PixlBit

I got another day, maybe, but I got a weird work schedule again this week and so am here recalling the day and half I spent so far.

I have to say, I'm tiring of my plan right now. I basically shelved it except for the library rental I'm about to get (Mario & Luigi: Brotherhood). I started a list of most recent games I really want to play, and just by chance, landed on a turn-based RPG; and not only that, a remaster of a 1991 Japanese only boardgame/rpg mashup, Sugoro Quest: Dice Heroes. 

It was the nice price of $6 on Xbox this week, and so I scarfed it up. I was initially miffed at it because the dice rolls seem highly adjusted to make you play longer; that is, they go against you at just the wrong time to make you lose and have to restart an area. But I learned some things they don't clearly tell you about as I played, and it suddenly got a little less unfair. It is still quite annoying at times though. 

This is a mashup that reminds me of the Culdcept series. You roll the dice to move along a path like a board game and land on squares that give you a battle, a rest, or some dialog to move the story along. . . oh, and upgrades and curses. . . and probably other things when I get past the second stage. 

You pick from four characters, equip him/her and start a mission which ends in a boss fight, or two. Battles are turn-based and involve yourself and a dice master whom you can call into battle to roll the dice for you (I learned this later on as I had no idea what the "call" function was). A roll of one gives you a terrible dice master who may knock himself on the head by accident or just run from the battle. A six gives you a master that may award you health or other bonuses. The enemy does the same, though, and can knock you flat with a critical, lower you power dice rating, or other dread things I haven't come across yet. 

Dice determine the success of an attack like initiative or damage dice in a DnD game. If you tie, another round of dice is rolled until there is a winner. This creates a combo attack that can do a lot of damage. Also, the farther appart the dice rolls are, the more damage you do, like a 4 against a 1 gives you 4x damage, or visa-versa.

I did fine as the Fighter, won the first mission, but in the second got beat by the final boss several times. The second time almost made me want to quit because I prepped for it so hard, and was so at a large avantage to the boss (my health was 400 to the boss' 150) that I thought I couldn't lose even with bad dice rolls. Well, I was wrong. The battle went so against me, I temporarily quit the game. My dice master knocked himself out on the first roll, I lost almost every single dice roll after that and had my power dice lowered for both my dice master and myself. My 400 HP became nothing in short order while I did only 75 damage to the boss. This seemed so fixed and absurd to me. 

But I dove back in with a new character, The Dwarf, and had a lot more success with him. Maybe it was that I learned the dice master strategy and used it on every battle, I don't know. But, when I got to that second stage boss with almost the same advantage I had with my fighter, I got beat again by impossibly bad dice rolls. I just laughed this time and prepared to try again. 

The game is growing on me despite its sometimes unfair dice rolls, much like Culdcept did, which has the same problem with crazy comebacks and obviously loaded dice. I like it and can't stop thinking about it now. 

The Dumb Stuff I Play During Lunch Breaks

Clicker Heroes - I'm still clickin' away hoping to get enough gems for my first Ascention. Ascending restarts everything but gives you Hero Stones you can spend to buy more powerful battlers. It's a bit like how Grim Idle works. My friend is way ahead of me, but he bought some gems with real money, so that's not the same thing. I haven't spent a dime. 

Lego Marvel Super Heroes - Clicker Heroes isn't exactly dropping achievements for me right now, and I'm getting behind my friends, and so I loaded up some mostly easy games from my backlog on Xbox. I've previously played through the story of this game, but now I'm hunting down collectibles. I took some time to reaquaint myself with the location of the upgrade store and all the many powers you can weild to solve puzzles, but I think I'm back in the groove again. There is quite the open world New York City to tool around in and replays of all the story missions. Plenty to do here. I'm at about 1/3 complete so far. 

Maybe I play some tomorrow, but maybe not. I suppose I'll update on Sat if I get a chance.