Finished Heavy Rain

Hi everyone,

We just finished our second night of Heavy Rain, finishing the story at around 1 AM, and needless to say, I enjoyed the second half of the game a lot more than the first half, since there was seemingly less need for the motion controls, since Heavy Rain was designed with the PlayStation Move controller in mind. Now we ended up saving Shaun and keeping three of the characters alive when we finished the story at 1 AM and the initial credits rolled (Jayden, Ethan and Scott), with Madison biting it when I made a wrong choice in the burning apartment. At that point we had 24 trophies unlocked.

Then I discovered we could replay chapters specifically, and since Madison in the apartment is the next to last chapter of the game, we re did it and went for the creative Indiana Jones solution (as in get in the fridge), which led to her telling Ethan were Shaun was leading to getting all four main characters to the ending in one piece, which also made the final chapter and sequence of events a lot more wild with all the cuts back and forth between Ethan, Jayden and Madison. Also meant we got the super happy ending.

Now going into it, I was aware of that Scott was the true villain, but there was certainly a lot of reasons to believe he wasn't it... unless one forgets that the box Ethan gets has the same items that Scott is picking up at various locations.

Will I want to play this again? Yes, but probably to go for the Perfect Crime ending, which would mean letting various things happen that I avoided in this play through. We'll save that for next year (assuming I can keep my head above water, find a consistent part time job and don't end up destitute which would please my father immensely)

I'll have a video commentary review on my YouTube channel in a few weeks, since I want to get into the habit of talking about games I finish as part of a casual review series.

Heavy Rain Trophies

• Fugitive: Fugitive - Manage to escape Blake in the subway station
• Detox: Jayden Blues - Resist Triptocaine
• I'm not a Killer!: The Shark - Do not kill the Drug Dealer
• Smart Girl: The Doc - Do not drink the Doc's beverage
• Queen of Ropes: The Doc - Escape before the Doc returns
• The Chef: Eureka - Prepare a good omelette on time
• Pride Saved: Sexy Girl - Take off no more than one item of clothing during the strip-tease
• Lover Boy: On the Loose - Forgive Madison
• Escape Master: On the Loose - Escape the police at the motel
• Kind Hearted: Face to Face - Give Kramer his medicine
• Invincible Scott: Face to Face - Do not get shot in Kramer's villa
• Nerd: Find all clues using ARI (Crime scene + Mad Jack + Fish tank) and find the Origami Killer
• Saved the Kid: Save Shaun
• HEAVY RAIN™ Hero: Finish HEAVY RAIN™
• Simple Mind: The Old Warehouse - Save the Origami Killer before he falls, with Jayden or Madison
• Cold as Ice: Killer's Place - Survive the explosion by hiding in the fridge
• Four Heroes: Complete the story with four characters alive

For the raid we dropped in on zonesama who was playing We Love Katamari Reroll + Royal Reverie over at twitch.tv/zonesama, for those who don't know zonesama is best known for making certain Flash animations that fall under Rule 34, they are incredibly talented, and their community is rather welcoming

Work was alright, got one completed interview in a casual paced night.

Also picked up another Mass Effect short story commission request based on the Omega DLC mission for Mass Effect 3. 

So what's the next game we're going to play on PlayStation Fridays? I'm leaning towards Beyond Two Souls which features Elliot Page, which could be another interesting two-stream style game. Either that or Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales. We'll see.

On the agenda for Saturday night's stream is the beginning of the Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney Trilogy. Since I have played the Steam version before, I'm going to use my notes from 2019 for this play through on the Xbox One.

So on that note we'll see you about 7 PM Eastern over on twitch.tv/fredcasden, I might start earlier, depends on how I'm feeling.

A full night of Street Fighter 6's World Tour Mode

Hi everyone,

We finished tonight's stream about an hour ago as I'm writing this, and we focused fully on the World Tour mode of Street Fighter 6, meeting various legendary fighters (Ken, Ryu, Guile, Zangief, Jamie and others) and progressed the story in a big way, doing everything we can as it relates to side quests. The story does seem to be split between a data card and the mystery of Bosch's whereabouts. 

One thing I did notice is that there is a need to have various attires to progress the story, such as a full judo gi outfit is needed to go to France to meet Lady Gaga I mean Maron, plus a need for a construction hat to get into the construction site to meet Ken, but thankfully the game goes out of it way to make sure you have the items... but there does seem to be a bit of a glitch if you have items as appearance only. I'm going to assume Capcom wasn't considering people figuring out the display only for options in regards to cut scenes.

Also there is some real bullshit when it comes to some of the optional fights, such as the jack ass with the sword... I ended up using quite a few healing items.

I do feel like we'll be able to get the Side Quests achievement the next time we play the World Tour Mode on stream, because the next set are behind the progression of the story, which I want to do on stream.

I did consider jumping into the Battle Hub, but with how much there is to do in World Tour mode, we didn't get a chance to do any head to head matches last night.

For the raid we dropped in on annietalksshow who was playing Mario Kart 8 Deluxe over at twitch.tv/annietalksshow

Work was okay, if rather mundane and made more difficulty because of an bug where the font shrank to where I could barely read it. Does amaze me how so many folks don't want to get compensated for doing a very straight forward study.

Also found out there will be no work on Monday in celebration of Juneteenth, which means we'll be able to start early that day in make sure we knock out a lot of Persona 3 Portable

So the plan for Friday night's stream will be Heavy Rain, with the goal to finish our first play through of it. I'll have to turn on the PS4 early to make sure the wireless controller is fully charged. I will not be shocked if the stream ends up going long.

The stream will start at 9:30 PM Eastern, so on that note we'll see you over on twitch.tv/fredcasden!

So Heavy Rain's Plot Only Happens Because A Kid Is An Idiot...

 Hi everyone,

We had another great day of work, granted it got a bit tough with no real breaks between interview attempts, but hey, I was felt super productive. However, my work schedule will lead to Monday's stream starting at 8:30 PM Eastern, while Tuesday to Friday's stream next week will be still starting at 9:30 PM Eastern

Also got in some groceries, some bananas, some goodies, a few frozen food items... if I'm learning to cook on the fly, got to make sure I have some things that are edible just in case things go wrong. Rather like the Bowl & Basket branded stuff from Shop Rite, they are cheap and often I don't have to worry about expiration dates.

So we started Heavy Rain, and right off the bat I have to say the entire plot is based on the face that Ethan's son Jason being a complete fucking idiot and wandering off for no real apparent reason. So the kid wanders off, Ethan chases after him and a tragic accident happens which leads to the actually story moving forward. I do like the various changes in perspective but this game has a big problem.

That problem is that the CONTROLS ARE FUCKING AWFUL... Heavy Rain is a game whose controls depend fully on the gimmick of features of the PlayStation 4's controller, such as shaking , turning and making various motions with it. Not to mention some of the most awkward button presses that make some things impossible. 

Still by my math, we covered about half of the game so far, and looking at the achievement list, this game will require a guide to try and get various other achievements unlocked in future play throughs down the road.

We'll continue and problem finish Heavy Rain next Friday

Heavy Rain Trophies

• Happy Birthday: Prologue - Complete the drawing + Set the table + Play with kids
• Interactive Drama: Thank you for supporting Interactive Drama
• Private Eye: Sleazy Place - Lead Lauren to talk about her son
• White Knight: Sleazy Place - Beat Troy
• Negotiator: Hassan's Shop - Persuade the Robber to leave
• Lucky Locker: Lexington Station - Find the correct locker on first try
• Blunder: Nathaniel - Shoot Nathaniel
• Good Driver: The Bear - Complete the Bear Trial successfully
• Cat & Mouse: Covered Market - Beat Korda in the cold storage
• Tough Guy: Kramer's Party - Defeat Gordi's bodyguards
• Coward!: The Butterfly - Give up or fail the Butterfly Trial
• Good Cop: Shrink and Punches - Stop Blake from hitting Dupré

For the raid we dropped in on watchshouttv while Highlander was airing over on twitch.tv/watchshouttv

Thing on the agenda for Saturday include doing the dishes and laundry (though that can wait until Sunday). Also will try and get some writing done on a Mass Effect commission request that I started writing a few day ago.

The plan for tonight's stream is Street Fighter 6, we're going to do a lot of stuff in the World Tour to progress it story and work towards achievements. We might do some Fighting Ground matches as well.

So on that note we'll see you at about 7 PM Eastern over on twitch.tv/fredcasden

A Positive Day On All Fronts

Hi everyone,

Thursday was all together a positive day as it relates to work, as we got an assignment that I could really sink my teeth into, with perfect pacing. I actually lost track of how many interviews I completed.

Speaking of completing, we finished our current playthrough of the Xbox 360 version of Mass Effect, hitting level 56, which is actually 6 levels higher than the first play through of this version we did in 2020. The big difference was of course me jumping out of the Mako to fight enemies on the ground as often as possible. I suspect it is possible to hit level 60 in a single play through starting from scratch if you're willing to fight a thresher maw on the ground... which I'm not.

Now with this play through done, that leaves only doing a run using Garus and Liara for the majority of the missions, and playing as Adept in order to get all the achievements related to being a biotic.That will be challenging because of the lack of fire power options that will be available. But we'll worry about that when we get to it. 

Mass Effect Achievements

• First Aid Specialist: Use medi-gel 150 times
• Long Service Medal: Complete 2 Playthroughs

For the raid we dropped in on pradoxgamerau who was playing Diablo IV over at twitch.tv/pradoxgamerau, while it is a game I want to play, I'm going to wait until expansions start rolling out for it because I might as well get the most bang for the buck... and when guides are available to do everything.

Since Mass Effect is finished, we're going to move Street Fighter 6 into the Thursday night slot to focus on the World Tour mode and do head to head stuff. I already have 77% of the game's achievement unlocked (thanks to some off-stream gaming I've done since Saturday), and there are about 8 more achievements that I think are possible for me to unlock. We're still going to play Street Fighter 6 this Saturday

So that will free Saturdays, which raises the question of what will go on Saturdays. Folks have asked if I played Hallow Knight or any game in the Yakuza series... so those are contenders based on the chat and comments left on my YouTube channel. 

I saw that there will be a new spin off for Persona 5 that looks like a tactics style game, a genre that I've never played before. It looked kind of cute. Of course, there is also the news that Persona 3 is being remastered, and will come out in 2024. Which means I won't get to it until 2025 because I would still need to do a FemC run of Persona 3 Portable!

Also saw that there will be a new Sonic The Hedgehog game where up to four players can play, that seems like it would be a hoot! 

The plan for tonight's stream is to play Heavy Rain on the PlayStation 4, I have to remember to install it before the start of tonight's stream 

So on that note we'll see you later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden! (Note Tonight's stream will start at 9:30 PM Eastern)

An entire day of feeling depressed

Hi everyone,

Figure I better just post these blogs after my streams from now on...

Yesterday got off to a really bad start, as I made the mistake of trying to talk to my dad about things, and he took it as yet another opportunity to berate me. I refuse to apologize to him, and I'll just go back to just calling him on Father's Day and his Birthday... because I have enough worries, concerns, fears that I don't need him compounding things. Hell all day and I had this gut wrenching feeling in the pit of my stomach.

This of course let to me making a video trying to voice my feelings and it's on my YouTube channel, because I want to make it clear that I intend to try, because what's the worse that can happen to me at this point? I've already lost my mom, I barely hold things together as is. So all I can do is try.

Things were so bad for me yesterday that for the first time in years I thought about calling out from work, but since I need to make sure I get what hours I can. There were times I felt I would break down trying to read the script. Made it through the shift, just didn't get a completed interview... so add not feeling as productive as I like to the feelings I dealt with

Hell I barely felt like doing the stream, but my goal every day is to make it to my streams and do them, it's my daily end goal. And we finished Kena: Bridge of Spirits... ironically, its story is about grief and loss, so the ending was getting to me a bit, but the final boss battle and the reason for the events of the game being the result of a village leader's ego took the sting out of. Would I play this game again? Probably to just clean up the achievements in finding the last 26 Rot and all the remaining hats

 Kena: Bridge of Spirits (PS4) Trophies

• Adira's Fear: Found Adira's Hammer Relic.
• Adira's Regret: Found Adira's Village Heart Relic.
• A Heavy Hammer: Defeated the Corrupted Woodsmith.
• Crossing Over: Learned the Dash Ability.
• Triple Threat: Destroyed 3 enemies with a single Parry.
• Toshi's Fear: Found Toshi's Incense Relic.
• Toshi's Regret: Found Toshi's Harpoon Relic.
• Toshi's Love: Found Toshi's Village Crest Relic.
• A Leader Walks Alone: Defeated Corrupted Toshi.
• The Lonely Path: Reached the Mountain Shrine.
• Restore Balance: Defeated the Corrupted Rot God.

For the raid we dropped in on zonesama who was playing Diablo IV over at twitch.tv/zonesama

So with Kena: Bridge of Spirits done, the next PlayStation 4 game we're going to play will be Heavy Rain, which we'll start next Friday. 

Did get a bit of writing done on the AEW Commission story, with luck I can finish it in a few days. Granted I repurposed an outline for it, but it works.

The plan for tonight's stream is to play Street Fighter 6, and we have extra incentive to do so, as BangBangBang gifted me a code to get 250 coins for in-game currency.

So on that note, we'll see you later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden

Today's Notes 3/26/21

 

Good morning everybody,

Well we got an announcement right off the bat as we've officially added the Xbox Series S to my stable of consoles. Now why the Series S and not the Series X you may ask. Well first off, the Series X version is probably going to be impossible to find for the better part of the next year, with the simple fact any that are manufactured and shipped off to retailers are selling out within seconds. Also, to justify having a Series X, I would need to get a new monitor to get the most out of it, and 98% of my Xbox library is digital anyway. So the Series S makes more sense

That out of the way, last night's stream of Star Trek Online saw a lot of changes. One a deleted six of my characters because getting them all caught up will be impossible, so I've kept Zagreus and Sorra as main characters representing the Starfleet and the Klingon Defense Force, plus my two 'recruit characters' which are needed to unlock some account perks and such. We also ran into a lot of people sabotaging game play when it comes to Task Force Operations, where they either go AFK for the majority of the time or intentionally do something that makes completing the objectives impossible. This is why the developers put in a Buyout option when it comes to events that often involve dealing with a TFO, because they know it's a real problem. It got so bad last night I ended the stream early

So since I had extra time, I decided to start working on getting PlayStation Network Trophies, using games that I've played before on other platforms... and the first was Saints Row The Third, and boy was I not expecting the controls when it comes to the bumper and trigger buttons to be backward. L1 is to shoot, L2 is to toss a grenade....when on the PC and Xbox versions, it's reversed, R2 and R1 are also reversed as well for whatever reason. What were the developers thinking

Today's Ftiness Boxing 2 session was a solid 30 minutes (factoring in stretching) and was more for me to get loose today, as it's starting to heat up and getting a good sweat going is a hell of a lot easier when it's warm than when it's cold.

We've added Heavy Rain: Director's Cut  for the Playstation 3 to our collection, and so another acclaimed game that we'll eventually feature on Twitch.

Not completely sure what will be on tonight's agenda, probably some things involving the Nintendo Switch, but not completely sure.

And on that note we'll see you later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden!