Game #23: Story of Seasons

Story of Seasons
Platform: 3DS
Duration: 55 Hours

No, this isn't that Zelda game.

So this game is from the team that originally made Harvest Moon, but Natsume has the trademark for that now and they have been making...questionable games with it lately so these guys broke off and made this game. If you have any love for Harvest Moon at all, you will love this game. I fucking loved it. There's all the standard farm and livestock activities (though with tons of quality of live improvements) as well as a ton of waifus and husbandarus to get. Then, they added a completely customizable farm and house, tons of crafting and decorating, and even a bunch of clothes to craft including a bear costume because why not.

This game is great for killing time. I mean, seriously, 55 hours to get to the credits (which roll whenever you get married). By then, I had the biggest house in the game, was fucking ROLLING in money and had over a billion dollars from selling clothes from my fields of flax. I don't know how my magic sewing machine kept up with everything, but I hope it wasn't child labor. I also owned every public field in the town. Not because I needed them, but because I wanted to exert my dominance over the other shitty farmers in town.

I'm not even past Spring in the second year. I could keep going with this game for a very long time. Buy it, seriously.

Game #22: Watch_Dogs

Watch_Dogs
Platform: PC
Duration: 17 Hours

If you were to make a checklist of every AAA cliche and then made a game based on that list, the end result would be Watch_Dogs. Open world, side activities and collectibles, a dark and brooding protagonist, incredibly complex tasks reduced to a simple minigame, a mystery you have to solve, a betrayal from a close friend, it's all here. If I had to sum up the game in one word, it would be "safe". Don't get me wrong, in the end I did enjoy my time with the game. It was nothing groundbreaking or new, but I was not bored during the playthrough.

Aside from the blandness, I think the biggest thing that bugged me was the storyline. Well, maybe not the story it was trying to tell, but more of how it accomplished it.

Here's an example. Someone is kidnapped and you make a deal to trace an IP address to get them back. So when you try to trace the IP your base gets attacked, so you set off to find another base, which your only lead is a crazy hermit, who you have to beat at poker so he trusts you, so you can get the remote to a bridge, so you can go to the island, so you can turn on the generators, so that THEN you can finally have a new base. It has now been two hours and you have not even started the task yet. This is also not a one off scenario, the story does this CONSTANTLY. I think it was about 10 hours of gameplay before I finally found the kidnap victim because the game just kept adding more and more little tasks to complete before I could actually do something important.

The gun system could have used a little work as well. I completed about 90% of the fights in the game with a pistol. I don't think I ever even used a shotgun or submachine gun once because I know how to aim. Saints Row also suffers from this problem a bit.

Also, I get it Watch_Dogs, you have to set everything up for the sequel, but the ending didn't have to be a string of videos going "this group is still alive and is mad at you".