.  Turns out, I had only completed the one playthrough and that had occurred in my third.  So I completed my second playthrough last night, using the app, and it did seem to work out better than using the touchpad.  I’m going to complete a third playthrough and keep the game in my game rotation for the month of July.  There is only six playthroughs, so I should be able to do all six of them in July or August.  Using the app did seem to give me a few additional seconds to make a choice, but I could be remembering it wrong.

Some people are complaining about these being the games to celebrate 10 years, but it seems like a pretty decent month to me, and I’m pretty happy that Erica is getting some attention that it deserves.

.  .  .

PSPrices

NBA 2k20 is currently a $60 game, but goes as low as $19.79, so maybe people are remembering 2k19’s amazing sale and not 2k20.

Rise of the Tomb Raider is typically a $30 game, but goes as low as $8.39.

Erica is typically a $10 game, but goes as low as $4.99.

Our currently running value of PS Plus is $131, with us considering Call of Duty WWII a bonus game.  So we’ll round up and add $34 to the total to make $165, and that’s us now in the second half of the year, so I’ll say we definitely have gotten our value from the service for our $45 investment.  Plus, hopefully the price doesn’t go up too much for the PS5, but hopefully it still goes on sale for either Black Friday or the holiday season.

PS Store

NBA 2k20 has the standard edition for $60, and the game is heavily influenced by microtransactions.

5,000 VC for $2
15,000 VC for $5
35,000 VC for $10
75,000 VC for $20
200,000 VC for $50
450,000 VC for $100

There is a Digital Deluxe edition for $80 and a Legend Edition for $100.

Free International Commentary so I’ve downloaded that already.

I’ve never been tempted to buy VC (the game’s currency), but you do earn a small amount with most things you do in the game.  Just not as much.

Rise of the Tomb Raider is the 20 Year Celebration edition, so it comes with all five DLC.

Erica also does not have any additional content.

.  .  .

Here are reddit’s reactions to the games :

PS4

PlayStation Plus July games lineup & a thank you for 10 years of supporting PS Plus from PS4

PlayStation Plus

As PS Plus reaches its tenth anniversary, your games for July are revealed: NBA 2K20, Rise of the Tomb Raider and Erica from PlayStationPlus

PS4Deals

PS+ Free Games July 2020 – NBA 2K20, Rise of the Tomb Raider & Erica | PSN | Available July 7th from PS4Deals

Not sure what is happening with the Plus subreddit, they were trying to link to Twitter.

.  .  .

Here are my YouTube peeps :

Nathan of PlayStation Access :

Adam of PlayStation Grenade :

Ben of Platinum Chasers :

Ben has a fun little intro as the announcement came on a Monday instead of the traditional Wednesday, is like three months in a row of the announcement breaking from tradition.

Turns out, Walker Dennis is quite familiar with PlayStation Grenade thanks to Adam’s great videos relating to Goat Simulator.

.  .  .

Here are PlayStation Trophies.org’s guides to the games :

https://www.playstationtrophies.org/game/nba-2k20/guide/

https://www.playstationtrophies.org/game/rise-of-the-tomb-raider/guide/

https://www.playstationtrophies.org/game/erica-na-ps4/guide/

https://www.playstationtrophies.org/forum/erica/339001-erica-platinum-walkthrough-text-guide.html

Hey, NBA 2k20 has a guide!  I immediately checked and no one made a 2k19 guide, so I’m still just stumbling my way through getting those.

I apparently made some mistake in my first two playthroughs of Erica and did not earn Fall Out Girl, so hopefully one of the other playthroughs has me redo one of those activities, but it is pretty early on in the game, so it shouldn’t take too much and the recommended sixth playthrough is essentially play the entire game except do this one thing towards the end, so that’s when I will ensure I annoy each of the ladies then.

.  .  .

I’ve been making some great headway and keeping with my gaming rotation.  I will have to modify it to include two new games, but it was fun during the previous cycle.  It really just helps when I have so many episodic games to play.

I finally earn the Kifflom trophy in Grand Theft Auto V, which was one of the non-story related trophies I felt I was capable of earning.  I believe I did what was necessary to earn my million dollars for Online, but clearly I never checked again.  I will sometime around July 15, when I try to earn another million dollars.  Then I will play another mission or so.  I left the game where Michael is working for a movie producer and Franklin and Trevor are doing some mission Michael is not involved in.  So I will do the Franklin/Trevor mission and another studio mission as that was fun, and call it good.

I started playing Ratchet & Clank, and kept just thinking to myself, what an amazing game!  I really want to watch the movie now, but it isn’t streaming anywhere and I really don’t want to spend more than five dollars through VUDU and I want to say it was still asking $15 for it, and it came out in 2016 and I’m probably the only one wanting to watch it who hasn’t.  Well, I guess they just announced Rift in Time, so the desire is probably coming back, but I will watch for a sale for it.

Just because I was already at VUDU, they want $18 for the Angelina Jolie two films, and $15 for Alicia Vikander’s 2018 remake.  I do like how Lara Croft has been portrayed by two Oscar winners, she deserves that.  Jolie won for 2000’s Girl, Interrupted, Best Supporting Actress, and Vikander for 2016’s The Danish Girl, Best Supporting Actress, so also fun that they both won for Supporting Actress, as well.  $33 is a bit much for those three films, I’ll say.  Shame VUDU isn’t doing a three movie bundle like they often do for other movies, but that’s probably a rights issue.

I left Ratchet & Clank on Gaspar looking for 60 brains, which was super annoying to me as I found 40 on my own, and can’t really fathom where the other 20 could be.  Then I was reading the guide, and at some point, we earn a map that makes finding the brains way easier, so I’ll have to make progress and come back.  I really liked the flamethrower weapon, the Pyro Blaster.  I have it completely leveled up to 5, so I’ve taken it out of my weapon setup, but I’m missing it dearly, but I clearly won’t use other weapons otherwise.  Well, that isn’t true, I was using Mr. Zurkon as well, who I also loved as our buddy buddy.  I do wonder if Clank is jealous or annoyed by Mr. Zurkon.  Mr. Zurkon gives these amazing quips and I also have him maxed at level 5, so he’s out of the rotation.  The game is a lot harder without my main assets, but that’s on me, I should have been balancing them more.  Turns out, in New Game Plus, I can raise these higher to level 10, so I’m excited about that possibility.

I really got into Detroit Become Human playing for several more nights than I was expecting.  I was also surprised to see Connor come back, as I got him killed in the very first mission.  My Connor, unfortunately, is not very good, he’s let Kara escape (as how could I let him capture her?  She’s the best!), but he also failed to catch the bird Android person and also failed to figure out where murderous sex robot went, which he’s upset with himself almost as much as I’m upset with myself over it.  The bird android, I get, as we lost track of him in that final stage, but the sex robot, we were doing everything possible, but I was having to talk to more androids than expected.

Kara and Alice are still save, and we got new buddy Lucifer now too.  We’ve been to the abandoned amusement park.  That mansion where we meet Lucifer was intense!

Markus has met his crew and I want to ship him and North so hard!  Turns out, she’s played by Minka Kelly, so she’s giving Kara’s actress, Valorie Curry a run for her money.  But I still like Kara more, especially as Markus keeps doing at least one thing that annoys North, but then she makes it pretty clear what she wants to have happen next happen, and I make those decision so easily, even if it annoys the rest of the crew.  Valorie Curry was on Amazon’s The Tick, so now I really want to watch that show.

I meant to keep playing even more but then I was reading up on what skills I need in The Council and it made me really want to play that game.  Seriously, I really want more people to play The Council.  The first episode is free, and I love how it is a TellTale style of game, but with a skill tree.  I love the act of finding out which skills I need, I make a list, when it comes time to pump skills into the tree, I find out which ones I really needed during the previous quest, and I raise those skills and see how it effects the next quest.  I completed Episode 2, and just having a great time with this historical fiction.  I can’t wait to jump into Episode 3!

I finally got around to playing Metal Gear Solid V : Ground Zeroes.  I thought I was doing a pretty decent job at stealth, but I would blow my cover, but I eventually got my two buddies rescued.  It got intense towards the end of it, but I figured out a path, and got her out of there.  I hate to write this, as it may be controversial, but I think I much prefer Sniper Elite IV’s stealth to Metal Gear Solid V, but I was instantly taken by Sniper Elite IV, and I will give Ground Zeroes a couple more tries and try to get good with it.

I finished Chapter Eight of Uncharted 4, such a fun game.  Here is another game where there is just a lot of fighting, and I forget that besides amazing set pieces, that the game is a cover shooter.  Like, I forget all of the combat that is required to get through, just to get to the next place.  I’m playing on Normal, and I’m sure the two lower difficulties probably has less enemies, but after completing a chapter, I usually feel pretty good with my progress.

I finished the second episode of King’s Quest.  Still really enjoying the game.  I had to do one full run of Episode 2, and then pretty much two thirds of a playthrough, twice, to get the other two endings.  I recall reading Episode Four might be the same way with having to create saves to save time, but I’m still here for it.  A fun game, the characters are fun, not enough of Amaya for my taste, but she was barely in the first episode as well.  I doubt she becomes the future queen, but if she is, that would be amazing.

Doing these episodic games, I was reminded that we never completed the first episode of TellTale’s Back to the Future game.  So I completed my run, and then I helped Walker Dennis complete his run.  He started the second episode and the controls seem to be a tad better.  There was a lot of back tracking in 1955 that I wouldn’t have minded so much, if when I press the left direction, Marty walked in the left direction.  Because of camera angles, or not implementing a better control scheme, I was holding down to make him to across the screen in the right direction.  It wouldn’t have been so bad, but I was running across the central area and going to the soup kitchen and the jail a bunch, and the controls could have been a tad better.

A game that has pretty much perfect controls is Batman : Arkham Aslyum.  I finished the game with locking Harley up and moving onto the Botanical Gardens.  I forgot how creepy those lunatics are, and two different ones jumps on my back and gave me quite the freight!  That’s when I knew it was bed time.  I meant to play more, but then the free games were announced I wanted to play Erica’s second playthrough and that took almost two hours, but I still had enough time to knock out some easier trophies in NBA 2k19.

.  .  . 

Because I had filled the PS4 with my current game rotation and to make room for Erica and NBA 2k19, I had to delete Uncharted 4, Ratchet & Clank, GTA V (which was probably the only one I really needed to delete), and Detroit Become Human.  It was fun to revisit those games, but removing those games freed up a bunch of space.  Oh, and I deleted Final Fantasy XIV as well.  I clearly was not coming back that game any time soon.  So I should have enough space now for Rise of the Tomb Raider and I will delete NBAS 2k19, once I have 2k20.  I thought progress carried over between games, but I also clearly never finished a season, so what would I be carrying over?  I just checked and NBA 2k20’s demo is not the prelude, it does not have a story mode that benefits the game, so that’s pretty disappointing.  So I will spend a night (hopefully) of running around the neighborhood to earn the Marathon Man trophy and delete 2k19 in preparation of 2k20.

I’m sure I will redownload Uncharted 4 and Ratchet & Clank again as the desire will return, especially Ratchet & Clank, as I’m sure Rise of the Tomb Raider will scratch the Uncharted itch.

.  .  .

My beautiful wife got me the best Father’s Day present ever!  I am now the proud owner of a PlayStation Vita!  I’ve been wanting one for so long!  She also treated me to a 16GB SD card so I was able to fill the thing up with so many games, that I eventually had to delete a few as I got carried away with wondering how many filled up the 16GB as the first few games I downloaded, were super small.  Turns out, and I’m still getting used to the store format through the Vita, but I did claim some additional games that I didn’t think I did.  So that has been nice, and even one game I didn’t even know I had access too.  That game is Super Mutant Alien Assault.

At first, I had no intention of redownloading games I have played on the PS4 that were cross play, but then I realized how silly that was as that eliminated like 20 games, and I decided against that policy when I realized I had 20 Vita games, when I thought I only had like six.

Every Wednesday, I’m going to check psprices (I do this regardless) to see the cheap Vita games and slowly start building my collection.  Especially if the game is cross play as I like to give them a shot on the big TV before playing them on the Vita.  I bought Blasting Agent : Ultimate Edition as it was $1.19, and worth a risk.  I saw Cel Damaged was on sale for $3, but I think I can hold off on buying games until they are under $2, especially as I have so many new games I haven’t even played yet.

I did buy Demetrois : Big Cynical Adventure after reading it was a visual novel with a twist, and I think I really want to turn my Vita into a Visual Novel machine, as those seem to be perfect carry around and play type of games.

I write that but I have been playing King Oddball like crazy!  To the point, where I want to reinstall it onto the PS4 as I’ve been making crazy progress, but I’m also okay with not doing that.  Such a great game, if you want Angry Birds, but with a floating head that throws rocks using his tongue, King Oddball is the game for you!

I also been playing Sparkle 2 for a lot longer than I ever gave it a chance on the PS4.  I am mentally committed to playing it until I earned the Play for 4 Hours trophy, but I’ll probably see it to the end.

Divekick is a very fun fighting game, either we jump or we are divekicking.  I did one playthrough as the bear character and now I’m currently playing as Dive, brother to Kick.  Though I am playing with the YOLO gem, so one kick to me, and I lose and I have to kick my opponent five times, one kick per round.  It is for a trophy, and it like King Oddball, as a real “just one more go” feel to it.

Draw Slasher is not the Ninja Fruit clone I thought it was going to be, but I understand now where they make that comparison.  It is more of a side scrolling fighting game, where we are constantly swiping our sword at opponents.  Pretty fun, I beat the boss and felt good with my progress.  I’m essentially just trying out a slew of games to see what I take too.

For instance, I did not take to Atomic Ninjas, there is a lot of depth and abilities to the game, maybe a few too many, and I’m just plain not good at it.  Like, I felt good at the beginning of the tutorial, but then it goes on for like six additional abilities and then I try it for real, and I just end up bouncing around the area and shoving people into fire.

I sort of want to buy a 32GB SD card, but those things are so expensive but I just want to have access to all of my games.  Which is silly a the PS4 has clearly trained me to only keeping like six games at any given time.

Blasting Agent : Ultimate Edition was fun until I got to the second boss fight.  It took so many tries, but I did it, and felt I got my $1.19 out of it.  It also served as a cautionary tale to maybe not just buy every dollar game out there.

I really want to get Uncharted : Golden Abyss, I rather not spend $15 on it, but I think I might just be getting to the point that I want to play one of the best Vita titles out there.  I also saw there was Batman Origins Blackgate for the Vita, and I sort of want that game too.  Hopefully with people’s interest in the Vita since that one moment in The Last of Us Part 2, sales for games will start kicking in.  I saw there are already two company’s who are going back to developing games for the system, so hopefully that is a new trend.

I’m still no good at 36 Fragments of Midnight, but I feel like it could be a perfect Vita game.  Usually I tuck Walker Dennis in at night, then I sit and play on the Vita until he falls asleep, which has been nice as there were a few nights (too many, to be honest), where I started getting sleepy myself, and either dozed off or became to sleepy to hang out with my wife.  Now I am pretty alert and ready to hang out, so it has been worth it.

The Vita has a tutorial to learn more about its function, Welcome Park, and there were trophies associated with it, so I gave that a try.  I’m no good at that jigsaw puzzle, but I’m never good with those where we are missing a piece and have to move all of the tiles along to form the puzzle.

I’m hoping Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross go on sale, they were on sale in March or so, and if I knew I was getting a Vita then (it was still a dream at that point), I would have bought them when they were $5 each, instead of $10.  If they had trophy support, I would just buy them right now, but they don’t, so I’m holding out for a sale.

So a lot of gaming stuff is happening around me and I’m super excited for July!

Playing Star Wars Battlefront II & Call of Duty WWII / Future of Gaming PS5

Posted by John Klein III on June 17, 2020
Posted in: Fun With YouTube, Games. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

I finally got around to completing what I wanted to complete in Star Wars Battlefront II, so here is my article.

Call of Duty WWII was pretty fun.  I was enjoying the first two story missions and could see myself going back for more.  The multiplayer was nice, I got my first ten kills, and got a trophy, and felt I experienced it enough.

Star Wars Battlefront II on the other hand, I had a lot more fun with.  I am no good with the spaceship missions.  I completed two of the story missions, it starts with some space battles, and then we land into another ship.  That was when I wanted to try multiplayer.  I did all of the arcade modes for the training of it all.  Then I did all of the multiplayer options until I won one of each for those trophies.  Some of them took much longer than others, probably because I was on their teams, but I feel like I was getting better at it, as I was playing.

Both games are off of my PS4, which freed up a bunch of room.

.  .  .

I’ve been playing a slew of games again.

Lego Worlds, I have completed the first three tutorial levels, and explored an icy world.  Walker Dennis has really taken to the game, he spends a lot of time on the Monster World.

World of Warships : Legends, I’m not sure what made me stumble across this game, I was searching for something else, and saw this free game.  I looked into it for the USS Arizona, and if I bought the Firepower Deluxe $30 combo pack, I could get a slew of great upgrades and ships, including the USS Arizona.  $30 is way more than I want to spend on a free game, and we could earn in-game currency to buy it, but that specific currency is a very slow earn.  Which I completely get, as there is a $30 combo pack that needs buying.  I played for a decent amount, I unlock Standard battles, which would be the PvP aspect of the game, but I really enjoyed the PvC aspect.  It felt like a team effort, and I wasn’t being shown up by veterans of the game.  I was able to pull my weight, which I appreciated.  The game looks amazing, and the learning curve is not steep at all.  Unfortunately, there were two games where we were being blasted out of the water, were down to two ships, and neither ship was even playing.  Which was irritating, but it was good experience.

That’s You, I was reminded PlayStation Access played this game and I recall how I bought this game for 25 cents at the GameStop in Missoula.  Walker Dennis was nice enough to play with me.  I went for some easy trophies, and we had a pretty decent time.  The game was over in like 20 minutes or so, it was very fast.

Lego Dimensions, I got the Scooby Doo and Shaggy team pack, with the Mystery Machine.  There are 27 gold bricks in the Scooby world and I was able to get 25 of them.  The two I am missing is a dumb car racing one, and another is a dumb flying one.  I tried so many times, and then I remembered I have a backlog of games (that I’m adding too, all of the time!), and just gave up.  25 out of 27 is pretty good, I’ll write.  Such a fun world and I loved how it got me using characters I haven’t used in forever.  I was clearing the underwater gold bricks and ended up using Slimer, Evan Hunt, and a Cyberman.  There was a Portal gold brick and a Ghostbusters good brick as well.

It really made me want to put aside some more money and buy more characters, but I need to start saving for a bigger item, I think.

36 Fragments of Midnight, is a game that is currently 89 cents, and is on many lists for easy platinums.  Which I am super annoyed by, as clearly, I am not going to be able to earn this easy platinum.  I can get up to 29 fragments, and then I fall apart.  Either the map is too big and I’m not used to it yet, or I’m rushing it as there are two timed trophies.  One is to beat the game in ten minutes and another is to beat it in six minutes.  But I clearly cannot even get the final seven fragments, but I keep trying.  It really is a pleasant platformer and a real mellow experience.

King’s Quest, I subscribed to the King’s Quest subreddit, even though I mostly only like King’s Quest IV with Rosella.  I heard she was in the PS4 version, but in the later chapters.  Like, The Council, the first chapter of five, is free.  So I downloaded it, and I had a really great time with it.  We play as King Graham, voiced by legend Christopher Lloyd.  He’s retelling his earlier adventures to his granddaughter.  If the collection ever drops below ten dollars, I’ll buy the rest of it.  Wallace Shawn is another voice actor in the game, and they worked in his great scene from The Princess Bride, with the poisoned cups.

Grand Theft Auto V, I started playing this again an obvious reason I will get into below, and having a pretty good time again.  I have been playing the Kifflom mission with the Epsilon Program.  It is the last non-story trophy I believe I will earn.  I’ve been waiting to start this quest and it feels good to do it, it is very long.  I am about to do the five miles in the desert mission, so I am pretty close to completing it.  While wearing the robes for 10 days, I bought the helicopter pad, stole a helicopter, and flew around the map and finally earned the sight seer trophy.

Walker Dennis has been really into Back to the Future, watching the trilogy, taking a day break from it, and then starting it all over again.  That first movie really is a perfect movie.  We’ve been playing in the Back to the Future world in Lego Dimensions and I even took the time to find a Ruiner in GTA V and bought a red vested suit.

So that has been a lot of fun.  Walker started the TellTale game and has gotten decently farther into the first episode than I did, earning a few additional trophies. So now I want to at least catch up to him on my own file, so I have it on my list to at least play and complete the first chapter.  It is very different than the other TellTale games I played, there is a lot of back and forth and exploring and going back to areas.  It isn’t as straight forward as the Batman games.  But now my playthrough should be much quicker now that I know where to go.

For the big sale that is happening, I did buy The Council, and keep wanting to jump right into it, but I put these games first to get out of my system.  I also bought Metal Gear Solid V Definitive Edition, so now I feel like I can properly say I’m a fan of Rob from PlayStation Access.  Not a super fan yet, as I would need to have bought Skyrim.

.  .  .

We were treated to the big PS5 presentation on June 11.

The system looks amazing, but I really want a classic PlayStation black edition, or another limited edition.  The white is nice, but I feel like it is going to be a real dust collector.

Thanks to PlayStation for hosting their own presentation.

Below are my Top 10 game moments from the presentation!  I’m just going in the order as presented.

10

GTA V is going to join the ranks of Resident Evil 2 and Skyrim, and be on as many consoles as possible.  PS4 owners of GTA V will be given a million dollars for GTA Online each month until the PS5 is releaed.  As I enjoy free money, either real or digitally, I figured I’ll take advantge of it and play the game.  I want that Kifflom trophy, then I will do one additional mission, and then probably put the game onto the back burner until next month.

Interesting choice to start with a PS3 game, but I think it was a good transition from the PS4 to PS5.

9

I am fully committed to waiting a solid year for Black Friday 2021 to buy a PS5 (or have that be the earliest I will buy it) as I want it to drop a $100, as there is now it will be released between the $300 to $400 range.  But seeing Spider-Man : Miles Morales, oh boy.  I want a PS5 so much!  I know waiting a year is the right play, plus all of these amazing games will be a tad cheaper by then, but gosh, this teaser looks amazing!

People keep saying it is going to work like Uncharted : Lost Legacy, where it is a smaller game, using the bigger game’s engine, but improved graphically, and a bold new story.  So I am here for this!  I really should add Uncharted 4 to my list of games to reinvest time into.

8

I deleted Call of Duty WWII and Star Wars Battlefront II, as I needed room to play all of the games I was inspred to play.  One of those was Ratchet and Clank, which I plan on playing for at least a level, after I have completed my current fun with GTA V.

I’m also a fan of the title, Rift Apart, such clever word play.

7

I’m not sure what Stray is about, but it looks super intriguing.  Developed by BlueTwelve and published by Annapurna Interactive are bringing us the game, and I’ve been wanting to do a deep dive into other Annapurna Interactive games after really enjoying What Remains of Edith Finch.  Donut County, Ashen, and Kentucky Route Zero, all look pretty interesting.  They also published Flower and Journey too, so a name I should trust.

Seeing the robots in this game, inspired me to reinstall Detroit Become Human, so I’m going to at least play another chapter of that game.  My main focus right now is playing chapters of games, and just having a fun time with it.

6

Sackboy A Big Adventure had a very fun opening, as I was like “Tony the Tiger, the Game?”  Then I saw the zipper on his chest, and I knew we were in for a good time.

5

Kena Bridge of Spirits, looks like a lovely platformer in the same vein as Rachet and Clank.  It looks amazing.  Ember Labs is the developer and publisher of the game.

4

Miles Morales is my clear favorite of the list, but my very close second will have to be, Goodbye, Volcano High.  It just looks super interesting, and I just want to know more about it!  It is being developed by KO_OP.

3

Solar Ash gave me real RiME vibes.  This game is also being published by Annapurna Interactive.  The game is being developed by Heart Machine, so no connections to RiME, besides my initial reaction to it.

2

Hitman III is coming to PS5!  I really wish I was better at these games, but they are so big that I sort of get lost in all of the options, but I really should commit to playing the first game again.

1

Horizon Forbidden West is coming to PS5!  So I’m predicting now that at some point this year, Horizon Zero Dawn will be a free PS+ title.  Which probably isn’t saying much as I’ve been predicting it for a while, but it has to be now, right?

Solar Ash is more of a bonus item, but of course, none of these games will be possible without . . .

The PlayStation 5!

I’m mostly looking forward to getting some truly amazing games for the PS4 through PS+, and then some incredible indie games for the PS5, if they run the program like they did when the PS4 originally came out, with smaller PS4 titles and bigger PS3 titles.

What are you mostly looking forward to?

YouTuber, 6BURGH Gaming, was nice enough to write the following time stamps for the presentation of the 26 games :

     GTA V – 3:50
     Spider-Man Miles Morales – 5:49
     GT7 – 7:30
     Ratchet & Clank Rift Apart – 10:08
     Project Athia – 15:49
     Stray – 17:01
     Returnal – 20:48
     Sackboy A Big Adventure – 23:10
     Destruction All-Stars – 25:20
     Kena Bridge of Spirits – 27:32
     Goodbye Volcano High – 29:54
     Oddworld Soulstorm – 31:50
     Ghostwire Tokyo – 34:10
     Jett The Far Shore – 36:10
     Godfall – 38:34
     Solar Ash – 40:00
     Hitman 3 – 41:47
     Astro’s Playroom – 44:28
     Little Devil Inside – 45:23
     NBA 2K21 – 47:39
     Bugsnax – 49:01
     Demon’s Souls – 52:10
     Deathloop – 54:17
     Resident Evil Village – 57:50
     Pragmatic – 1:01:00
     Horizon Forbidden West – 1:03:35
     CONSOLE – 1:08:31

These are exciting times!

PlayStation Trophy Rank 16

Posted by John Klein III on August 22, 2019
Posted in: Fun With YouTube, Games, Websites. Tagged: , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Thanks to Rocket League and Grand Theft Auto V, I finally got to Rank 16!

Sorry the picture isn’t better, I should have changed my theme and then taken a picture and reverted back to the Las Vegas theme that I got for Walker Dennis and his love for Chad Wild Clay.

16 Rank
1929 Total Trophies
21 Platinums
127 Gold
407 Silver
1374 Bronze

Plus a lot of hard work and dedication!  No sweat or tears, that I can remember.

That last ten percentage was a slow crawl from 15 to 16.

I was reading this website :

https://www.digitaltrends.com/gaming/ps4-trophies-everything-you-need-to-know/

Gabe Gurwin writes that:  Bronze trophies are worth 15 points, silver are 30 points, gold are 90 points, and platinum trophies are 180 points.

So I knew once I got the platinum for Late Shift (which still hasn’t happened), I was for sure making it to Rank 16 but that was probably going to take a while before I got back to that game and then another round before I beat it.

.  .  .

I was having a blast playing Rocket League online and just trying different modes.  The 4 v 4 match was intense and no wonder they nicknamed it the Chaos Run, as so much is happening at all times.  It took a long time to find me a match but once the game paired me, I was pretty worried about making sure my team won the game and we did in overtime!  I was fully committed to just selecting the option again until we won but once we won, I ran out of that lobby to try other modes.

I still need to complete my first offline season, and now I wish I had the forethought to have made sure I had used either a Dominus or Takumi for an entire season so then I could have earned Winning is Winning and Champion at the same time.  But that’s okay, I’ll play two full seasons and still enjoy the heck out of it. It would have just saved some time, but I’ll be so much better at it the second time around.

I’m still using the Cristiano wheels to try to get 50 km as I got 10 km on them so I just have to keep using them.

I’m still trying to earn items, it just takes a long time to do so.  I barely have any rare items but once I get five of them, I have to trade them in to earn a very rare item and then win a match wearing that item.  I’m also trying to earn my first painted item too.  I haven’t come across Certified Items either.

I’m still not good enough to play against non-rookie bot opponents in handicap matches.

Those are my basic trophy goals for Rocket League but even after I get those and maybe a few other trophies, I’ll probably keep this game in the rotation and just enjoy myself that night.  Such fun!

.  .  .

I started Grand Theft Auto 4 with the pure intentions of just earning trophies.  So I cheated and got the Play in First Person Mode for 15 hours as I hate playing in first person mode if I have the option for third person mode.  I left the game on all night and used a rubber band to keep the right stick at an angle so the system nor the controller would turn itself off.

I played as Franklin got a slew of trophies.  I already had 200,000 for the cab company but I saw there was a side quest where I could pick a guy up and he’ll give me a good stock tip.  I only earned like $80,000 more dollars when I thought I was going to get into the millions but it was enough of a bump to earn me a trophy for using the stock exchange.  Plus, I was able to fully modify Franklin’s pistol and his personal car.  He bought the cab company and then did a private ride and maybe got a girlfriend out of it?  I don’t know, they were flirting but then the next night, she was too busy so I’m not sure what is happening there.  It was late though so I didn’t blame her.

I got the team together to do a FIB mission.  Then I thought I’ll quickly play as Trevor and get a few of his trophies but instead I did the prep work for The Merryweather Heist, which will be the next thing I do in the game.  Oh, that was after I tortured a guy as Trevor so Michael could snipe a chain smoker.

I’ll probably still try to knock out a few of Trevor’s trophies but at this point, I’m just committed to just beating the main story and I’ll see where I go from there.

.  .  .

A game I am done with for the meantime is Yakuza Kiwami.  I was having a great time escaping from the funeral until I came up against Futoshi Shimano.

From what I’ve read, he’s by far the hardest boss in the game, and the other ones are more fair.  I also read the game has 15 chapters which I was looking forward to playing through all of them but I spent like 30 minutes dying to Futoshi Shimano and that wasn’t even a fun 30 minutes.

I read that the match does essentially take 20 minutes of the most boring fighting there is.  Essentially, we have to hit him, run away, and repeat.  Which is not great and I clearly didn’t have the patience to do keep trying last night.  I’m hoping the game autosaved my progress as I really don’t want to do the 20 minutes of fights that led up to Shimano but if I have to do it, then that’s just what I have to do but, for now, the game is out of my rotation.  Be more fun game!

.  .  .

September 2019 Prediction Thread from PlayStationPlus

The PlayStation Plus subreddit just started accepting guesses for what the free September games are going to be.  Someone on the Trophies subreddit mentioned how they got the plat for Grand Theft Auto III and now I really want to play that game again.  It would be nice to get it free of course but I added it to my PSPrices wishlist.

There is two ways about getting the game for the PS4.  One is to buy the trilogy pack that comes with Vice City and San Andreas.  Which I really liked Vice City but I didn’t quite get into San Andreas.  Vice City, I went back too later to see if I could goof around in the world but too much time had passed and it just felt like a foreign city to me.  San Andreas had a mission very early on where I had to chase a guy on a bike while I was also on a bike (which is fair) but I just never got good enough to complete it and that left me feeling defeated.  I even tried to keep CJ on a bike to increase his speed abilities but it was never enough.

The trilogy is usually $35 but goes as low as $17.49, which seems pretty generous.  Especially as III by itself is $15 but goes as low as $7.49.  Which I wouldn’t mind getting the trilogy for $18, as three full games for $18 is an amazing price!  But if III goes on sale prior to the trilogy, eight dollars for a game I really want, is a great price too!  I can only imagine if one is on sale, the other would be too.  So it is a race to see which goes on sale first!

I would feel compelled to play Vice City and San Andreas too, and I’m way better at games now, so I’ll probably have a great time but I’m also older and don’t have all the time in the world, so these games would hold me over for quite some time.  Plus, I own them, so I can play them whenever.

Looking at the trophy guide for III :

https://www.playstationtrophies.org/game/grand-theft-auto-3/guide/

I bet I don’t get the platinum for it but I just remember loving III so much and having a great time in Liberty City.

.  .  .

We really need to move Stranger Things Season Three up our watch list as :

Thanks to Dead by Daylight for hosting their own video!

Nancy and Steve are coming to Dead by Daylight!  They are bringing a demogorgon with them and a new map too!

I can only imagine this is going to be upwards of seven dollars with two new survivors and a new killer.  If we can finish the series in time, I’m buying this day one, if not, I’ll be buying it once we finish it.  I still want Ghostface which I’ve been tempted to just buy right now but I imagine once this gets released, all of the other DLC will get discounted.  That’s what I’m hoping happens.

The Dead by Daylight subreddit is getting hyped for it too!

Chapter 13: Stranger Things Reveal Trailer from deadbydaylight

 

So nice to see the community come together for great news!

People are posting that they are coming back to the game for this, which sounds pretty legit.  Possibly, too legit!

People are hyped for Steve but of the two characters, I’ll be playing as Nancy.

I would also be okay if Alien and Ripley join Dead by Daylight, let’s get nuts!

They have also announced the nine new perks too!

Stranger Things DLC perks from the Developer stream from deadbydaylight

Which sounds pretty cool, especially once redditors were explaining the actual benefits.

.  .  .

During the latest PlayStation Store update video, Rob mentions new game, Erica, that I really want to get.  It is only ten dollars but I think I will still wait for a deal on it.

Thanks to PlayStation for hosting the trailer.

I just finished my sixth playthrough (second to last) of Late Shift and I’m sort of in the mood for another live action game where I get to make the decisions.  Seems like either the game just came out or it just came out and people have already unlocked all seven endings already.  Which seems way fast but maybe it is a shorter game but that seems odd for a mystery.

Interactive thriller Erica out on PS4 now from PS4

Seems like some good and honest reviews for the game.  Seems shorter than 90 minutes so all seven endings might be fast to do.  There apparently is an app too that hopefully actually works unlike Beyond : Two Souls app that would not connect to the PS4.  Until Dawn had an app but it was mostly a fun novelty to track friendship meters and to do a quiz to see which character you are. I want to say after the quiz, we got a fun fake phone call that I had to uninstall and reinstall each time for someone else to experience it.  Pretty fun.

.  .  .

I got a lot done in Lego Marvel Superheroes 2.  I completed the Ego the Living Lego Planet level so I have two more story missions before having to replay them all in Free Play.  Before that, I’ve committed to just doing the six DLC levels, once I complete one, I’ll go right back in for the Free Play and trophy cleanup.  Then I will tackle all of the story missions again with Free Play.  I also got Knowhere unlocked but none of the hub activities were available besides the cartographer monitor.  Oh, and those birds showed up so I have the Arial Avenger challenge completed.  I also rescued Stan Lee twice and completed maybe five races.  I nearly lost my mind doing so, but after completing the Billboard challenge, I earned Black Widow’s motorcycle which made two races much easier to handle.  One of those races was a webslinging one that was pretty difficult but now I have the Captain Britain Spider-Man.  I also unlocked Vulture too, so that was nice.  He’s the version of Spider-Man : Homecoming.

So tonight, I’ll play Beyond : Two Souls and do the briefing chapter, which is a short video and then I’ll do whatever comes afterwards.

.  .  .

I got to play Sniper Elite 4’s second mission as well.  It either seemed shorter or I didn’t have as many tutorials to learn skills with.  Mostly, they taught me how to not be spotted by a sniper and then I got spotted anyways as I couldn’t really make out where he was.  So I’ll definitely attempt the third mission next.  I’m really enjoying myself with the game.  I got to rank 6, and I also shot a guy in his foot and then shot him in the nuts for that sweet nutcracker trophy.

I think my rotation plan is working as I envisioned, but it is definitely too many games as I want to play all of the games and it is too long of a rotation before getting through the lap.  That’ll become faster now that Yakuza Kiwami is out and Late Shift is one playthrough from being done.  I do like taking a break between playthroughs as it would be a bit much watching the same film over and over again.  Though I was tempted to just knock it out that night but that isn’t the right mental state to play.  Plus, it would have been another two hours.

Playing WipEout Omega Collection and Sniper Elite 4

Posted by John Klein III on August 15, 2019
Posted in: Fun With YouTube, Games. Tagged: , , , , , , . Leave a comment

I finally got a chance to play WipEout Omega Collection and Sniper Elite 4!

I’ll start with WipEout, which I did not really enjoy.  I was doing the first solo campaign and made it through the finish line for the first three races.  I could already tell I was not going to be good at the game.  The fourth track had an objective to come in fifth, so I already knew this might it for me.  Which it was as I was steadily eighth like I have been.  So I lost that race, I didn’t even finish it as we get 30 seconds from first place to cross the finish line.

So then I relooked at the trophy guide as I am super committed to at least getting one trophy per game now.  I saw the “Finish 10 online games” and it was already 11:45pm but I figured I would knock out ten in like 20 minutes but it took like a full hour to get the matchmaking systems and to find tracks that I could finish.  Someone even set the laps to 20 so I jumped out of that one so quick.  I did eventually get into a group of people who kept running four lap races and I finished my ten race and went to bed.

I’m not sure what it is about the game that didn’t click.  Maybe it is the speed as we’re definitely racing at top speeds as I kept hitting the walls with nearly every turn or I was not making the most out of the boost pads.

.  .  .

The next night, I loaded Sniper Elite 4.  There is a tutorial that gets us into the game and then it exceeds to the next section but then the game pretty much just lets us play how we want.  Which I read is sort of how Hitman works, but SE4 has a limited amount of things to do but more space to do it.  So I should probably try to do that first level of Hitman but the trophies made it sound overly complicated but I’ll get it a proper chance again.

It was super fun to run around sniping Nazis.  There were secondary objectives, such as break three cameras and kill four Nazi officers, along with the main objective of killing the main Nazi officer.

I really got into the idea of taking the time to carry dead bodies and either throw them into the water or onto a giant stack of other dead bodies.  It takes more time but I like the clear message it delivers.

There is only eight missions, so I’ve added the game to my rotation and I’m committed to doing all eight.  Or at the very least, the second mission and take it from there.

I’m tempted to try out Sniper Elite 3, as I figured it would be a five dollar game at least point, but it seems to still go for $20 so at that price, I might as well just buy the DLC to 4, but I also will just wait until I’ve completed the main story.

So I really didn’t care for WipEout but really took to Sniper Elite 4 – which really, should be the point of the free games through PlayStation Plus.  To expose us to games we may have been tempted to buy, but probably never would.

.  .  .

Walker Dennis really wanted to play as Lego Batman so I ejected the Lego Marvel Collection and inserted Lego Dimensions.  He just had a blast on the Hub world.  Once he was done, I took the chance to insert Grand Theft Auto V.

I really wanted that first trophy of online and I made my person and I forgot how much GTA V wants us to really time commit to levels as I did a race, and then the game wanted me and my two new friends to do a drug run.  I was a much better driver than the one guy as he had us off the road and into a neighborhood and I had to get us back on track.  Then it seemed to finally release us from the crew and we were off to do our own stuff.  So I chose to just play the main game, to make sure my file saved.  Which it didn’t, I had to redo that level where Michael’s family left him again but it barely took ten minutes.

So now I’m tempted to try to add GTA V to my rotation and get the game finished.  And it really doesn’t take long to take a disc out and get a new one placed in.

Now I also have one more trophy in common with most of the players I play with in Dead by Daylight as I’ve seen the Off The Plane trophy on so many player’s trophy lists.

.  .  .

Girlfriend Reviews did a review of Yakuza 0 which apparently I’m easily convinced by this channel to play games, and I did watch it thinking I might end up playing Yakuza Kiwami.  Which it totally did!

For those who don’t know.  0 is the prequel to Yakuza 1 that was remade for the PS4 as Yakuza Kiwami.  Kiwami was a free game back in November 2018.  The same month we got Burly Men at Sea (which I platinumed) and Roundabout (which I really enjoyed but hit a point of what I could do).  Bulletstorm : Full Clip Edition was the other big game but I still haven’t attempted that game.

I finished the Chapter One, which didn’t take too long, and started the first part of Chapter Two.  I really enjoy the saving format as it seems I can save whenever.  It does an odd thing of saving the game, and then it saves to the system, as two separate steps, which I rather it just did the second step at the same time, behind the scenes.  I guess I take it for granted that is how it works when we save games now but who knows.  The whole process is done in like ten seconds but I just try not to save too much but I have this habit of saving after every fight.

I feel like I’m just hitting square and then triangle, but I’ll learn other combos as I level Kazumi Kiryu up.  I figure since I’m adding games to my backlog, I’ll add this one too, but I predict there will be a point where I just can’t get pass and it’ll go back into the backlog but I’ll wait to see what happens.  I’ve earned three trophies in that two hour gaming session so that felt pretty good.

I’m currently at Level 15, sitting at 96% completion before level 16!  I’m so close but I really need to start earning silvers and gold trophies, or perhaps just one more platinum.

.  .  .

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2eEGT06FrWFU6VBnPOR9lg/videos

Girlfriend Reviews keeps making a joke about face reveals but I feel like their icon and banner on their YouTube page pretty much shows Shelby’s face but maybe I’m missing the joke.

I looked over the list of 36 videos and there are a few videos where I could be tempted to play the game.  I have a goal to play Detroit Become Human.  I’ve earned a trophy on Borderlands 2 so I feel good with that and I got stuck on that one level so that will stay in the backlog.  I should rewatch the Arkham Asylum video as I don’t quite recall it though I know I’ve seen it.  I would love to treat myself to the Return to Arkham combo set but I’m hoping out for Arkham Origins to be added to the collection.  I’ll eventually get around to playing Last of Us, and I’ve been tempted, since I’m making a now ridiculous (still a word I can never spell without assistance) game rotation, to just throw Uncharted 4 onto that list so I can go 4, Lost Legacy, to The Last of Us.  I read recently Last of Us 2 is slated for February so I should probably make that decision now.  Not like it matters, I won’t be getting the sequel anytime close to the game’s release.  Plus, now that I got Detroit for free, I’m tempted to wait until they give Last of Us for free so I can return the physical disc to GameStop for credit.

Which, I really am tempted to just get digital copies now.  I told Walker Dennis that he can play Lego Movie 1 whenever he wants as we have it digitally and he’s really taken me up on that offer as he’s been playing it for a few nights now.  I can’t get him to want to play Lego Marvel Superheroes 2 but I need to get back to that game myself.  I did tell him that once we platinum that game, I’ll get him DC Super-Villains, so he’s excited about that.  I did tell him it will be a while.

I’ve been sort of regretting now getting Man of Medan digitally but lesson learned.

The only God of War game I own is the remastered III but I really don’t know how I feel about having essentially two games on my trophy list, both of them not platinumed.  Though it would be the same case if I ever got Return to Arkham as I already have Asylum and City in my trophy list.  Plus, it is a silly reason not to play a game.

.  .  .

So my game rotation currently looks like this:

Late Shift (three more playthroughs before the Platinum)
Lego Marvel Superheroes 2
Beyond : Two Souls
Sniper Elite 4
Grand Theft Auto V
Yakuza Kiwami

with Dead by Daylight and Rocket League being my chill games that I rotate between.  Though lately, I’ve just been playing a full game session with one game.  Especially as Dead by Daylight takes so long to match me with other survivors.  As a killer, I have no problems getting matched but it be like that sometimes.

Walker and I got a slew of additional trophies in Rocket League but we might be finally getting through all of easily achieved ones and now we’re in the grind.  I do want to complete one season to earn three trophies, I just have to commit to doing it.

I tried to get the play online with a friend, after I set up my wife’s account to connect her to the PlayStation Network, but minus Plus.  We were able to get one trophy for playing online with a friend on the Championship field but we can’t get the basic play online with a friend, I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong there.

So six games, with one going away in the third round.  It is silly and I’m sure two of those will drop off soon too but time will tell.

.  .  .

Beyond : Two Souls, I got the Master Stealth trophy for completing The Mission without being seen.  Such an intense level!  It ends very dramatically as well!  The next level is Old Friends and I didn’t see any trophies attach, and it might be a short mission too but that is what happens with one mission a round.

Plus, doing it this way, gives me things to write about, so that’s a big win for me!

Seven levels left with maybe an extra level if I have the DLC, I’m not sure if I have it or not.

.  .  .

For Dead by Daylight, I did get the trophy for Adept Ash and for completing the generator on the steam boat and living to tell about it.

I’m not usually this trophy focus, but I really want to get to rank 16.

So those are the games I’m currently playing.  To get GTA V on my PS4, I had to delete Deus Ex : Mankind Divided and Uncanny Valley but that’s okay.  I have had those games for a while and I’ll eventually get back to giving them a property play.