My latest round with Game Pass Ultimate

 i just completed a 3-month Bing Rewards points subscription to Game Pass Ultimate. Still playing on my Xbox One, so some games i wanted to try were not playable (didn't really want to download stuff on my Series S).  i got close to the monthly internet cap as it was every month without those mammoth "next gen" downloads.

Strange that rewards gets me to play less games on Game Pass than i would without them. Why? The daily and monthly 5 pt reward for achievements. i basically hold off playing games as much to make that daily easier (to make the 500pt and 1,000pt monthly bonuses easier to get).

So what did i play/"beat" (considering that i mostly play at the easiest difficulty possible). 

• Ben 10: Power Trip: had to use internet for collectibles though.  There were some annoying segments.  i hate that fast character (hard to control) XLR8. More platforming than i would like
• My Friend Peppa Pig: (for the achievements)
• Dordogne (didn't get the CPR achievements, hate QTEs)
• Bluey The Video game (for the achievements)
• TOEM
• Sword and Fairy: Together Forever
• Persona 5 Tactica: though i hate tactics games
• Persona 3 Reload
• Venba

Played about 60 hours of Octopath Traveler 2 over a 10-day span. Kind of hate the gimmick bosses (especially Dulcinea). Beat half of the character story lines.  Every character 50+ (three are level 75) View some characters as useless.

Disappointments:

* Crash Bandicoot N Sane Trilogy: i suck at this. Spyro was the better series (not like i can do that much better anymore)

* Sponge Bob Square Pants: another annoyingly hard (for me) platformer.

* Rainbow Billy: The Curse of the Leviathan: feel dumber having played this game.  Too much feeling bs.

* Eiyuden Chronicles: Hundred Heroes: Massive problems with stick drift/dead zones made this game virtually unplayable.  Stupid minigames and other annoyances.

If you want to play a Suikoden style game wait for the Remaster March 6, 2025

* Diablo IV: a game i didn't actually play.  Why?  i'm not signing up to "battle pass" to play a game.  Also heard it was too much of an MMO type game (i want to play a game, not with others)

* Palworld: don't see the appeal

* Lies of P: getting one achievement was about all of that game i could stomach.

Started, But Didn't Play Enough to Ultimately Get a Feel:

* My Time at Sandrock: stuck when you need to create a crane or something and have to recycle components

* While the Iron's Hot

* Lil Gator Game

 

 

Been a while since my last post.

 Let's see what happened on the video game front...

*  i miss E3.  The hype, the announcements, the industry cohesiveness.  Now you have a bunch of disjointed videos.  MSFT is probably the closest to still have E3 type, but i didn't watch again this year. Only really interested in Fable anyway.

* Becoming more and more disenfranchised with what video games have seemingly turned into. Unfinished buggy messes at launch.  $70 for new games, how about no.  Constant updates are annoying.

* Got Game Pass again for 3 months (thanks severely nerfed Microsoft/Bing Rewards points).  Decided to get it to play Persona 3 Reload and Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes (hopefully, i'll get around to it before GP expires in September).  With Game Pass, it seems i play games more for the pittances i get for rewards than actually enjoying the games.

2023 Xbox Year in Review

 Long time, no post. Yes, still alive, technically. i finally got to 250,00 gamerscore.

The Xbox "Year in Review" came out (oot if you're Candian). What are my stats...

• Total Time: 920 hours.
• Total Game Played: 59
• Total Gamerscore increase: 8,040
• Total Achievements: 386
• Microsoft Reward Points: 176,728
• Top Game Play Month: January
• Top Genre: RPG (49%), Action/Adventure (29%), Puzzle/Trivia (23%), Simulation (1%), Other 1%

Top 5% time played, top 5% Gamerscore, Top 5% achievements unlocked

Most played: Puzzle Quest 3 - 189 hours

True Achievements Year in Review:

• Total Achievements: 391
• Games Played: 33
• Gamerscore: 8,170
• Most Played: Puzzle Quest 3: 180 hours

Why Do i Rarely Use My Series S

 i got the Series S near launch with stimulus money (i think). 

Why the Series S (i targeted that model specifically). Why? Well, i view 4k as a complete waste of resources - especially hard drive space. 2K (1080P) is a little bit of a waste. The fast boot and load times are nice when i use it. But i just don't use it that often. Why is that?

1) One of my biggest problems with the Series S is that there is no ability to select the Xbox One download - i know not an issue with future games (Series S/X only). With the tiny onboard storage, i would rather play the Xbox One version off an external hard drive than the Series Version.

1b) Small hard drive and big games mean i can fit few on the console. i like to have as many as possible and not switch between storage options. Why do i like to have games on the console? - i don't trust they'll always be online if i want to download them (had some issues with Xbox 360 downloaded items disappearing from the store, even when in my download history and download history not saying what the item was).

2) The room it is in has a really crappy wi-fi connection. Really slow download speeds. Doubt i'll be able to use game streaming for future games. 

Superficially it is white and everything else near the TV in my primary recreation area is black (TV edge, soundbar, Blu-ray player, Xbox, weak old Computer - should have never downgraded to Windows 10, i really liked Windows 8). Additionally, i'm swapping out HDMI cables as it is.

3) My Launch Xbox One still works fine - it is more convenient to use.

4) There really aren't that many Series S/X games that interest me, with rising retail prices and modern games, it'd be better for me to use Game Pass Ultimate when there are a few games i want to play. 

Also, games, you don't need to use every button on the controller. i hate using the bumpers and pressing thumb sticks (it feels so wrong).

Didn't watch MSFT presentation for first time in years

Long title rings true. Throught the years, i used to always watch the MSFT E3 show and then the streaming event near June. This was the first year in a long time (maybe Xbox 360 reveal) where i didn't watch.

Why? i guess because i don't really care. Modern games kind of suck - pretty disasters with potentially political undertones. Am i interested in Fable? Yes. Maybe some JRPGs. At some point i'll have to subscribe to Game Pass again.

i would be more interested in ports from PS1 and PS2 era consoles than anything new and shiny (with 100GB+ File sizes). Online multiplayer and games as a service, forget that (mostly).

Persona on Game Passs

Persona games. These games are kind of long (100 hrs 5, 65 hours 3, 4 about 35).  Story wise they are ok -some variant of teenage angst and identity issues.  Turn-based, nice.  However, sometimes the structure of the games and the feeling of bloat (especially around the "social" links) seems annoying.  The games are structured into days with mostly after school and evening activities.  Unfortunately, there is not a ton to do in the evenings.  Then there are forced events that don't always let you do what you want to on certain days. Also, very heavy on Japanese stuff that i was not familiar with (especially the questions).

Persona games have the same themes but tackle it a slightly different story way. Persona 3 had the dark hour and Tartarus. Persona 5 had stealing people's warped desires and Mementos.  Persona 4 has this weird TV thing when it rains at midnight (and going through the TV) - kind of more of a mystery (so far).

Checking in 2023 Edition

 So, what have i been doing in the video game playing space.

i got Game Pass for 3 months (November-February).  Have been playing the Persona games.  Beat (not 1,000ed) 3 and 5.  Playing 4. Backlog of games is still pretty long. Still playing on Xbox One - because it is easier and i don't want to deal with inflated game sizes on a tiny HD.

GamerScore up to 243K (will i hit 250k this year? Probably not, unless i get Game Pass again several times this year). Other (original account) 107,000 - mostly to get Xbox weekly rewards now.  Third gamertag, never really took off (too many games, streaming services, solstice item watching).