What Video Game Did I Play Yesterday?
Sonic Forces (PS4)
November 27th, 2022
Yesterday was a decent day again, but I still wasn't in a very game-heavy mood, which is fine. Even playing something for just a few minutes is enough to calm down a lot of overthinking and nervousness, even if I did only mess with games I've already finished.
I played PriPara: All Idol Perfect Stage for a few minutes to take some reference screenshots of the idol team I made in game, so I changed their outfits, played a couple of songs, and went back to crafts. This will almost definitely happen again today.
Before bed, I played with the avatar creator in Sonic Forces for a few minutes, too. I want a pair of white boots for one of my characters, but having already gotten the "500 character parts" trophy, I do concede that they may not even be in the game. Still, I have this game practically memorized, so I got another set of character parts unlocked and turned it off.
July 10th, 2022
Today, I bask in the glory of posting while I wait for my hair to dry, so I don't look too weird when I go to Subway for lunch.
My most interesting game yesterday was a cute little adventure game I found in one of my itch.io bundles, Little Favors. It was made in Bitsy, which is an interesting game engine I've stared at more than actually used. I keep thinking I should try to make a game in it, but have not taken any of the necessary steps to do so.
Anyway, Little Favors is a very cute, brief, and charming browser game where you do fetch quests to help a cat overcome a shopping crisis. It's not super complex, but knowing how the rooms and interactions had to come together to run in order for the player, I was really impressed by how smoothly everything ran. The little animal sprites are really cute, too, and even though the interactions are brief, the characters have a good amount of personality.
If you'd like to play it yourself, you can find it here! Click here to play!
From there, everything was pretty standard. I played the Episode Shadow pack-in DLC in Sonic Forces, in which we learn that being a little rude to someone can make them a full on supervillain. I'm going to keep this in mind as a new career path during work tomorrow. That aside, I am close to hitting a wall in this game. The time trials and red coins aren't a bad challenge, but the levels aren't interesting enough to run over and over trying to get everything right. Collecting the avatar parts is fun, but I'm not sure I have the patience to 100% this.
Then, I played Ensemble Stars way too much yesterday, trying to make headway in the event to very little avail. The font is way smaller for the song translations now, and it seemed to run with a little more lag than it used to. My office is up to 12 trash cans, though, so I am clearly doing very well.
July 9th, 2022
My Saturday "update" for this week is all backend stuff. I installed GIMP on the weenie little Windows laptop I'm on right now, that I use to edit this website, in order to cut down on the devices I use to take care of this daily. Typically, if I can take direct screenshots, like on my Android tablet or Switch, I will. Everything else is photographed through my iPad camera or, again in the case of the Switch, transferred over to the iPad using the archaic QR code reader system. I then email the photos over to myself, and before today, I was then making my fuzzy little jpegs out of the screenshots on a second, older and more frustrating computer, emailing them back to myself, and bouncing over to this machine.
I have known that this is a bad setup since the first day I posted here, but it took me over a month to simply install my image editor on this laptop, cutting a few steps out of my process. It seems nice so far, and'll make things faster on bad days at work.
Tomorrow, I might do an overall update to the website itself, but I haven't decided yet. If I don't end up doing anything like that tomorrow, I'll save it for next weekend.
Last night, I got trapped in mandatory overtime, which kind of tipped things over for the whole evening. I did a few missions in Sonic Forces, not accomplishing much, but having a pretty clear idea of what I want to go after today.
After that, as always, I cleared what I could of the daily missions in Ensemble Stars. Today's screenshot is cropped, unlike the usual ones, to make sure the text is readable. For me, this game having a character that talks at length about their church is a feature rather than a bug, since I think depictions of Christianity from cultures where it's not such a dominant religious ideology are interesting. This quote that comes up during the idol work sections always makes me laugh. I am curious what the original Japanese was here, because I suspect it's a translation error. If not, "May you be at rest. Amen," is an unexpected, to say the least, thing to tell fans calling in for an idol's radio show.
July 7th, 2022
Last night, I picked an RPG I'd been having some spatial awareness struggles with back up, Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga I. It is very enjoyable and interesting, but I am inexplicably stuck on the cruise ship dungeon 20 hours in. I've made efforts to go back in and get sorted out, not sure why I am so lost, but this time, I am not going to be defeated. By God, I'm taking notes! Before I go for it, though, I had to refresh myself on how the game systems work, so I spent about an hour in random battles and messing with menus last night. It's gripping stuff to write about after the fact.
Everything else I did was just mission clearing. I got through 5 or 6 super quick missions in Sonic Forces by redoing the Green Hill Zone intro level over and over to clear some of the "use your homing attack on 5 enemies in a row!" style missions for Sonic.
In Ensemble Stars, I did my daily missions and then played some songs quite badly before going to sleep. This is what mobile rhythm games were made for.
July 6th, 2022
I didn't do anything exciting yesterday, so I'm dashing out a quick post during my work break. In Sonic Forces, I set a goal to clear three missions and ended up clearing a 4th when the daily mission bonus kicked on, to get one of my S ranks cleared and out of the way.
In Ensemble Stars, I did the daily missions, a few of the Starry Lives to scum some diamonds, and read a couple of the machine-translated-into-slush story segments to clear off the last event. The standard story's translation isn't great, but it's doable. Some of the campaign story stuff is a wreck, though. Some proofreading or editing would help a ton. The screenshot is unrelated, but I thought it was funny that the main screen characters can look like they've had it with each other.
July 5th, 2022
Yesterday afternoon, I decided to sit down and finish Adventure for a Bit, which you can download from itch.io if you're curious. Here is the link! I had stalled a bit on finishing this, since I thought it would be a super long play session, but it turned out I only had around 15 minutes of the game left. There's nothing wrong with that, I just felt slightly like a dingbat.
At any rate, Adventure for a Bit was quick to play, had cute and charming characters, and had some really pretty and relaxing worlds to wander around in. It ended up being a really good random pick from my itch.io bundles.
I got back to messing around with post-game missions in Sonic Forces, which was pleasantly low stress. Most of my time was spent trying to keep deaths to a minimum in the third EX stage, and I did, to my credit, eventually get an S rank. It took a lot of horrific deaths by laser and falling from great heights to earn that, but it happens. I also unlocked this glorious Chao backpack, in shining pink. I ordered bootleg Crocs with a Chao like this on them, so I was quite pleased.
Last but not least, I hit my stride in Ensemble Stars and am ready to play until my eyes bleed tonight. I'm still working on the Start-Dash missions, but maybe tonight I can get them cleared!
July 2nd, 2022
Another day, another blathering post about moderate amounts of time spent playing games!
In Sonic Forces, my big accomplishment was to figure out how to get some red coins, then die and lose them. I got an S rank in one of the EX stages that I'd been struggling with, too, I guess that's more impressive. It's less memorable, though. It was kind of fun to play without worrying about progress.
With Ensemble Stars, I'd been worried that I'd have to put in a bunch of time to clear the event story, but it took less than an hour. After that, I went back to failing at making fancy jellos and cleared my daily missions a few hours later. I haven't read the event story yet, but I was more driven by the feeling that later, it would irritate me to have a piece missing than I was by needing to see how it ends. This game has over 40 collectible characters- I think I counted 48 last night. It's kind of too many for me to worry about the side story stuff so early on, since their personalities aren't super clear yet. It's not bad, just kind of overwhelming.
July 1st, 2022
It's the start of a new month! I have the day off work, so I did my weekly "improvements" to the site today, but it's mostly stuff on the back end. For my own sake, I'm putting my images in folders moving forward. It'll make navigating what I'm doing while I post way easier, even if there's no front end benefits to be seen. I also got the July post archive page started and linked across the board. It's a party, to be sure.
On the gaming front, there's no changes. I got started on the post game stuff of Sonic Forces, gathering coins and doing missions. I at least want to get the full honors on every avatar animal type and do the side story stuff for Shadow, but don't know if I'll 100% the whole thing. Certainly, though, I'm getting my $10 worth out of this game.
Over in Ensemble Stars, I'm focusing on the idol work mode to level up the office and craft new outfits for the office chibis. It's mostly mindless level grinding, though I realized I could have gotten a decent jump on the next goal by focusing on the event a bit more. Luckily, I don't care enough to regret not playing with more dedication.
June 30th, 2022
Last night, I spent several hours of swearing finishing the main story of Sonic Forces. I like games, but am not very good at them, so it occurred to me as I played that games should have a feature where, if you drop the f-bomb in the same insult enough times against a beloved children's character, it asks you if you're okay and want to keep trying, or go to bed before you have a heart attack. The final boss was pretty impressive, though, and I had fun overall, so I'm happy. I'm going to start in on some of the post game stuff tonight, which'll mostly be hours upon hours of magic animal dress up.
As always, I also cleared my daily missions in Ensemble Stars and tried to get a read on the cards I'd gathered. I looked, determined there were too many characters, and picked up no additional information. Tonight and tomorrow, I might see if I can make a run at clearing at least the story part of the event, but if I don't, I don't.
June 29th, 2022
My jello gummy bears last night were terrible. I learned from the experience, but regret my cockiness in the bygone era that yesterday has become, re-reading such youthful enthusiasm in today's harsh light.
Anyway, I didn't play anything out of the ordinary last night. I played more Sonic Forces, and think I'll beat the main campaign tonight.
I also cleared my daily missions and almost nothing more in Ensemble Stars.
Video games are a good time to enjoy penalty free laziness.
June 28th, 2022
It took me a while to get to posting tonight because I got some gummy bear molds and some agar powder, and I was makin' the hell out of some jello. I may actually post a photo here once I get enough colors made. It's not gaming content, but jello treats are a gift to the people.
Last night, I really turned a corner on Sonic Forces- I quite enjoy this game. It is dumb and not perfect, but I can run fast and unlock stuff endlessly. Stuff is stressful, I do not always need more from a game than this.
With Ensemble Stars, I did the daily goals and not much else. I respect that this game hands me enough unlockable stuff and level ups with short daily play sessions that it doesn't feel insurmountable. A low committment mobile game is fine.
June 27th, 2022
Yesterday involved a lot more old anime on the Roku live streaming channels and crafts than games, which was perfect for Sunday.
I did play Sonic Forces for a while and wonder if I'm getting close to the end of the game or not? I've fought the final boss style character, Infinite, twice now, and did a boss battle against Metal Sonic last night. I still maintain that this game is getting easier as it goes, too. I don't really mind, it's fine, it is just a hard game to get a read on, even if it is basically fun to play.
Over in mobile gaming fluff land, I got extremely set on getting a full combo on a difficult song in Ensemble Stars and just played it over and over until I succeeded. I did the 100 character garbage gacha, which was mildly satisfying, and bought another trash can for their office. It was moderate feelings of accomplishment all around.
June 26th, 2022
I got Sonic Adventure back up and running yesterday! In order to get the sound back, I had to install the SADX Mod Installer, which is here if you need it, overwriting the failed audio with the audio files from the Dreamcast version of the game. (I also, practically, installed a mod to add the Japan only DLC for holidays.) The mod installer did a few other things, too, adding in the unlockable Game Gear stuff from Game Cube, and, in a less fun bonus, adding camera control.
The camera in Sonic Adventure is bad to be sure, but I'm really prone to motion sickness in older 3D games. For whatever reason, the awful camera in this game doesn't really tend to trigger it, but with the mod on, it's pretty bad. If I keep my laptop as far away from me as possible, I think I'll still be able to finish it off one level at a time, but it's a disappointing trade-off.
Anyway, with the game back up and running, I played one of the Knuckles levels and did a boss fight alongside it.
Even though I have Sonic Adventure going again, I kept going with Sonic Forces. I feel, somewhat bafflingly, that the game is getting less challenging as it goes, rather than my just getting better at it. In some levels, I feel like it would be harder to get killed than not. Dressing up the avatar character is very cute, though, so I'm in it for the outfit pieces.
Of course, I kept going with my mobile game, too. I am almost incidentally grinding away at the event in Ensemble Stars as I play normally. I'm looking to finish unlocking the story for the current gacha cards, and I want to level up and get money to drown the chibi idols in the office in a sea of garbage cans. The game says I can have up to 99 of them, and I'm goin' for it. The event progresses with normal gameplay, though, so there's no real reason not to do it. Also, as I predicted, I've been able to level up enough to start scoring decently within just a week of play, which is fine.
I might not play much today, since I'm enjoying an over-complicated crochet project and trying to finish a diamond painting of hauntingly low quality, but craft time is good, too. I'll at least check in on a couple of games.
June 24th, 2022
Today sucks, just as a general vibe, so this is a minimalist post.
I played more Sonic Forces last night. Replaying levels, a lot of the setpieces get old fast. The shininess does not get old.
Ensemble Stars had an event start up last night. I will halfheartedly pursue some of the lower goals while filling my idol office with trash cans.
June 23rd, 2022
June is not my month! I was going to do a good post before work this morning, but ended up hacking with a sore throat and getting a COVID test instead. It's not as bad as what I had earlier in the month, even with the cough medicine they gave me to get through work making me ultra-sleepy, but still! My butt is so kicked lately.
Anyway, last night was pretty close to the night before. I knocked out a couple more levels of Sonic Forces, coming to the conclusion that the tone reads as weird to me because it's for kids that are really into the franchise, not judgy adults. That doesn't make it a great game, but if, when I was a grade schooler, there had been a game where you could design a Princess Toadstool lookalike and have her rescue the entire cast of the Mario games, I would have played it to death. It's cute.
After that, I had Ensemble Stars up and running properly again. I was thinking too hard about all the weird, slightly off Christian imagery in the game last night, which is very interesting rather than a negative. I was already feeling a little cruddy, though, so I failed to gather any evidence. Instead, here is a screenshot of the Idol Work mode, where you just kind of idly tap the screen a few times and get points. It's not the best, but I can definitely run it while I am leading the more productive points of my life for said points.
June 22nd, 2022
Last night, due to a pretty decent digital sale on PS4, I started playing Sonic Forces. It is not a replacement for Sonic Adventure, which I will try to fix over the weekend, but my expectations were so extremely low that I actually had a good time. The cutscenes were driving me up a wall, as I do not need so much chatter or angst from a Sonic game, but the character creator is cute and the game itself is, if not great, fine. So far, it seems like an okay 10 dollar game.
Ensemble Stars, on the other hand, was either suffering from server issues or my sitting too far away from my weenie router last night. Either way, I got through the daily missions and am at the final step of the beginner's missions.
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