Topic: Xbox Games You've Recently Beat

@Balta666 Congrats on finishing Lost Odyssey! Sounds like it was a decent experience, at least later on when the game opens up more. But it also sounds like it suffers from a lot of things that old JRPGs tend to suffer from and that's rather disappointing.

I was going to ask if the game was hard, but from the way you described the ending, it doesn't seem like the difficulty was much of an issue for you. I do have to ask, did you grind a lot in this game or did you level up naturally throughout your playthrough?

@LtSarge the game is hard at points but I would say more in the biggining when you don't have many options (also on disc 3 for similar reasons). I would not say I had to grind per se but that I did not realize a dungeon I was having troubles was a side quest and where I leveled up almost 20 levels (and abilities) just to get the boss and loosing hard, when I decided to go somewhere instead I was going to the end game and I was finishing enemies in one turn instead.

Just finished Forza Motorsport 6 on Xbox One. I think this game really solidified my fondness for the Forza Motorsport series and just racing sims in general. It's definitely the best game in the series so far, offering a large amount of tracks (both new and old ones), tons of cars and a great career mode which doesn't overstay its welcome. While Motorsport 3 and 4 were great, their career mode would become incredible repetitive as you had to do e.g. 20 races in order to finish one "season" out of like ten. In FM6, the career mode was fairly lengthy (took me about 25 hours to finish) but it never became repetitive as there were 15 series with 4-6 races in each series. Perfect length if you ask me. Not to mention there were fun showcase events you could do on the side, such as driving into bowling pins in order to score high, or try to pass as many cars as you can, or drive in between a set amount of cones. In other words, the game had great variety and I came away very satisfied by it.

@LtSarge Funnily enough i've recently gone back to some older FM titles that are on my tag. Fully finished up FM5 recently and just today i finished up FM2 with the full 1000G unlocked (can't do the same on FM5 unfortunately due to server issues regarding tunes/designs etc)

I'll be moving on to FM3 soon too but that's a grind. I had completed a lot of the career (4 seasons) years ago but no longer have that save file so will be starting a new career and doing gold in all events at some point

Hoping to get this all done and have a bit of a gap before the next entry in the series which may be later this year (but thinking more likely 2023)

@VOODOO85 That's very impressive, I would never have the patience to do all of that. I only strive towards completing the career mode in each game. FM5 in particular is very grindy.

I still have FM7 and also Horizon 4 left to play. But I did go through some storage boxes and found my copies of the first Forza Motorsport on the original Xbox as well as Project Gotham Racing 1-4. So I still have plenty of racing games on Xbox to play.

I have finished the story of cyberpunk 4 times with 3 different consequences (the last I wss expecting something different but it did not happen). I still have some side quests and gigs but for the most part I am done. The game is bloody fantastic altough it has still some bugs (major one in my run was a guy I was supposed to fight but it was knocked down on the floor while talking and when the battle was supposed to start I could not hit. Had to reload. Had also some hilarious like cars in front of me smashing against barreira and flying or boobs jigling like crazy for a second on a helicopter Ride). It is extremily linear with almost no consequences to your actions but that is not a problem to me as the story and characters are interesting and all side quest are worth it. it is a shame the state the game was released but CDPR still knows how to build great game!

@Balta666 Glad you enjoyed Cyberpunk 2077! I agree with you that, even though some bugs still persist, it's a really fantastic game. I actually played it not long after launch on a Series S and loved it so very excited to play it again with the next gen patch.

It's a shame that it will be remembered for the memes because I think the storytelling is nearly unrivalled and I felt incredibly connected to both the world and the characters. Hacking/stealth felt a little OP but I never found the combat to be a drag. And I think some of the endings are wonderful – especially the Arasaka ending (won't spoil it but it was my personal favourite).

I recently finished Lost Judgement, which I was a massive fan of. I love RGG games in general but I felt this one was the most generous and polished yet and sits behind Like A Dragon as my 2nd favourite game from the studio. The combat was much improved, Kamurocho and Ijincho were a joy to explore and I felt incredibly gripped by the story + the bravery of some of the subject matter RGG tackled.

I will say that the game suffered a bit from being too much of a good thing... to complete the School Stories you have to grind mini-games and whilst some are great fun, one or two were honestly pretty boring. RGG have never been known for brevity but I do think they went a little overboard this time round! I'd still really recommend it and I enjoyed it even more than Judgement – which I loved.

Now, back to Elden Ring...

Have great weekends all!

@voxshrapnel if I had to choose a favourite ending I would say the one Johnny takes the ride but to be fair i would prefer that the game had a proper happy ending.

From the Yakuza games I have finished zero and tried a bit of like a dragon but can say I am not a fan of the series and most likely won't play any more of it. I found them to be way to silly for my taste and even though some characters are definitely interesting overall I was bored a lot most of the time.

P.s: good Luck on elden ring. It is a game I won't pay 70€ but I will get into at some point for sure

Just finished The Artful Escape and i didn't find it as good as i'd hoped. It's a beautiful game from an aesthetic point of view and i liked the music in the game too (but more on that later) but the actual gameplay was lacking for me

The platforming elements would elicit some enjoyable moments at times but there were too few of these times for me and i would have liked them to be a little more challenging and make up more of the game

There are music based levels in Rayman Legends which are great in my opinion where the music matches up to the platforming and i would have liked Artful Escape to make use of a similar mechanic too, especially with music being such a big part of the game - instead the guitar riffs are great sounding but become a bit of a non-factor very quickly and i'd find myself never really riffing when walking / running / jumping around

It's on Gamepass so worth a try for anybody out there but it's one i would have regretted buying unless for a nominal amount - anything over £5 and i'd have said it wasn't worth it

I resumed my Guardians of the Galaxy playthrough and beat the game. At first, I didn't like the incessant chattering and the confusing gameplay and controls but the more I played it, the more I liked it. You reach a point when you naturally assess every new situation, considering the abilities of the team that you become familiarised with. Controls start to make sense and upgrades make finding collectibles and exploration more fun. Battles are like in Xenoblade Chronicles, chaotic but with underlying strategy. Reading the compendium is necessary because even if you have watched the films, there are lots of new things in the video game, most of them from the comics. So, at first, I didn't like it very much but then I loved the game and I think it deserves a solid 9/10.

@VOODOO85 the artful escape is most definitely intended to be played while under the influence of drugs...psychedelic ones specifically. Very goergus game and good tunes but it's meant to be enjoyed with some heightened senses. On it's own it's pretty meh.

@Banjo- the guys/gals who wrote the script for Guardians need to be brought into the Disney fold as this could have been a great movie or animated series. The gameplay killed the game a lot for me but story was phenomenal. 9/10 story, overall game was like 6/10 for me.

@Krzzystuff The story and the script are awesome although a little less of dialogue would have been better. Drax is the highlight.

@Banjo- Drax is definitely awesome.

I just finished my second The Evil Within playthrough. When you start playing you still feel the frame rate a little bit bumpy sometimes but then you somehow get used to and it seems smoother than it actually is. I enjoyed The Evil Within more this time. The attention to detail is impressive: nurse's phrases depend on the situation, regular items placed in creative ways, every handcrafted scene, excellent graphics design, addictive upgrades... Artistically, it's a masterpiece and the gameplay is brilliant, what else do you want from a game? The story is weird but it's well crafted. The sound is great as expected. This Shinji Mikami's work is very underrated because it's one of the best "Resident Evil" games I've played (spoiler: I've played them all). 9/10. I will do my second The Evil Within 2 playthrough soon. It was not directed by Shinji but I loved it, too. Just not as spooky and artistic as the first game.

@Banjo- I have yet to play Evil Within. You say it is like the RE games. Im not a big fan of those, especially the parts where one of the "baddies" is following you and you have to solve puzzles while they are following you, that gives me way to much stress. Are there also parts like that in Evil Within? Or is it more like RE with limited ammo and puzzles and such?
I played Ghostwire Tokyo earlier this year and absolutely loved that game and i understand Evil Within is nothing like it but since it was the same maker it peaked my interest. But as i said some horror games give me to much stress, which takes away from my enjoyment, so thats why im asking this to know if i should skip it or i can actually play it.

@Lavalera I'll definitely play Ghostwire Tokyo when it reaches Xbox. The Evil Within is like a combination of Resident Evil 2, 3 and 4. It has a lot of variety, streets, buildings, "zombies" and yes, there are two famous characters that chase you during certain occasions. However, those sections are quite linear and somewhat scripted. For instance, you have to slow him/her down during the first part using the environment or your weapons and during the second part you have to "finish" him/her off.

There is no map and that usually gives me trouble as I get lost easily in real life and in video games but, in this case, the handcrafted environments make you see where you are and the progression is more or less linear so I didn't miss a map 99% of the time. There is one section where you have to close some valves down and I didn't find the exit at first while being chased but then I realised it was basically next to the last checkpoint and the valve handle. Checkpoints are placed in a player-friendly way, they are generous during the most difficult segments. I didn't have so many issues with the camera this time and the game is certainly smoother on Series S/X.

The thing that impressed me the most is the artistic part. This is one of those horror games that makes me feel it's "real" because of the variety and how well crafted the environments are from start to end. There is a lot of freedom in how you manage enemies, too. Since Tango is part of Xbox Game Studios now, you can play these games on Game Pass. I think that you should play in the easiest difficulty level the first time and look for green gel for upgrades (also available in New Game Plus). Green gel is easy to find because the maps are easy to navigate. Other tips I can give you is use the melee button to break boxes and to stomp on enemies and use matches when more than one enemy is falling. When you find an explosive, duck and try to disable it by pressing the A button just before the hand reaches the blue part. When you open a chest and see an explosive inside, don't open the chest totally and you can still get what's inside.

There are many ways to deal with enemies. You can stealth kill many enemies from behind but you have to turn your lantern off first. Bottles can stagger enemies and then you choose what to do with them. Fire is usually effective, you can set fat enemies in fire with a crossbow bolt. Why fat enemies? Because they absorb more bullets before dying. The fire bolt is a lot of fun to use because it shoots fire rays once attached to an enemy. You can shoot enemies in the leg and when they fall you can use a match to ignite them. You can shoot an explosive bolt when you see many enemies together. The rifle and the shotgun are both very useful for long and short distances respectively and, like in Resident Evil, you'll find a Magnum for making bosses easier.

@Banjo- thank you very much for the answer m8, really appreciate it. Good to hear there is a difficulty slider that is something that helps me try out games I normally wouldn't. I'll put it on my play later list on gamepass now and see when I have time to play. Have such a huge backlog to go through both in and outside of gamepass, sometimes it's hard to chose what to play next haha

@Lavalera I know what you mean, my backlog of Game Pass and purchased games is also huge 😁 but, for some reason, I still enjoy a lot my playthroughs of certain games like Resident Evil, The Evil Within, Project Zero... I'm glad I helped you! 👍

Not posted in this thread for a while. But a couple of days ago I completed Wolfenstein: The New Order and wow I loved it. This was 2 years after beating the Old Blood. I played on one of the easiest difficulties which made it super fun to just blast through (literally). If you turn up the difficulty it becomes much more of a stealth game (not my sort of thing). Anyway I moved swiftly on to The New Colossus now which is just as awesome so far. Highly recommend these - and I have no love of Wolfenstein prior to this rebooted series really (verrrrry slight nostalgia for 3D but not played any others).