hisbrokenbutterfly

I recently reinstalled this gorgeous game in order to play its seven DLC stories that I already had aquired but had forgotten about them completely. They turned out to be absolutely wonderful, but in the process I realized that although I own the game since many years now, I had never attempted to play it in its hardest difficulty level, which is Deadly Obsession. In reality, Deadly Obsession is not exactly a difficutly level. If you have played the game in its standard hardest mode, One With the Jungle, you already have mastered its most difficult version. Deadly Obsession is essentialy the One With the Jungle difficulty minus the automatic checkpoints. You can only save on base camps, and thankfully the game offers a few free checkpoints during sequences that are too extended or too demanding, namely:  -During the prologue, due to the lack of base camps, there is one free checkpoint just before you meet the local archaeologist outside the dig site. -Again during the prologue, the...

  The last playthrough in my Tomb Raider Nostalgia Series is that of the very first game, both of the classics and the series as a whole. The original Tomb Raider game is a pure vintage gem with so much sentimental value that it makes up for the fuss that you have to go through in order to decently run and record it on a modern computer system.  The resolution is a bit low in the main game, but everything is smooth and running well in Unfinished Business, the Gold expansion, which, by the way, is one of the two classic Tomb Raiders that I have played less (along with The Lost Artifact, as I mentioned in my Tomb Raider III report). Now playing UB again, I remembered why: although it is beautiful visually and very elaborate as far as gameplay and puzzles are concerned, I soon got fed up with those mutant mummies with their annoying (insert non-decent characterization here) screeching noises. Regardless, the Gold expansion, like the main game, is a lovely game, and very interesti...

Next up in my Tomb Raider Nostalgia Playthrough Series is Tomb Raider 3, the third installment of the classics. There were quite a few innovations in this game compared the to the first and the second, the most memorable being the fact that, after the first section was completed, you could play the subsequent three adventures in any order you wanted. Like in Tomb Raider 2, a brief but fabulous bonus level would unlock if you completed the game with all secrets found. Since these playthroughs are going to be a one-time thing - that is, I will probably won't be replaying the classic Tomb Raiders in full, any time soon at least - I am trying to cover as much stuff as possible. Random kills or pickups that have no interest or are simply in the regular path, may be left behind, but I do find all the secrets and if there is exploration involved (including pickups) in areas that are optional, I go for them as well. In this game in particular, I am referring to the legendary River Ganges l...

Going on with my Tomb Raider Nostalgia Playthrough Series, I am now playing Tomb Raider: Chronicles, the fifth game of the classics. I remembered Chronicles fondly, and when I started to play it again after so many years I realized why, but then I got to the notorious VCI section and everything got a bit messy. The last three levels of the game are among the best of the classic Tomb Raiders, and maybe the most original and innovative compared to the rest of the series of that era, but at the same time they are so hard and so incredibly buggy that eventually the VCI adventure turns into an assemblage that could only be compared to Stefano Valentini's morbid creations: on the one hand the bugs can be hellish; from frustrating to literally game-stopping. Although sometimes said bugs may also have fortunate outcomes: as you will see in my video, at some point I tried to make Lara stealthily neutralize a guard, which she refused to do; at that point, the guard surprisingly turned around...

My second favorite from the classic Tomb Raiders after the Last Revelation, and the second that am playing in my Tomb Raider Nostalgia Playthrough Series, had always been Tomb Raider II, what with its emblematic Venetian environments and music, its complex puzzles and sceneries and its unforgettable arch-enemy Marco Bartoli. Like with my Last Revelation playthrough (you can read the report and a brief intro for this series of playthroughs here ), I play mostly from memory, and for this reason I am not getting all pickups or kills, but I do go and find all the secrets in every level, and if a pickup is tricky or challenging, I do go for it (like the legendary Uzis in the first level of The Golden Mask expansion). Again the run is split in parts. Main game: Part 1 includes The Great Wall intro and the Venice levels: Venice, Bartoli's Hideout, Opera House. Part 2 I call it The Deep Sea, and it includes the levels that take place at the rig and on the Maria Doria shipwreck, namely: Of...

  I decided to replay the classic Tomb Raider games, in a series which I am calling "Tomb Raider Nostalgia Playthrough Series". By the term "classic Tomb Raiders", I refer to the first five Tomb Raider games (1-5) and their Gold expansions or add-on levels, that were released from 1996 to 2000. The classic Tomb Raiders were among the very first video games that I played many years ago and the first of the Action/Adventure genre that I ever had the chance to know. I was an avid Tomb Raider player back then, having even developed a certain virtuosity, since I participated in extra hardcore challenges set around the "No Damage + Pistols Only" rule which, at times, proved to be extremely difficult. Since then, many things have changed, including the always evolving PC systems due to which running those old games now can be a real pain. The graphics look stretchy, the resolutions look weird and it's almost impossible to record the included FMV's the st...

This playthrough is a new and improved "No Merchant" gameplay of Resident Evil 4 in Professional difficulty, New Game, this time with the addition of the "No Damage" rule. A "No Merchant" playthrough of Resident Evil 4 means that you completely ignore the merchant throughout the whole game, which means that not only you cannot upgrade your weapons and your attache case at his "store", but moreover - and most importantly - you cannot buy any other guns from him. Plainly put, you are limited to your default inventory as is, plus the very few extra weapons that you come across in the game itself, namely the Shotgun (chapter 1-1), the Broken Butterfly (chapter 4-1) and the two Rocket Launchers (chapter 3-3 and Final chapter). The "No Damage" part of course consists in sustaining no injury at all. I saved a lot in this playthrough, and I also had to reload a lot. Sometimes because Leon would get hit, but most of the times because I thought I...

This is my Inferno playthrough of Resident Evil 3 Remake, without taking damage and without using any shop items. It is the most challenging mode of the game, this time in its raw edition, as I am not making use of any perks that would make the gameplay slightly easier. Specifically, I am using the default inventory for Jill and Carlos, and I pick the other items as they normally appear in the game. Inferno is several scales higher than Nightmare; not only are the enemies much tougher, but also the amount of bullets that you can pick up or craft is minimal. There are no automated checkpoints to aid you and several typewriters are absent, which means that you are required to go through whole areas without being able to manually save at all. My first Inferno run was with a few shop items included, but even then it was tough as Hell. After beating Nightmare without perks , however, I thought I'd also give raw Inferno a try. In practice, it is not as bad as it may seem or sound, given...

A playthrough of RE3 Remake in Nightmare difficulty. I am not taking any damage and I am not using any coins or infinite weapons. I do use a few other shop items, specifically: the Samurai Edge handgun and the Hot Dogger knife, the bonus pouches, the extra Lockpick and Bolt Cutters and the Crafting Companion. In Nightmare, the game generously gives you the Magnum from the beginning, as well as one extra inventory pouch The Samurai Edge handgun is stronger and more stable, so I do prefer it over the default one. The Hot Dogger is of course stronger than the standard knife, but most of all it has this impressive burning effect. I use the bonus pouches so as to have more space, since I take the bonus Lockpick and Bolt Cutters from the item box at the station, so as to not have to backtrack to every locked place with zombies and the Nemesis breathing down my neck (grenades are unable to stun the Nemesis in this mode, so I prefer to run and dodge while it's chasing me). The Crafting Com...

Tell Me Why is the latest episodic game by Dontnod, the team that created the Life Is Strange games. This time, the story revolves around two siblings, Alyson and Tyler Ronan, who grew up separated from each other for ten years (from ages 11 to 21) after Tyler was accused of murdering his mother in self-defence. The catch in the story is the fact that Tyler is a transgender boy, something that, back then, seems to have been what caused their mother's supposed attack against him resulting in her murder. When the siblings are reunited and return to their home town in order to sell their family house, they make discoveries that shed new light to the events of the past, and moreover we learn that things did not exactly happen like Alyson and Tyler said. If you expect something along the lines of the Life Is Strange games, you may find elements that relate to them, but you may also feel slightly disappointed. There is a metaphysical element, but in a very light version, and the story, a...