So I've been playing this recently...

[Ideofago]

Storm missiles are noice.

[LegalLoliLover]

Huh, Dynasty Warriors 9 Empires and Evenicle 2 come out at around the same time. So the question is whether I'm more in the mood for some empire building or loli electro play. Both are rather exciting endeavors.

[Mattias]

So now that Monster Hunter Rise is out on PC I've seen a lot more people streaming it and I felt an urge to go back and check out what new stuff has shown up in the past few months. Lots of extra difficult quests seems to be the answer. But now that I've built everything for my main weapon, I wanted to see if I could find something else to to try. Tried Longsword, and I just can't get the flow right. Greatsword took some getting used to and I do like those big numbers, but the immobility is a killer. (I did get a tail every time I played it though, so there is that). Spent the night getting the last materials for SnS, Lance and Glaive so I'll check them out later. But Switchaxe, that was a fun one. Especially once I realized that axe mode didn't build switch meter faster. But the satisfaction when nailing that sawing attack, combined with how often it broke parts? That's some magic right there. And it gives me something to do now, looking for parts to max out one axe for every element.

[Laserman]

I made it to Raven Beak a few days ago, but I only fought him a few times before I just decided to take a break and go back and get anything that I could have missed.

[Mattias]

I love that feeling when you hop on a fighting game for a DLC character and you're just screwing around, then your brain goes "Hey, I wonder if...". Then it's 45 minutes later and you've got a 80% damage combo that only takes half a bar of meter and have somehow figured out your ghetto control setup means you can aerial on the ground.

[Ideofago]

Now do it in a match
(Also what game is it)

[Mattias]

GG Strive. Baiken is a bit of a beast, as long as you don't drop your rubber band combo.

And being a gamepad scrub means I can Youzanzen on the ground, apparently.

[Ideofago]

It's not because you're on gamepad, you're just doing a Tiger Knee. It's the Hadouken plus the up diagonal, so in numpad notation it'd be 2369. Also works with semicircles, so stuff like 412369 works. I think every motion has some way of TKing.

[Ideofago]

I flashed a suitcase full of money at a building and now I own it. God I love Yakuza.

[Mattias]

It's not because you're on gamepad, you're just doing a Tiger Knee. It's the Hadouken plus the up diagonal, so in numpad notation it'd be 2369. Also works with semicircles, so stuff like 412369 works. I think every motion has some way of TKing.

Yeah, that's how it comes out since the game registers the hop before the button inputso it ends up a short hop attack. But it's still something I can't do when I'm using the directional buttons, only when I'm using the imprecise analog stick.


And yeah, Yakuza 0 is sick. I highly recommend checking out the Pocket Circuit sidequest north of the Bowling Alley.

[Ideofago]

Yeah, I've been doing that one, but I'm stuck on the (this is not what actually happens in game) pedophilia section because I haven't gotten the High Torque 2.0 yet.

Also, that's a nice botch, but I recommend practice if you ever intend to be consistent. I wouldn't recommend putting that much time in strive though.

[Mattias]

Strive's fine. It's not as wacky as Xrd was but that doesn't make it bad. And if I want SPEED then I'll play Melty.

[Ideofago]

Fair enough.

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Shougi (or is it Shogi) is very fun. Most of the complaints I had for chess are solved with this one. Too bad the different pieces are marked by kanji instead of shape, makes reading the board a bit tiresome. Now for there to be HP bars and super moves.

[Mattias]

I couldn't stand Shogi. After playing chess for most of my life, playing a variant that's more limited just didn't feel click. Now Mahjong, I sank probably 10+ hours into. Completely stalled on the story for maybe a week or two. And I still have no idea how it's scored. I know what makes a winning hand but have no inkling how you determine points for it.

[Ideofago]

I also tried Mahjong. I could not understand how to play Mahjong.

Also, how do you feel Shogi to be more limited? I felt quite the opposite. Maybe I'm just tired of chess's meta, and Shogi also has its own trappings I've yet to discover, but so far it feels much freer in some aspects.

[Mattias]

It's the fact there's little backwards movements. Knights can only move forward, I think it's Kings that can only move directly back and not at angles, Queens only have full control on diagonals. It's been a long while so I'm not sure those are the exact or if I'm confusing some for the promoted versions, but it basically boiled down to very little backwards movements.

Mahjong is a bit like the bastard of poker and bridge. You're looking to build 3-tile groups of straights and triplets mostly, with more points based on things like uniformity of scored tiles, your position at the table and a trump suit and number.

[Ideofago]

Lance and Knight can't move backwards. There is no Queen. Silver and Gold generals are a pair I like playing both with and against because of their complementary patterns. Once you get them together, they can be quite hard to put down, but flanking them is always fun and very intricate. The lance almost always feels like a tricky yet straightforward battle, and placing one like a fucking missile, locking down a column, always feels great. The bishop and rook feel adequately balanced, as even with only one of each, they feel much more powerful than their chess variants even though they have the exact same moveset, and when you promote them? Jesus christ. Also, promoting in general feels much more fun and much more like a main part of the game's strategy than the snoozefest it is in chess, where it's a highly situational quirk of the pawns. Also, pawns in this feel much more straightforward in a sense, especially with the whole locking down the battlefield. They're great ressurection ammo as well. The Knights are very tricky, but I think a lot of their positioning is thought with the ressurection in mind, since their weird angles are even more valuable here. You've gotta really consider it before moving them, something I had to figure out as I was opening with them, which doesn't seem to be a good idea. Plus, I'm very fond of how agressive I've had to play so far, and it allows me to be a bit more reckless, or at least at the easiest difficulty, and it's very fun. I'm kind of afraid of researching deeper into it because I don't want to ruin the groove I'm finding here.

Also, illustrating a bit more, it seems the whole game is a bit more geared towards push forward, territory management style, which to me is a bit more representative of what the abstract fantasy of war should be. The bigger board and the small movements being balanced out by the ressurecting makes the rhythm feel completely different yet very related to chess, and any game will play out in a way I'm personally more fond of right now.

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Also, I'm legitimately finding Blackjack fun. I must never allow myself near a casino.

[Rafflesiac]

Also, I'm legitimately finding Blackjack fun. I must never allow myself near a casino.

Time to read 21.

[Ideofago]

Is there something readable called 21, or is that some slang for card counting?

[Rafflesiac]

Oh, the book had a different title from the movie.