“Whatcha Playin’, Pixels?” – #018

A weekly roundup of games enjoyed by the writers of The Pixels

Is it just me, or did this week fly by at Sonic speed? How is it already Friday?? We at The Pixels can’t explain how a week can be over quickly. But, the one thing we can explain well is the games we played this week! Check out what our writers have been up to!

This week has been a bit of an eventful week, but gaming-wise, I’ve accomplished the goal of beating Tales of Arise. Overall, I really enjoyed the game, and especially the characters and interactions as per the highlight of the Tales Of series for me. Tales of Arise seems like a different direction for the series from what I hear as the story is a bit darker than other entries, the gameplay is the best I’ve seen from Tales (I’ve only really experienced two games), and the graphics seem a bit more detailed though they always keep the weebish characteristics. The main issues I have with the game are some pacing issues here and there and that Cure Points (CP) system. CP made the game a bit difficult as you can only heal as long as you have CP. You don’t start out with a lot but it’s a stat that encompasses the whole party and not just a single member. The beginning of the game seemed like it was the most difficult for me, with many challenges along the way. However, by the time I got my CP to 400, the difficulty I had dropped off to fights becoming fairly easy as long as I had enough points. It is difficult to survive if the party doesn’t have the CP to support it. Regardless of how I feel about CP, I still think the gameplay is stellar, but I hope that CP doesn’t make a return in the next game.

Tales of Arise took months for me to beat so I can’t lie if I wanted to beat it just to move on by the time I’ve finished it this week. Regardless, I really appreciate how moving the cast is. The ending was absolutely stellar!

~Zernius

I laid the capstone on Dragon Quest Builders 2 this week, which had some surprisingly compelling story beats in it. The building and automating mechanics kept me coming back for more, and while I had all kinds of visions of grandeur for constructing my own replicas of the tower from Shadow of the Colossus, Peach’s castle from Super Mario 64, and the Millennial Fair from Chrono Trigger, I think it’s best I set it aside for now and remain content with the fortress I built with the residents of Moonbrooke. There are many fish still to catch! The question is what to start next? I think it’ll be Dragon Quest XI, finally. Best to keep riding this Dragon Quest high… either that or play Minecraft for the first time for more building fun.

~Red

Not a lot on my plate this week. I gave Eiyuden Chronicle Rising a try on stream last week and enjoyed it so far. It’s kinda reminiscent of Odin Sphere or Dragon’s Crown with some city-building elements you often see in mobile games (bring X number of Y item and we’ll build or improve this specific building.) My only complaint was that a cutscene froze on me, but I was able to skip it and now I have no idea why this kangaroo man is in my party. Yes, there’s a kangaroo man. His name’s Garoo. You all see him too, right?

The other active game on my list is Hob, which also has had some cutscene issues. Guess that’s my luck this week! 

Look at him, t-posing at me. He’s supposed to be throwing one little guy like the dude on the ground and eating another, but instead, he popped into being just like this, the one he threw mysteriously floated into the air and got tossed, and the one he ate just kinda exploded in midair, and he continued to stand there like this. I would’ve whooped him if I’d been able to move, but at that point, the cutscene fell into idling and I had to force shutdown.

Glitches aside, I’m having fun with it. The exploration is incredibly satisfying, and the world is beautiful. Lots of cute, harmless critters mixed in with enemies of various sizes succeed in making the world feel alive. There are lots of looking at the map to try and figure out the path to the next area, but interactables are usually clearly indicated. It’s well designed, just kinda glitchy, which probably makes speedruns fun to watch!

~Maggie M

As a huge fan of Salt & Sanctuary, and 2D Souls-likes in general, I felt it was my duty to check out the newly released sequel Salt & Sacrifice this week. I know I’ve been Mr. Grumpy these past few weeks with my criticisms on here but I was fully prepared for this to be the game to put a smile back on my face. It… almost did.

I could cope with the game splitting everything into Demon’s Souls-esque smaller worlds connected by a hub, and the silly amount of grinding with very little explanation of the game’s mechanics. What I couldn’t deal with were the fights against (sorry!) The Mages. These guys were accessed via Monster Hunter-style menus, then ran off playing a level-wide game of hide and seek before they even considered letting you fight them. Honestly, if there’s one thing I don’t have patience for it’s hide and seek quests… Breath of Fire III, Majora’s Mask, and plenty of others I am sure… I’m looking at all of you!

Sadly this drained my patience very quickly and upon a number of deaths trying to chase an irritating ice-magic chap around and around, I found myself exasperated. Shame, because Salt & Sacrifice is a game I was really looking forward to.

~TeeBee

Being hard at work with my art for this summer’s festivals and sales, my gaming is mostly restricted to late-night sessions. So, in the witching hours, I have been continuing my ruthless playthrough of Wolfenstein: The New Order. I have played very few FPS games that weave a narrative into the core gameplay of a title quite like this one does. Captain Blazkowicz is everything that a great action hero needs to be, and more. Moving through the decimated European countryside of a world now under Nazi control, you get to listen to Blazkowicz’s thoughts and connect with his feelings. It is a very brutal game, but if you are able to make it through the intense firefights, then you will come face to face with a grand tale of heroism, sacrifice, and retribution. 

My personal taste for hot indie titles has led me to start playing Skul: The Hero Slayer, an “8-bit” roguelite with gameplay similar to that of Dead Cells. We often think of the armies of the undead as being bad guys, but what if one were to flip that narrative around? In this game, you play as a newly resurrected skeleton named Skul. Though Skul is small, he is the only one still around who can slip into the human’s stronghold and rescue his sovereign ruler, The Demon King. When Skul dies, he goes back to the Demon King’s palace, where he is able to upgrade his battle stats and even receive new heads for the next run. That’s right, Skul can place new heads on his body, thus giving him new abilities and moves. Much like in other roguelites, there is permadeath, but the narrative will continue and change depending on who Skul meets on his journey and where he dies. If you like the roguelite genre and fast-paced platformer action, then I highly recommend trying this game. It is currently free on Xbox Game Pass.

~Sommerfeldt

Hi everyone, it’s me again! This week I’ve been tinkering with Elden Ring still (slowly but surely getting better at it) and have been accused of turning a bit evil recently in DayZ (people don’t like it when you turn cannibal as a lifestyle decision, apparently!)

I’ve also reinstalled Mafia 3 which, despite being a very slow burner of a game, has one of the best stories I’ve ever encountered in a video game!

Lovely!

~Bizarro

I did a quick stream of Phantasy Star IV on Sunday night, mainly because I spent the day at my parents’ place and didn’t get back home until later that evening. After going through my initial run of Nurvus, I realize that I have some grinding to do. 

Oracle of Ages is coming along nicely! I had a bit of a brainfart in Dungeon 7 on the Tuesday stream. In the end, I figured out exactly where I needed to go to grab the boss key, take on the jellyfish boss and grab Essence #7! After that, I picked up a few items I missed earlier and then started my journey to the 8th dungeon – the Ancient Tomb. 

For such a large dungeon, Thursday’s stream only took me roughly an hour to clear it! I was surprised that I was able to blow through Ancient Tomb so quickly, but, gotta go fast, amirite? Now, I can wrap up the rest of the game and start Oracle of Seasons!

Off-stream, I took a break from CrossCode – I have the DLC to start playing for it. Instead, I switched over to The World Ends With You for the Nintendo DS, in preparation to play NEO: The World Ends With You. I had a complete save file, including incredibly strong pins and abilities, that I was going to use to refresh myself on the story. Imagine my surprise when I started up the game to see my entire save file was corrupted and deleted!!! Even though I was a bit disappointed, I decided to power through and play the original game from the beginning.

~Ryan C

So, what were you playing this week?

Ryan Cheddi – our friendly, neighbourhood caffeine addict – is a man of many talents: an engineer, a gaming historian, a fiction writer and a streamer. He is also a self-avowed Sonic the Hedgehog fan. You can check out his cool beans at his site – Games with Coffee – or find him on Twitter as @GameswCoffee, and Instagram as @games_with_coffee. He streams on Twitch, also as GamesWithCoffee.