Video game lessons learned the hard way

Digimon Story: Cyber Sleuth: Complete Edition:

• There are four main Digimon types: Data, Virus, Vaccine, and Free. Data types are strong against Vaccine types, which are strong against Virus types, which are strong against Data types. Free type Digimon have no strengths or weaknesses towards any of the other types. Having a party balanced around these matchups is a must. Digimon can also have a multitude of separate elemental attributes, each with their own unique strengths and weaknesses as well.

• You also have to watch out for your party memory, which limits how many Digimon you can bring with you at once. Each Digimon takes up a certain amount of memory space, so make sure you have enough memory for the Digimon you want to bring with you. Memory can be expanded with Memory Ups, which you can get from boss battles, chests, and completing story quests. If a Digimon's Digivolution were to push your party over your current memory limit, you'll have to put the Digimon into your farm or Digibank before you can Digivolve them.

• Certain Digivolutions require a Digimon to be at a certain percentage of camaraderie (or CAM for short,) which grows by 1 after every battle. However, the Digimon has to be in your active battle party at the end of a battle in order for their CAM to go up at all, so Digimon in your reserve party won't have their CAM go up. Digimon in the farm can also have their CAM raised by feeding them.

• Some Digivolutions require a certain level of ability (ABI for short), which can only be increased through Digivolving and De-Digivolving. ABI also increases the amount of bonus stats your Digimon can earn from training in the farm. If you want stronger Digimon, don't be afraid to De-Digivolve them from time to time.

• Some field skills can only be used if the Digimon in your party meet certain requirements. For example, Firewall Level 2 can only be used if four or more of the Digimon in your party are at Rookie level or higher.

• Training and development in the Digifarm takes real world time. Because of this, the game will continue to run while your Switch is in sleep mode. Take advantage of this to level up your Digimon while AFK.

Edited by Pogakure on Jan 31st 2022 at 8:52:59 AM

Super Robot Wars V:

• Fighters are terrible at dealing damage. What they are good at is evasion. Send them into the front lines and have them draw enemy fire.
• Stage 5's Secret Point requires landing a One-Hit Kill on one of the mooks. The quickest way to do this is a combination of EX Actions, Black Getter's finisher, and the Analyze spirit. The easy way to do this is to move the Yamato in close and hit one with Volley of Fire.
• Be aggressive in Stage 6. Move your units forward as quickly as possible, split into two groups covering the left and right. The Secret Point requires you to shoot down the enemy flagship before it escapes, and its escape point is in the top-left. Aggressive movement will allow you to get the jump on it. Playing defensively means you won't be able to get into range before it gets off the map.
• Black Getter is a Glass Cannon and burns energy like it's coal in the winter. Don't expect it to hold up for very long.
• Don't sit on your cash, and don't forget the bottom, segregated bar in the Customize screen - that's for your weapons.

Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin:

Do NOT bring Reverto to the Velkhana fight in the Elder's Lair. The idiot will use Taunt and ruin attempts for you to double attack with your Monstie, and this can be fatal if you are doing the tougher version of the fight.

Minecraft:

• If you're on a survival world with experimental features on, achievements will act somewhat strangely i.e they may or may not trigger.
• Strays are awful. Their arrows of slowness make them even worse than a regular skeleton.
• The Nether will not wait for you to ask your friend through text chat when she made (or possibly just found) a Nether portal. You will die while you are typing.
• Piglins will mob you and destroy you if you are wearing anything other than gold armour.

Edited by ReikoKazama on Oct 5th 2021 at 5:13:34 AM

Bayonetta: -    DO NOT    fall off pits. A few of them for some godforsaken reason count as a full death, gimping your score forevermore. -    I SUCK    at playing as Jeanne. Completely. I don't want to experience that again, lol

Digimon Story: Cyber Sleuth: Complete Edition:

Turns out what I said earlier about how you increase ABI was only sorta correct. Alongside Digivolution, there is also special food you can buy that'll increase a Digimon's ABI stat if you feed it to them in the farm. Interesting.

Playstation 5:

• You have to have PS 5 games on the internal memory in order to actually play them.
• Playstation 5 games will not download from the disc if the machine is in rest mode.
• If the PS 5 goes into rest mode while a game's downloading from the disc, it has to start over.

I'm really starting to hate SSD drives.

Dark Deity: In Chapter 4, don't send Irving to the west to Sophia's cell. The enemy mage and arcanists will eat him alive due to his low magic resistance.

Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine

• Man, even on EASY the game is 5-color? WHY?! Puyo Puyo 1 didn't pull this! It alternated between 3- and 4- color in that game.
• The Curtain Call song sounds so cursed when you know it's an arrangement of Theme of Puyo Puyo. As a friend put it, "Where are the NOTES?"

Far Cry 6:

The vehicles - aircraft included - tend to take critical damage and explode at times for no discernable reason. This includes flying through the air with no objects around whatsoever or driving on smooth paved roads. So if you start seeing fire coming from the hood of your vehicle (or the front of your cockpit in the case of aircraft), bail out immediately - that vehicle is about to explode and there's nothing you can do about it.

Methinks it might have to do with hitting invisible objects nearby the cutoff point for loading new areas: I've had one of my helos get taken down after hitting what was probably a bird, followed by a brief noticeable stutter in the framerate. Another time it was a truck simply hitting a small tree stump on a dirt road that seemed to pop up out of nowhere.

Pokemon Café Remix: Mew may be able to use its special skill to hit everything on the screen, but unlike most skills, it only counts as the equivalent of making one combo when affecting a gimmick that requires multiple combos but could be cleared instantly with most other skills. Combined with how long it takes to charge, Mew may not actually be the best for all level types.

Connec Tank:

Know what strategy your selected tank's loadout supports, and build on that; by extension, know what your tank does, and avoid accessories that work against that. For instance, anything that buffs trash ammo is good for the Armadillogeddon, but by the same token, anything that hurts when you make trash ammo hurts even more on it.

More ammo is a mixed bag; while they can improve your odds of getting what you need for your strategy, there's more that might not be what you want.

As long as you aren't using accessories that require certain health values, you can sorta treat health like Life in Mt G: it doesn't really matter how much you have, as long as you have it. Just, be careful; healing methods are on the rare side, and any sustained damage will stay with you.

Armor is basically extra health that goes away at the end of the battle. Losing some max health for gaining armor at the start of battle is often a good deal.

Ammo stat increases can rapidly add up, especially damage. Also, damage is per shot... and some ammo types fire multiple shots. You can see where this is going.

Detroit: Become Human:

• Don't be too worried if Connor doesn't survive the opening.
• Don't release the buttons until the icon goes away.
• Hank has very little patience for androids.
• When looking for a place for Alice to sleep, there are drawbacks to every option. Even the one that looks best has thorns.

Ghost of Tsushima:

• Fighting multiple enemies at once is suicide.
• Press Circle once when dodging an attack. Pressing twice makes you roll, which has its uses, but puts you out of range to counterattack.
• Standoff looks cool, but usually leaves you fighting multiple enemies at once.

Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl: Regice has basically as low PP as possible for a high level Pokémon. Assuming you weaken it enough to maximize catch rate, after it uses only 20 moves, it will struggle and KO itself.

I'm willing to bet this will also apply to Regirock and Registeel.

Edited by ShinyCottonCandy on Nov 22nd 2021 at 4:44:38 AM

Animal Crossing New Horizons: Kappn's islands aren't tied to the calendar month you're in, so the Critterpedia will still say, for example, November when you're on a Spring Island.

Digimon Story: Cyber Sleuth:

• When DNA Digivolving, only one of the Digimon you'll be using needs to have the required stats for Digivolution. As long as you have that other Digimon at max camaraderie required for the Digivolution, you're good to go.
• When De-Digivolving a DNA Digivolved Digimon, you can only get one of the original two Digimon used in the process; you can't get both (i.e. if I were De-Digivolving Paildramon I'd have to choose between Ex-Veemon and Stingmon; if I wanted to get Paildramon again, I'd have to start over again from scratch.)
• You gain more ABI from De-Digivolution as opposed to regular Digivolution. The amount of ABI you gain also increases the higher your Digimon's level is at the time of Digivolution.
• In the Complete Edition re-release, Cyber Sleuth shares a Digimon roster with Hacker's Memory, so some items - like the Human and Beast Spirits required to get the Agunimon and Lobomon lines - can only be obtained in Hacker's Memory with no way to get them in Cyber Sleuth and that mildly irritates me to no end.
• Beelzemon's special skill, Gluttony, decreases a partner Digimon's health by 5% of their max HP and increases their attack by 5% at the end of each turn. Theoretically, you could nullify the damage if you have an Antylamon or a Rosemon Burst Mode in your active party since their special skills restore a little bit of your health after each turn, but since the healing always takes effect before Gluttony, it sadly doesn't work like that.
• Some Digimon, like Piedmon, have special attacks that can inflict the Helpless status, which prevents the affected Digimon from using any stat boosting moves. Bringing along Digimon that can inflict Helpless can turn boss fights like the second fight against Examon into a walk in the park.

Edited by Pogakure on Dec 15th 2021 at 2:20:50 PM

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild:

• When fighting a lynel, remember to put away your bow immediately after firing it, because you cannot backflip with the bow in hands!
• Putting the bow away can take one more B press than you think.

Edited by Medinoc on Dec 9th 2021 at 9:37:41 PM

Red Alert 2: Mental Omega mod:

Don't just constantly save-scum; ensure that you have a previous backup to fall upon too. You'd be surprised how devious some of these missions can be, or how a single mistake you made 10 minutes ago may end up costing you everything else later on.

Best example has got to be Epilson Act 2, mission 1: The Conqueror. Once the nuclear reactors have been destroyed, everything is going to unfold FAST, and I STRONGLY advise slowing down the game speed. The next objective will be to mind control all 8 TOPOL-M launchers until they leave the battlefield, and given the absolute chaos throughout Moscow it's quite likely that more than a couple of your Psi-Corps troops will get unexpectedly killed. And said TOPOL-Ms won't always follow the same path - expect them to take odd turns into unexplored areas, and ruin your mission all because you lost a squad and couldn't track down the launcher in time before it escaped.

Black Book: Take every card reward you can get. This isn't a Roguelike Deck Building Game like Slay the Spire or Monster Train, where you have few ways to streamline your deck and any excess card you take could doom your run with a bad draw.

Here, you can modify your deck outside of battles, including upon restarting a lost battle. In the latter case, though, you can't buy or otherwise acquire cards that aren't already in your inventory. So neglecting to get certain cards when you have the chance leaves you with no way to counter some bosses' powerful status effects, rendering them Unwinnable by Mistake.

Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin:

Jonathan is worse than useless when fighting Astarte. Use Charlotte instead.

Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Red Rescue Team^note (Well any PMD game, actually, but that's the one I found it out on, since it was the first one I played.:

The warnings (i.e.: "Something is stirring", etc) are not for a random event, they are for you to get your ass to the stairs after you've been on one floor for too long.

Digimon Adventure 02: Tag Tamers:

• The standard Floppy Disc will only heal a bit of a Digimon's HP, and by a bit of HP I obviously mean barely any HP at all. If you want healing items, I'd advise you stock up on HiFloppy Discs when you get the money. (although healing isn't really all that much of a concern early game, since wild Digimon barely do any damage and you automatically recover all your HP and DP every time you get sent back to Primary Village after you beat a dungeon.)

• You can not adjust the individual quantity of items you put in the Reload Machine. If I have 15 Poison Chips and want to put them in the Reload Machine, I have to put all 15 of them in there, take it or leave it.

• You can't resume control of a battle after you put it on auto. The game does not tell you this.

Batman: Arkham Asylum (Return to Arkham version)

• This is not Arkham Knight.
  • Inverted Takedown must be bought as an upgrade.
  • Detective Vision is on L1.
  • You use the D-pad to switch gadgets.
  • You can't chain grapnels.
  • Batman won't attack downed enemies, so if you knock everyone down, your combo ends.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons:

• Making a rock garden still sucks.
• There is no guarantee that Kapp'n will take you to an island you want to go to (in my case a spring bamboo island so I can replace some bamboo my best friend accidentally cut down bc her game lagged a bit).
• Certain things you want to use in the yard of a vacation home won't be available yet and you'll have to make do.

Ghost of Tsushima:

• When approaching a combat encounter, if you have the opportunity to assassinate some of your opponents before the fight begins, do it. The fewer enemies you face in pitched combat, the better.
  • Prioritize shield-bearing enemies, then twin-sword-wielding enemies, then spear enemies.
• Do not fuck with wild pigs.
• Bears are great sources of Predator Hide, but they will make you earn it.
• Direct attacks will usually be blocked. Attempt to parry or dodge your opponent, then counter-attack.

Here's what I learned so far while playing the following games:

• Stella Glow: Many enemies have a thing against Lisette, and they don't even bother hiding it. Only make her advance through the battlefield when another character is in need of being healed. If she has enough magic, though, you can give those bastards a dose of Splash to inflict damage onto them. It probably won't kill them, but the resulting damage can allow any other party member finish the job.
• WarioWare Gold: Thinking fast isn't enough. You also have to react intelligently. For example, if you're playing that microgame where you're trying to pour coffee onto a cup, don't try to draw in your mind the potential paths from above through the Pipe Maze to figure out which one makes the coffee reach the cup. Instead, see quickly the correct path by looking at the cup itself and then checking in reverse which path from above takes the coffee there.
• No More Heroes III: The quicker you master the basic techniques, the better, because even the first boss can kick your rear if you're still struggling with your own moves. Also, remember that the sushi meals are your friend.
• Metroid Dread: Each EMMI is different, and thinking that you can flee from them by employing the same tricks and tactics is an easy way to get a scary, humiliating death. And make sure to study the layout and design of their jurisdictions, because the EMMI already studied them and will exploit every single possible shortcut to reach you.

Too early to have learned something from Cuphead. I have just played it for the first time . The only thing I can say right now is that the opponents' attacks demand good reflexes and quick thinking to dodge or negate them.