Wolfenstein: The Old Blood - Platinum n° 52

    Wolfenstein: The Old Blood, prequel to Wolfenstein: The New Order is my platinum n° 52.

    Votes:

    - Game: 8/10

    - Fun: 8/10

    - Platinum: 4/10

    This game is a well rounded single-player FPS with a good price, nice graphics, ok-but-not-striking story, great and various gameplay and fun B.J. Blazkowicz moments, especially if you're a Wolfenstein's serie fan since it's first episode in far 1992 ;) .

    The game is fun even at highest difficulty, as it's not so unforgiving if you're an FPS veteran; Moreover, if you adopt a stealth approach, you can skip alot of fights. Sure there are some quite hard fights, but nothing insurmountable.

    Platinum is fast to gain and quite easy. As mentioned the game itself is not that hard, and most trophies just come naturally or just need a bit of farming. Challenges are the true hard part, but after some tries you should be able to get the grip on them. As a general advice, remember that enemies can't clim ladders (not stairs: ladders): exploiting this AI limit can easy up your life alot, trust me ;).

    It took me around 14 hours to plat this game, without using any kind of guide and playing it at maximum difficulty on first run.

    If you don't apply last patches, there even is a glitch that allows you to play all the game on "Can I play Daddy" difficulty and just replay last chapter in "I Am the Death Incarnate" to gain ALL difficulty based trophies (Hero, Super Hero, Uber Hero).

    The game is quite easy to platinum without using guides and such, but if you need any help, here is a good forum where you can find it: http://www.playstationtrophies.org/forum/wolfenstein-the-old-blood/.

    I started The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt two days ago; I already checked the trophies list, and I don't think I'll go for the platinum for this title, but I'll play it deeply for sure, as it seems huge, fun, addictive and very well polished, even if the action side of the title (read: combat), is ok but not great at all. Still, game's direction is wonderful.

    P.S.: The digital version of Wolfenstein: The Old Blood has been released on 5/5/2015, which is the 23rd birthday date of Wolfenstein 3D.

PS4 and PlaystationTV marry Power Line Adapters

    This week I decided to buy PlaystationTV, mostly because I was tempted by the possibility to play PSVita titles on the big screen. As soon as the small but powerful console was delivered, I attached it to my 42" plasma, realising that the TV was way too big for the PSVita games, as the graphics really appeared awkward and heavily pixeled.

    Not that great problem, to be honest, as graphics is not the most important part of most the titles I play on the PSVita, but still it was a bit unsatisfying.

    So, in a rush of impulse, I decided to change the initial purpose of the PlaystationTV i buyed, transforming it in a secondary gaming location, basically installed on the bedroom, but easily movable to every place of the house I like.

    Now, the main problem was the router and the Wi-Fi range: my main "gaming" room is located in the basemend (really fresh during the hottest months of the year), with all my books, comics, action figures etc. etc., and with the router too, which is located very near to PS4, PC etc. The signal of my little guy has proved to be pretty strong, even if basement's walls are thick and heavy, but not enough to provide a stable and powerful enough connection for the remote play.

    I considered various solutions for this problem, such as moving the router or buying Range Extenders, but the first did not work very well, and I was not very sure about the latter (i'm pretty new to all this stuff).

     I turned to a local computer shop for an help, and the guy suggested me to try out Power Line Adapter, an ingenious invention that throw your internet signal on the electric wires, allowing it to reach places quite far from the router, as long as the target electric socket is under the same switch of the one where the router's Power Line is attached to. This kind of technology is pretty old, in truth, but today's devices are much more reliable and powerful than the old ones. This is perhaps the best way to extend internet coverage in your house, even if it is not free from issues; the one I was more afraid of was that it's suggested to attach the Power Line adapter directly to an electric socket (i.e.: not to a power strip), in order to avoid interferences from other devices on the same socket: doing this was pretty impossible for me as sockets in the house are all single.

    But the issue proved to be inexistent: after installing the Power Line adapters (an incredibly simple process), I turned up the PlaystationTV, eager to see the results, and they were amazing: remote play work very well with both streaming options set to "High", even if the PS4 is still under Wi-Fi connection. Sure, the game is not as smooth as if it is played on the original console (the gameplay feels somehow "gummy", if you get what I mean), but it still works excellently. I'm trying the remote play with Wolfenstein: The Old Blood, and it's very playable, even if you lack a bit of precision and finesse in controls; with a different genre of game, the results can perhaps be better, as FPSs in general require a greater degree of precisione compared to other kinds.

    To complete my new gaming location, I buyed a relatively economic Telefunken TV: 24" and HD Ready are enough to take advantage of PlaystationTV. I meant to spend even fewer euros on it, but this one was the less expensive I founded at the local store.

    So, in the end, here is what this "whim" costed:
    - PlaystationTV (discounted): €59,99;
    - Controller Dualshock 4 (discounted): €59,99;
    - Telefunken Tv Led 24"' Te24275B31T10E: €168,00;
    - AV500 Nano Powerline Adapter Starter Kit (TL-PA4010KIT): €65,00
    Total: €352,98

    Not an inexpensive solution, but hey, still less than buying another PS4 + another TV!

    Next step will be to try bringing all this outside, in the garden. The sun's reflexes will probably make it impossible to see the TV screen well enough to play, but I want to give it a try, as playing outside, during spring/summer, would be fantastic.

    Oh, ok, I'm an extreme Gamer, I know! As always: good game everyone.

Dark Souls 2: SotFS Platinum!

    Ahhh, so, after around 150 hours, I finally earned Dak Souls 2 Scholar of the First Sin Platinum!

    I haven't rushed this Platinum, as I explored the game very deeply before completing the trophy list, reaching level 709 and gathering around 98% of all the equipment and spells available (I actually miss 11 "objects", between spells, weapons, armor, rings and shields).

    It's my plat n° 48. Not that many, but I'm proud of all of them ^_^ .

    This one has been a long, but not so difficult, Platinum. The game itself is hard and unforgiving, but once you get the grip of how it works and how you should approach exploration and combat, everything goes much smoother. And you can always farm a bit to make your character more powerful but, most important thing in my opinion, more versatile: being an huber melee fighter with some backup healing spells, the ultra-useful Repair or some ranged magical attack can prove to be quite helpful.

    Still it can be difficult to earn this Plat without a guide,  as some of the trophyes are tricky to obtain, if you don't know exactly what to do. For this reason, I strongly suggest to have a look at this guide: Dark Souls 2 Scholar of the First Sin Trophy Guide and Roadmap, at least to know what you'll be facing.

    And now, let's start Final Fantasy Type-0, at least until I don't receive my physical copy of Wolfenstein: The Old Blood *__*!!

Blooddborne farming - Blood Echoes farming - 11000 every 2 minutes - Lecture Building

    So, Bloodborne is out, and I'm very engaged by the title. It proved to be a neat challenge and a fun game, with a great, if hard, gameplay and a beautiful setting. I love demon/monster hunting, after all :) .

    Among the various tips and advices you can give/find about this game, I learned that one of the most important is to level up your character. I was quite lucky in finding an incredible Blood Echoes farming location early in the game, and this made a big portion of Bloodborne incredibly easy after just an hour or so of farming. So I'm here to share this trick with you. As mentioned, the best about this farming spot is that you can reach it very soon: Just after you defeat Vicar Amelia (she can be your 3rd boss, after Cleric Beast and Father Gascoigne) you can travel to the Forbidden Woods, which is the first step to discover the Lecture Building. I don't exactly remember when and how I reached the location, as it was mostly a matter of luck and risk, but I made my best to rebuild the steps to get there, and here they are:

    Step 1) Go to Forbidden Woods and follow the path of the bridge (beware the trap), until you reach a group of enemies near a campfire. Kill or rush beyond them and go left, following the path throught a flowered camp with a ruined house to its right (with an enemy inside it). Go ahead and pass a low gate that bring you to a big group of houses, like a small town. You should reach another house with a red lantern and some cages near it (with caged or free dogs, depending on how deep are you in the game). Speak to the person inside and you'll receive an item you need to reach the Lecture Building (Beast's Roar?).

    Step 2) Go to the Grand Cathedral lamp and exit down the first ramp of stairs. Looking at the Grand Cathedral entrance, follow the right path, which bring you to an area where you need to fight (or avoid) two hunters (one of them wield a Tonitrus). From there, the path continue down (there are other enemies along the road: kill or avoid them), to a large area with a couple of big guys and an edifice at it's end. Inside the edifice there is a giant monster hanging from the cieling (the monster is incorporeal until you reach a given point of the story), and a door (closed in the beginning of the game: it will automatically open as you progress into the story). When you try to open the door (or if you pass through it while it's open), a warp/portal-like effect will appear: you must do your best to get caught by that distortion. The creature will take you in it's hand, squeeze you, give you Frenzy and say something, before throwing you to the Lecture Building (it will kill you, if you don't have the item recovered from the Forbidden Woods; note that you are automatically teleported in the above mentioned area after you kill Rom, The Vacuous Spider).

    Step 3) Activate the lantern and clear all this floor by opening all the door and exploring all of it's parts. When you're done, you can go back to the Hunter's Dream and start farming the location shown in the video (see below), for a neat amount of 702 x 16 Blood Echoes each run (which takes 2-3 minutes). One of the best things is that the load time for this location is pretty short, as it is small!

    Here follow a couple of videos that explains both how to reach the location and how to farm it:

    Video 1 - How to reach Lecture Building: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRpandCc3Bs (exactly at 4:48, the guy reach the Lecture Building lamp)

    Video 2 - How to farm Lecture Building: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icj6T9Ez0A0

    Hope this can help some of you in not succumbing to frustration for such a demanding title ;).

    Good hunt, out there.

The Order 1886: My Two Cents (Ita)

    Ci sono molte recensioni di questo gioco in giro per la rete. Nel complesso viene, fortunatamente, acclamato, ma tutti sono concordi sul constatare che si tratta di un prodotto controverso, cui sembra mancare qualcosa.

    Nonostante a me sia piaciuto molto, e sia più che soddisfatto di averlo preso al dayOne, ho deciso di fare una review più oggettiva possibile, sperando di aiutare tutti quei giocatori indecisi se acquistarlo fin da ora, a prezzo pieno, o se aspettare più avanti.


    - Presentazione (grafica/sonoro/storia/ambientazione): L' aspetto immersivo di The Order è sicuramente il suo punto di forza. L' impatto grafico è notevole e dimostra una cura eccelsa, presentando una Londra vivida sia nelle ambientazioni, sempre diverse tra loro e che non fanno sentire quel fattore "ripetitività" tipico di altri giochi (sempre le stesse riviste in giro per il gioco, sempre le stesse bottiglie, gli stessi poster/quadri etc), sia negli effetti di luce e nelle animazioni, fluide e realistiche a parte qualche rarissimo caso. Il dettaglio dei personaggi è eccelso, come sono ottime anche le animazioni facciali, mai facili da rendere. Pixellizazione a distanza ravvicinata pressochè nulla. Piccolo neo sulla varietà dei visi dei nemici, dato che sembra di combattere sempre contro gli stessi tre ribelli, ma è un dettaglio trascurabile, che si nota quasi solamente combattendo a distanza molto ravvicinata. Musiche ed effetti sonori, pur non lasciando a bocca aperta come invece può succedere per il reparto visivo, sono altrettanto curati e si fondono bene col complesso narrativo, creando un' esperienza audio/visiva degna di uno splendido film. La scelta delle barre nere che modificano la risoluzione base del gioco può risultare fastidiosa, anche se ci si abitua piuttosto in fretta. Se le avessero tolte nelle fasi azione avrebbero spezzato lo standard visivo, quindi, alla fine, è probabilmente stata la scelta migliore mantenerle per tutto il gioco. La storia è ovviamente legata al gusto personale del giocatore, ma, seppure possa risultare un po' scontata per i veterani della fiction in generale, è ben curata e la narrazione si svolge in modo superbo, con un' ottima regia; non darò info aggiuntive su questo aspetto per ovvi motivi di spoiler :).
    Voto 9

    - Giocabilità: La giocabilità non è sicuramente il lato più eclatante di questo TPS (ThirdPersonShooter). Non presenta infatti grandi novità; anzi, per certi versi sembra aver fatto alcuni passi indietro rispetto agli standard moderni. L' interattività con l' ambiente è molto limitata, ed il gioco è piuttosto ferreo su dove/come ci si può muovere in giro per le varie sezioni; non ci sono capriole o salti, il corpo a corpo gestito come QTE (QuickTimeEvent) risulta un po' goffo (nemico su livello diverso non sempre può essere attaccato in mischia, ad esempio, anche se è poco più in alto del giocatore) e limitante, ed in tutte le parti che non siano di pura azione, la mobilità è altrettanto bloccata. In ogni caso, in quel "poco" che fa, il gioco riesce bene: il sistema di coperture è ottimale e non mi ha mai creato fastidi (come invece mi è successo per altri titoli), permettendo un passaggio disinvolto dai ripari al campo aperto; le meccaniche di sparo funzionano a dovere sia come precisione e fluidità che come resa (anche se a volte ho avuto l' impressione che sparare ad un nemico sbilanciato da un primo colpo risultasse inefficace); i mini giochi legati alla fase esplorativa sono semplici, rapidi e, nel complesso, abbastanza divertenti da non risultare fastidiosi o pesanti. La ricerca dei collezionabili è un' attività piacevole e non troppo complicata, aiutata dall' indicatore dell' oggetto, piuttosto evidente (personalmente ne ho persi solamente 2 nel primo walkthrough), anche se l' assenza di un sistema di tracciamento degli stessi rende poco pratica la raccolta in fasi successive (molto simpatiche le citazioni legate a questo aspetto di gioco). Nel complesso si ha un po' la sensazione di essere legati ed obbligati a giocare il titolo come vogliono i programmatori: se ciò aiuta, da un lato, l' immersione nell' ambientazione (non poter correre quando non sembra appropriato, ad esempio), dall' altro potrebbe dare la sensazione di essere troppo pilotati a quei giocatori che preferiscono una maggior libertà di azione.
    Voto 6

    - Longevità: Questo è sicuramente il punto dove The Order 1886 pecca maggiormente. Un titolo dal prezzo standard di €69,99 che offre, nel complesso, un' esperienza di gioco che occupa circa una settimana, può far storcere il naso a molti acquirenti. Io ho impiegato circa 15 ore a completare il titolo, giocando con calma a difficoltà normale, cercando i collezionabili senza guida e mirando a fare più trofei possibile, ottenendo anche il Platino, che ha una difficoltà di conquista davvero irrisoria. Si tratta quindi di un tipico titolo "filmone", come li definisco io, da giocarsi una volta godendoselo a livello visivo e di narrazione, per poi riporlo nella propria collezione, fino all' uscita dell' eventuale capitolo successivo. Non credo si senta la mancanza di un MultiPlayer, se non forse una qualche forma di cooperativo, dato che il gioco è chiaramente più orientato alla ricchezza della storia che racconta, piuttosto che all' aspetto competitivo. Questo aspetto del gioco, come già detto, è una questione molto personale, nel senso che ad alcuni giocatori può non interessare la durata quando c' è la qualità in altri aspetti, mentre altri preferiscono titoli che possano occupare mesi e mesi del loro tempo. The Order 1886 non è sicuramente adatto a questi ultimi, a meno che non vogliano provare un' esperienza diversa. Il voto oggettivo non può però che essere orientato verso il basso, data l' innegabile cortezza di ogni aspetto del gioco.
    Voto 5


    La mia sensazione è che questo titolo sia un po' un campo di prova sperimentale per un team di programmatori abituati ad altro. E' come se in alcuni aspetti si fossero volutamente trattenuti e limitati, come a tastare il terreno. Speriamo che nei seguiti (perchè ce ne saranno, se le vendite non risultano troppo scarse) decidano di osare di più, ampliando l' esperienza di gioco dal punto di vista puramente ludico, dato che sul piano narrativo han già ottenuto un gran risultato.

    Nel complesso The Order 1886 E' un bel prodotto, ma inadatto a tutti i palati e sicuramente più orientato a quei giocatori che amano la fiction, piuttosto che l' azione e l' open world: se ami leggere libri, fumetti, guardare film e simili, The Order è il titolo per te e vale i soldi che ci spenderai. Se invece sei più per passare ore ed ore a cercare e completare missioni secondarie o raccogliere dozzine e dozzine di collezionabili per sbloccare questo o quell' extra, forse è meglio se ci rifletti un attimo prima di acquistarlo, o che aspetti di trovarlo usato, ad un prezzo più adatto alle poche ore di svago che offre.

    Come sempre, Just My Two Cents.

Metro Last Light, Walking Bank and Businessman Trophies

     I'm making my way to this game Platinum trophy. I just want to share a quick method I used to do the Walking Bank and Businessman trophies, even if you probably already figured it out by yourself.

    The method is plain simple: the Bandit chapter is the only one where you have access to both a vendor and a good number of opponents. The full level homes around 30 human enemies, mainly equipped with personalized Lolife, Duplet and Ashot.

    These weapons are worth around 25-65 military rounds each. Because of this, even in the worst scenario, you should be easily able to reach the 1000 military rounds amount needed for Walking Bank by just gathering the dropped weapons and running back to the vendor to sell them.

    Remember you can't sell all your weapons (Artyom will always keep at least one with him), so this can take a while, but it's neverthless the quickest way to complete the trophy.

    The Businessman trophy comes by itself just after completing the previous one: the best way to do it is to quickly buy and resell Throwing Knives at the above mentioned vendor. At a minimum cost and in no time, you'll also get this trophy.

    Good Luck & Have Fun ;).

Tree Ninja trophy for AC3: Liberation

    Most people farm this trophy during Sequence 3, Mission 3. I think I founded a better place to grind the kills you need: have a look to the embeeded video to discover my super-pro strategy :)!!!

The Last of Us - Platinum Trophy

One of the best games I ever played. Great story, mood and gameplay. Multiplayer is a bit boring because of the few modes and maps, but it's quite fun (perhaps because I founded I'm pretty good at it :P). The single player has some minor flaws, imho (like the gargantuan amount of enemies you face in your journey!), but its neverthless a masterpiece!

And now? What's next? Well, to continue with the survivor mood, let's plat Fallout 3!!

Ni No Kuni - Wrath of the White Witch: Platinum trophy!!!

    After a total neat time of 76 hours, 22 minutes and 45 seconds I finally got my Platinum trophy for this interesting and nostalgic JRPG.

    Playing this game was a big dive into the past!

    I'm going to write a review of this game in the next few days.

Climber trophy for Assassin's Creed III: Liberation

    Here's a quick way to get the "Climber" trophy for Assassin's Creed III: Liberation!

    First of all look for a wall without footholds: one that can not be scaled by Aveline. Trying to climb a wall of this type (by pressing Forward + R), you will be credited with 1.5 meters of "climbing".

    Found such a suitable wall, get two rubber bands and something with which they can be secured after crossing the two holes at the sides, bottom, on your PSVita. I found very functional the metal straps covered with plastic / rubber that are used to keep bags closed. At this point, position the rubber bands as in the picture, by passing them below both lever and around the back of the console, pulling them throught the two holes I mentioned earlier. Lock them in that position.

    The left rubber band (looking at the PSVita) need only hold the lever in the "Forward" position, while the right one has to be positioned so as the "R" button is constantly pressed.

    Leave the console turned on in this state and you will get the trophy easily!

    I am forced to give it a look every 10 minutes or so, because on the wall I use, Aveline tends to slide to the left, so I must put her back in place!

    Maybe you will find a better wall than mine ;)!

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