Recommend a PS4 game that I can actually play

The Game Room
21

That’s not an issue with Fallout 4. It uses the “VATS” system that slows everything down when you’re shooting at things and you literally pick what part of the enemy you’re shooting. It’s not a shooter like Halo where you’re manually aiming. There’s practically zero chance of the scenario you’re describing; the combat doesn’t work like that. And it has a good map to get around in with fast travel to landmarks.

Just to clarify; it might still not be your cup of tea but those concerns won’t apply to that game.

22

So, maybe a glance at something like Yakuza 0? It is a fighting game at its core, but I suck at those as well, dropping to Easy mode gives me enough of a challenge, and it’s got a lot of minigames that you can spend a lot of time on–karaoke, dancing, bowling, etc. All with an underlying theme of 80s Japan weirdness.

23

If you liked the fighting in Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate, I’d suggest Arkham Asylum/Arkham City which have a similar fighting system. But then again, they might have what you consider to be “very nasty enemies” – only you can be the judge.

24

Unless you really want to, like if you’re using a sniper rifle and use the scope to pick off the enemy before they know you’re there. The game has 12 quick access slots for your inventory so switching between your favorite weapons only takes a few button presses.

Stimpacks automatically default to one of those slots so healing yourself only takes one button press, if you don’t run out. There’s always food & water but those will also irradiate you unless used in a cooking recipe or you have a perk to negate the radiation.

25

True, you can go full first-person shooter mode if you want (and like you said it’s handy when sniping with a scope). But the game is designed so that you’re unlikely to ever get swarmed and overwhelmed due to VATS. Most of the times I died was because I made a bad choice of targets (how hard can that Deathclaw be?).

26

Yeah, that first one is a pain. The thing to do there is to not bother using the Minigun on the raiders; save that ammo for the beast to pop up. When you have its attention, jump off the roof, duck into the store across the street, and open up with the Minigun when it’s in the doorway. It’ll take swings at you but it can’t enter.

27

Yeah, that first Deathclaw is a pain, but really you only need to barely get by it, in the sense that any win is a win. As you play it gets easier. OTOH I think I enjoyed Fallout 4 because I grew up in Boston and I think they really captured it beautifully. As in, I broke into hysterical laughter when I found a traffic circle in the middle of nowhere. So you might not love it like I do. And VATS? It makes it so easy, it really feels like cheating.

Anyhoo, don’t dismiss Lego City Undercover either. You might watch a few “Let’s Play” videos to get a feel.

28

DKW, the game I’m playing now might actually be a good fit for you: Divinity: Original Sin 2. It’s a turn-based tactics game - you control a party of up to four characters, and during each discrete combat encounter, you move them around and select their actions one at a time. There is absolutely no reflex element involved, and while there’s a small RNG element it has very little impact on the outcomes. The emphasis of each combat is on using environment, positioning, and preparation to gain an advantage; things like getting enemies wet and then electrocuting them to exacerbate the damage are common. Best of all, though: the game has a range of difficulty options that go from hilariously easy to absurdly hard, with multiple grades in the middle, so you can fine tune the challenge level to your own preferences.

And it’s all wrapped around a pretty solid story, with compelling side stories and extra content depending on the characters you choose to bring along. The game isn’t a graphical marvel, but it does what it needs to do.

29

Have you considered or looked at Hitman (or Hitman 2)?

There’s a map.

There’s exploration, both of the map and the storylines “within” each map.

It’s not a first-person shooter. In fact, if you DO get into a gunfight, you’re probably doing it wrong.

It’s a game that encourages you to go slowly, sneak around, and make clever decisions.

There is a multiplayer mode (introduced in Hitman 2), but I’ve never played it - the main game is designed to be single-player.

There are 3 main difficulty levels, each with different amounts of guidance that help you learn and explore different ways to succeed on each map.

There are lots of “challenges” for each map, encouraging replayability of the maps.

I’m not a big video-game player - I’ve spent some time on Xbox looking for the “right” title, with the majority of current titles not appealing to me at all, but Hitman has been a real hit (pun intended) with me.

30

Based on this comment, I would recommend The Witness. I guarantee you will never die in a hail of gunfire. I don’t think there’s ever even time pressure. No survival mode with zombie hordes, no split second timing requirements. Just you and puzzles.

31

The Witness is a brilliant game, very Myst like but there is a timed sequence near the end that I can’t get past. There is also a fake ending that just sends you back to the beginning., and lot of hidden puzzles. The hidden ones are a different type than the obvious puzzles and so are easy to miss. Frankly, I think a lot of players never even find the hidden puzzles and give up after the fake ending. As far as that goes, there at least two fake endings but it doesn’t matter really because you have to go around a few times to see everything. Just be sure to keep notes. Lots and lots of notes.

As I say, I really enjoyed the game, but I can’t get to the ending

32

Wow, have you not played a JRPG in the last 15 years or something? Or just Final Fantasy games? This game is actually well crafted – most of your concerns don’t apply. :slight_smile:

Play Cold Steel. Just do it. It is FULL of maps. You will NEVER get lost. At WORST you will struggle a little bit figuring out “how do I lower this bridge here without cutting off my route to this place here” and frankly, it’s easy stuff. The world itself has all the fast travel you could ever want.

There’s very little randomness; Sure, there’s the odd status effect here and there, but assuming you’re not playing on an elevated difficulty, it’s never going to be something to worry about.

This is not an 80s adventure game. You’re not going to “get stuck” because you can’t figure out where to go next, and the difficulty progression is extremely level. Assuming you fight most of the monsters that present themselves for fighting, you’re not going to run into something that kills you off and “renders all your hard work totally wasted”. It’s very hard to lose any progress in this game.

Also, yes, it’s a PC title, but the PS4 version comes out right soon:

https://www.amazon.com/Legend-Heroes-Trails-Steel-Decisive-PlayStation/dp/B07J329666

Seriously. I will vouch for this one. If you somehow get lost or stuck, I will buy your copy of the game off you for full retail.

33

I honestly thought Skywatcher was being facetious about Fallout 4. Now I’m tempted to get it just to see if it’s really that good. :slight_smile: Thanks, everyone for being courteous and genuinely trying to help; that is damn rare where video games are concerned.

Arcite - I’ll send you a PM regarding the Assassin’s Creed games when I can (I’ll keep it as tight as possible). As for your list, I looked up a video for Little Big Planet 3 and…it looks like it could be fun. My main beef with the first game was that the character constantly slipped all over the damn place and made me give up in disgust after about 15 minutes. Judging from the video I watched, that doesn’t seem to be a problem anymore, and the player didn’t seem that good. One to watch out for. Thanks.

Storyteller0910 - From what I’ve seen…it looks nice. If I can manage the inventory and spells and whatnot, might be worth a shot.

Inner Stickler - It looks lovely, and after what happened to Minecraft I’m definitely open to a new wander-around-and-take-in-the-scenery game. I can’t ignore pmwgreen’s concerns, though. Maybe if I can get it really cheap.

yearofglad - I’m not too terrible with stealth mechanics in moderation (I thought LA Noire handled them well), but if they’re more or less mandatory for the whole game, I can see it getting frustrating in a big hurry. Probably too rich for my blood.

Airk - Lessee…Ultima 2, 3, 5, and 7, Final Fantasy 1, all three Bards Tales, the first Wizardry, something called “Ruffhouse RPG” (fangame, don’t bother looking for it), and I think one or two more that I’ve blocked from memory. I’ve seen contemporary JRPGs in Gamestop but I have no idea if any of them are any good (again, no one in my life who plays video games at all, and these don’t exactly get primetime ad space).

I can tell that you’re quite enthusiastic about this game. I’ll put it on my list, but I’m definitely going to do some more research first.

34

One of the latest JRPG series that’s gotten really good reviews is Ni no Kuni. I really need to get back to playing the first one. But if you’re into Japanese media, some the of companies and names involved will mean something. Animated sequences are by Studio Ghibli and the composer was Joe Hisaishi. It’s surprising to me that Level-5, which mostly does portable and mobile games, has done so well on the bigger consoles. I don’t know if Ni no Kuni is available on the PS4, as it’s really a PS3 game. But Ni no Kuni II came out last year for PS4. I’m pretty sure you don’t need to have played the first one.

35

Yeah, so… that stuff is all MAD OLD. Like, setting aside the fan game you mentioned, the newest game on that list came out in 1992. You’re doing the equivalent of saying “I’m worried about only having three lives and running into some fiendishly difficult sequence requiring pixel perfect control” in a modern platformer. That’s not really a thing anymore. Unless you’re playing a game that is specifically trying to give you some sort of “old school” feel and force you to draw your own maps on graph paper, you’re really worrying about problems that don’t exist in modern examples of the genre. The hardest number crunching you’re going to do is maybe deciding which weapon upgrades to purchase if you can’t afford them all, and there are no wrong answers. Everything has a map.

Go ahead and do some research. Watch a Let’s Play or whatever. You don’t need to worry about any of the stuff you’re stressing over.

Edit: With regard to the original Ni No Kuni, I’m not sure I can recommend it; The Ally AI in battle was extremely frustrating to us.

36

I have to agree with Inner Stickler - The Witness is a brilliant game. Very Myst-like, definitely.

If you don’t find the hidden puzzles, no bother - there are still TONS of puzzles that make up the main content of the game.

The timed bit near the end can definitely be challenging, but it’s also, well, just about at the end of the game, so if you’ve gotten that far, you’ve already gotten your money’s worth, I suspect.

The Witness was the best game I played in 2017, bar none.

37

I adored the first Ni No Kuni - it’s one of the very few games I’ve got 100% on myself. The second game (which does not feature any Studi Ghibli animation) just isn’t as good, although I found it entertaining enough to play through.

38

Indeed. DKW, everyone else got annoyed by those things too, so they stopped doing them.

39

I’m 50 with crappy coordination and have something like 2500 hours in the PC version.

40

Agree with this. Back in the NES days, there were games so difficult I couldn’t even reach the final boss, let alone beat him (Castlevania and Ninja Gaiden come to mind) and I was 12-13 at the time. Now I’m in my early forties, and there isn’t a single game I listed upthread that I found too difficult.