What We Played #52

It was back on 20th May last year that this new incarnation of Lee’s old What We’re Playing series made its debut with me at the helm. Initially we experimented with playing around with the title each week starting with What We Played… While PSN Was Down which is self-explanatory.

That was followed by the L.A. Noire-inspired What We Played… In 1947 (originally to have been titled What We pLAyed). The following week it was What We Played… Whilst Climbing Trains, a title it ‘earned’ merely because Blair and Josh had been playing Uncharted 2: Among Thieves.

You can see that things were getting a bit tenuous already so week 4’s post was simply What We Played #4 with us having settled on the simple change of tense from Lee’s original formula that we had morphed slightly to reflect what we’d played in the previous week instead of what we were playing at the time the post went live.

It’s remained pretty much the same ever since: a thousand-word summary, often with attempted humour, of what we’ve been playing for the past week.

It’s satisfying to see that the friendly discussions you all have down there in the comments generally ensure that the latest What We Played post sits among the list of the week’s most commented on posts on the front page. A personal thank you for your support, I do always read through all your comments, it’s why we can keep finding the enthusiasm to keep providing you with all the community-focused content here on TSA.

What I’d like you to think about while you read through what we’ve played below is whether there is anything about the format of What We Played that you would like changed or if you have any ideas for things we could incorporate to keep it fresh? Let me know in the comments.

This week What We Played belatedly welcomes Keith, who you’ll more likely know as the keyboard-sneeze-like kjkg. The fact it’s a belated welcome is admittedly my fault for repeatedly forgetting to ask him what he’s been playing.

And I almost regret asking already as he informs me that he has just got “a shiny platinum in Little Deviants” which isn’t as easy as it might first appear. Keith’s clearly been favouring his PS Vita over his PS3 as he’s been spoiling a good walk in Hot Shots Golf.

No friendly four ball for him though, it’s single-player only as the online pass for his American copy won’t work with his UK PSN account, something he politely describes as a “bit of a kicker”.

Maybe the resulting frustration is why he’s also been indulging in “small bouts” of Unit 13.

Aran has been saving most of the galaxy in Mass Effect 3. I say most of as he’s already lost one race, presumably not down the back of the sofa as I don’t think the game features the mini-galaxy from Men in Black [Here come the Men in Black, Galaxy defenders - Ed]. He’s also played the “amazing” Journey which has already grabbed one of his coveted game of the year nominations.

Trying to make an impact on his gaming backlog we find Jim, who’s started his assault with Majin and the Forsaken Kingdom. “At a glance it looks terrible”, he says, “like some last-gen relic”. First impressions didn’t hold though as he adds “it’s easily one of the best games I have played in a while”.

Aside from that he’s hopped back into Borderlands playing as Lilith. He’s finding that while the game “can feel a little too MMO-inspired at times” that’s not necessarily all bad as “the constant loot-hoarding” is keeping him engaged.

Awesomenauts, Salem and Little Deviants also get a mention and of the latter he comments “as a game which seems kid-oriented those ‘gold’ scores are absolutely brutal”. Maybe he should have a word with Keith?

Joseph is another who has been working through some older titles. He’s “nearing the end” of the 3DS’ Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones which has been “a pretty fun distraction”. He notes that any regrets he had about purchasing a 3DS have been vanquished.

The first Mass Effect is also seeing some slow but steady progress:

Having played about 10 hours I’m starting to see what the all the fuss is about. I have finally discovered choice based gameplay is a good thing, having shunned Western RPGs for their Japanese alternatives in the past. Looking forward to being rid of those damn Mako missions in the sequel though, goddamn.

Personally I quite enjoyed the Mako missions as I’ve mentioned before. My own gaming this week has seen the usual few hours of Skyrim and Gran Turismo 5. I’ve also realised that most weeks I’m forgetting to mention I’m still playing Star Wars: The Old Republic.

It gets a few hours a week but it’s odd that it’s almost become a kind of habit rather than a conscious decision to play. I’m not sure what that says about it or me. I’ve not played any of the multi-player missions recently so my Captain Jenn is still working her way through the single player content and having fun exploring the environments. There’s a particularly pesky datacron on Tattooine that’s proving something of a challenge at the moment.

My PS Vita has also seen a lot of gap-filling play this week with Treasures of Motezuma Blitz and a number of minis robbing all the ‘bigger’ games except for Ridge Racer of screen time. Old favourite Vector TD still gets a lot of play during the longer gaps that need filling.

In the shorter moments, often after I’ve temporarily run out of ‘lives’ in ToM Blitz, the brilliant Velocity gets some more attention. I’ve also been playing The Impossible Game which, while exceedingly difficult, never leaves you in any doubt about its fairness; failure is always your fault and you can see what you need to do to overcome it. It now occupies the same mental pigeon hole as Ikaruga and F-Zero.

Peter has been indulging in a spot of footy management with Football Manager 2012.

“It’s really all I’ve had time for because FM2012 fits into a very specific space in my life. It’s the game I play for five minutes between other PC-based work and then leave running for half an hour while I work before coming back, tweaking for a few minutes and going away again. I finished third with Leicester but started my second season badly, as I always seem to. So they sacked me after six games and I got a job with Brighton instead. I love FM.”

Trials Evolution has been keeping Blair entertained with its single player mode. That he finds the multiplayer “nothing special” is fortunate as his LIVE Gold subscription has just run out. Will he renew? He doesn’t say.

Portal 2’s new Perpetual Testing DLC “offering a good level editor and tons of content with new Cave Johnson announcements” is reportedly “great”. He also tells me that this week he finally got Minecraft and some time of not understanding what all the fuss was about.

That’s it from us but before I go here’s a quick reminder to get your TSA E3 Bingo 2012 entry in by the end of today if you haven’t already.

What’s on your own ‘played’ list this week?