deathinactthree's recent activity
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Comment on Do you feel like you’ve had many lives so far? Why, why not? Which? in ~life
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Conclusion and Recap in ~games
deathinactthree Link ParentThanks for the detailed instructions! Very helpful and appreciated.Thanks for the detailed instructions! Very helpful and appreciated.
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Conclusion and Recap in ~games
deathinactthree Link ParentOh wow--I actually haven't looked at modding DkS before, I don't think the thought ever even occurred to me. Thanks for the links, Archthrones and Daughters of Ash in particular look pretty...Oh wow--I actually haven't looked at modding DkS before, I don't think the thought ever even occurred to me. Thanks for the links, Archthrones and Daughters of Ash in particular look pretty awesome (although I don't think I can play the latter on my Linux box). Definitely checking this out!
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Conclusion and Recap in ~games
deathinactthree Link ParentI wouldn't say the heavy feeling of combat in ToI turned me off--Dark Souls 1 is one of my favorite games of all time and I've probably put at least 500 hours into it doing various challenge...I wouldn't say the heavy feeling of combat in ToI turned me off--Dark Souls 1 is one of my favorite games of all time and I've probably put at least 500 hours into it doing various challenge playthroughs (including a OneBro run) and PvP. I like that style of play, but I compared ToI to Trek to contrast how slow, methodical combat in the latter works significantly better than the former, even though you have similar limitations on gear and movement.
ToI would've worked better for me if there were meaningful moveset differences, say, between a sword and a spear, and/or if trash mobs didn't take so much time to clear. Bizarrely, the Clubba fight was easier for me than a lot of the zone fights were--I can't remember if it took me either two or three attempts, but once I realized to chase down and kill the archer first, and to not be greedy attacking Clubba and focus on dodging, I was still on my toes but it wasn't too challenging. That fight was probably the one time I was having actual fun in the game. I would play more of that.
Despite my minor criticisms, I would definitely recommend Ender Lilies. Good to know about the Notes feature for when I eventually pick up the sequel on sale--I don't typically use any Steam features except "launch game"--so thanks for the tip. For my own part, I would say that you'll have a more enjoyable time with Ender if you just keep two things in mind:
First is about upgrade materials: you'll find stacks of Blight occasionally laying on the ground in the game but it's not enough on its own and the game doesn't do a good job of telling you that the two real main ways of getting mats besides defeating bosses are smashing every pot and crate you see, and to go through the Memories (replaying boss fights but they drop a fair amount of Blight) as often as you can spare the time to.
Second, even with that, not all spells are created equal and should not all be upgraded. A couple of spells are kind of useless, others are useful but it's better if you pick just two or three spells you like and devote all your mats to it early on to create a "build". Some spirit skills are needed to clear/reach certain areas of the map, but they don't need to be upgraded, so you don't need to spend anything on them if you don't otherwise plan to use them. Definitely upgrade the starting sword (Umbral Knight) when you can, it takes a unique mat so you don't need to save it, and the sword will carry you through the whole game. But outside of that my hot tip for becoming a raw damage beast that's effective against everything is to max out Western Merchant and Dark Witch Eleine as early as you can. (This is not a spoiler because other builds can be effective and it's up to personal preference.)
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Conclusion and Recap in ~games
deathinactthree (edited )Linkdeathinactthree's bingo card Mode: Standard Bingo! Finished 0/25 Has dinosaurs Nominated for The Game Awards You control a party of characters Uses procedural generation A romhack or total...deathinactthree's bingo card
Mode: Standard Bingo! Finished 0/25 Has dinosaurs Nominated for The Game Awards You control a party of characters Uses procedural generation A romhack or total conversion mod A modded game Has a review score above 94 Single-word title
SkulYou can save/pet/care for animals Considered a classic From a series you have never played
Tails of IronHas a lives system ★ Wildcard Has great reviews, but not your usual type Has a time limit From a genre you don’t normally play It’s already installed
No Straight RoadsHas driving Has both combat and puzzles Has a cozy vibe Adaptation of other media type (e.g. board game, movie) Is considered cinematic
Trek to YomiIs one of the oldest games you own Has a score system Popular game you never got around to playing
Ender LiliesWell, unfortunately I got completely buried this month. November is the busiest time of the year for me work-wise and always has been, and though I was still able to get to a number of games and finish some long write-ups last November, this one was busier than most. But although it's technically too late now, I did get to a couple more games since my last writeup in Week 2, so I'll go ahead and post my thoughts on them for posterity.
Ender Lilies (PS5)--I tend to play a lot of Metroidvanias and so do my friends that I regularly talk games with, but although I've had this one installed on my PS5 for like two years and my friends raved about it, I never really got to it until this BB event. I did finish it, but kind of rushed to the "A" ending (one of several) because I literally completed it on 11/30. So I definitely missed some content, mainly The Abyss, but I'm told it's reminiscent of the Path of Pain from Hollow Knight so I feel kind of okay having skipped it. I might go back and play the extra content at some point but if I don't, I'm content with the 12 hours I spent with it.
The world of Land's End is being overtaken by the Blight, which corrupts everything and turns its inhabitants into zombies and other bizarre creatures. You are Lily, a young girl and member of the order of White Priestesses and possibly the last one, as many of your sisters were killed or corrupted into hideous monstrosities. You yourself actually don't have any attacks as you're a heckin' smol bean and completely defenseless on your own. Fortunately, you have the ability to contain and use the purified souls of the boss characters you come across as you progress in the world. A few act as your basic melee attacks, some are attack spells like fireballs or magic javelins or force pushes or poison clouds, others are defensive in nature (your only method of blocking).
Navigation is your standard Metroidvania cell-style of map, and the map is pretty significantly large--after 12 hours I think I only completed about 70% of the total map, including the hidden areas or alternative exits. Fortunately you have fast travel, but I noticed that although zones have names like The Stockades or Cliffside Hamlet or Catacombs, the map does not visually specify which zones are which and that can be a little annoying in the late game when you're trying to figure out where you need to backtrack to in order to find something. Once you unlock around 50% or more of the map, you can easily find yourself wandering around between locations trying to remember where the hell that high ledge was that you can now make it to since you just unlocked the flying dash capability. Granular exploration is usually a value-add in Metroidvanias, but it can get a little tiring here. Not so bad that I didn't have fun, but I guarantee you I would've finished the game in 8 hours if I'd just been able to annotate the map.
The art style is fantastic...when it's not moving. Everything is originally hand-drawn and the overall vibe is beautiful and haunting and creepy. Unfortunately the animation suffers a lot, and character movement--especially on very large bosses like Guardian Silva--looks like it was tweened in Flash. Lily's own character animation is actually pretty good, but enemies give off a paper-puppet type of stiffness that is a little jarring to watch. Music is a standout, being largely mournful piano melodies, and sound design in general is solid throughout. All of Ender Lilies has a beautiful and compelling visual/audio style that it's really a shame that the animations are so oddly deficient.
All that said, I give this game a thumbs-up and I enjoyed my time with it. However, I will note that my only true complaint about the game was that it was billed as Dark Souls hard, which I found it to be and beat my head against several zones and bosses and just assumed it was meant to be that way, and did not realize that I was underleveled throughout almost the entire game. I was essentially doing a "OneBro run" because I didn't know I'd missed a bunch of upgrade materials so I was fighting almost all of the late-game bosses with the same sword at the same power level I'd started the game with. That was a bummer to learn, as I think I would've enjoyed this game even more with a bit less of the frustration I had in instances like the Catacombs or Dark Witch Elaine.
Tails of Iron (PS5)--One of my favorite comics is Mouse Guard. A frankly kind of absurd premise (Mice! Camelot-ish! Weasel War!) taken absolutely seriously and succeeds as a result, and ends up being really imaginative and enjoyable. So as a result I was all in on Tails of Iron, which is not the same IP but the same idea. You're a rat knight, a minor prince, and the Frog Kingdom lays waste to yours while you're still figuring out who you want to be as someone who's not first in line for the throne. After the destruction about 20 minutes in, you're the only one in the royal succession left standing, so it's time to take the kingdom back.
It has a heavy, medieval-gothic line art style that I like a lot and while it doesn't look precisely like Mouse Guard, you can tell immediately that it was a direct inspiration, almost to the point that I'm surprised they didn't get a letter from Petersen. Unfortunately that's the best I can say about it. The art is great, but almost nothing else is.
This is also a 2D side-scrolling melee combat game that uses the phrase "Dark Souls" in its sizzle copy but the joyless slog it starts off as never changes. Gear is limited and not that meaningful. Enemies, even trash mobs, are damage sponges and even basic fights feel like they take forever. Trek to Yomi from my previous writeup could have some basic fights take a while, but when that happens they feel like proper duels with skilled opponents that you have to pay close attention to, and it gives you a sense of accomplishment to win. In Tails of Iron, there's no real sense of give and take or timing, just repetitiveness because enemies absorb so much damage, and some have crazy i-frames moving around the screen (archers in particular) that gets incredibly annoying in short order. Combat is swing, block, dodge, repeat, and that's it--there's little of the variation that makes games like Dark Souls or Trek interesting enough to experiment until you find what works for you.
I really, really wanted to like this game but after several hours I'm leaning on "joyless slog". Maybe if I powered through there would be more meat on the bone there but I gave up after maybe 4 hours. Damn shame. Only makes me want a proper Mouse Guard game more, done better.
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Week 3 Discussion in ~games
deathinactthree Link ParentI felt the same way--Rogue Legacy was great and I finished it, Moonlighter looked right up my alley but I found it cumbersome. But like you said, sometimes you might just have to be in the right...Rogue Legacy really worked for me, whereas my submission earlier this week Moonlighter did not.
I felt the same way--Rogue Legacy was great and I finished it, Moonlighter looked right up my alley but I found it cumbersome. But like you said, sometimes you might just have to be in the right mood. I may come back to Skul sometime later and find it cozy, but now is not that time.
As an aside, I like the idea behind the head swap mechanic. It reminds me of swapping your shell in Another Crab's Treasure, or just Kirby games, I guess
It is genuinely a fun mechanic, and comparing it to ACT or Kirby is pretty accurate.
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Week 3 Discussion in ~games
deathinactthree (edited )LinkGah! Somehow made it to Week 3 and got too caught up to write anything down! But I did play some games! Here's some stuff I said about them! deathinactthree's bingo card Mode: Standard Bingo!...Gah! Somehow made it to Week 3 and got too caught up to write anything down! But I did play some games! Here's some stuff I said about them!
deathinactthree's bingo card
Mode: Standard Bingo! Finished 0/25 Has dinosaurs Nominated for The Game Awards You control a party of characters Uses procedural generation A romhack or total conversion mod A modded game Has a review score above 94 Single-word title
SkulYou can save/pet/care for animals Considered a classic From a series you have never played Has a lives system ★ Wildcard Has great reviews, but not your usual type Has a time limit From a genre you don’t normally play It’s already installed
No Straight RoadsHas driving Has both combat and puzzles Has a cozy vibe Adaptation of other media type (e.g. board game, movie) Is considered cinematic
Trek to YomiIs one of the oldest games you own Has a score system Popular game you never got around to playing Trek to Yomi--Pretty much the Platonic ideal of "cinematic", as the game is directly modeled to look like a 1950s Japanese samurai movie, entirely in black and white. The film grain, the classic title card style, environments in the Unreal engine that are set up and shot in a way to look like Kurosawa is behind the camera, the score where they used a traditional gagaku orchestra playing period-correct instruments...the whole experience is not simply a nod to the heyday of mid-century Toho dramas, but an attempt to fully recreate one. It's legitimately impressive how much it captures the vibe, the design team clearly has both a love of and deep knowledge of its visual inspiration. As it's a short game (5 hours max if you're any good at the combat or playing it on Easy), it's worth playing solely to look at it.
The story is also trope-y of the cinematic period: You're a young samurai, your master gets killed, you seek revenge. There's more to it that I won't spoil, but the story is pretty straightforward even when you're faced with a couple of choices that lead to one of three endings. Nothing innovative in the narrative, but nothing disappointing in the execution either. Voice acting is very solid if you play it in the default subtitled Japanese to preserve the vibes.
The combat is where it received most of its criticism, though I don't quite think it deserves it. All combat and most travel is 2D but it's not a Metroidvania, so there's very little backtracking or exploration or much verticality of any kind, though you can mantle onto ledges and will occasionally climb ladders. Despite the game's supernatural trappings you don't have magic. You're a samurai with a sword, and will pick up a couple of ranged weapons of dubious utility, and that's it. You don't jump or use aerial attacks or Call Upon the Light of the Ancestors to imbue your sword with lightning. These are intentional design choices in order to stay faithful to the inspirational source material--you're a katana master, but you're still just a normal human guy, fighting normal human guys (until you're not)--so combat will be fairly limited in options to what a normal human can do. Some reviewers didn't like that and found it too constraining. I would agree if the game were any longer, but I didn't feel like it wore out its welcome especially in the late game. There is still a lot to master, though the reviewers are right to say that the core mechanics won't vary too much.
What mechanics you do have are sword combos, more of which you unlock as you progress the story. The combos are designed to do different things, such as pass behind your enemy to his back as a method of crowd control, quickly attack someone behind you, throw a quick flurry of blows that don't consume stamina, or precisely target weak spots on armored enemies. None of these are flashy, because this isn't anime. They are extremely useful however, and absolutely necessary after about the game's halfway mark where duels start to actually feel like duels. Likewise you can block but you have a parry mechanic that is critically important to master by the end of the game, so it's worth your time to practice it a lot near the beginning when the combat is much more forgiving. Parrying and your anti-armor sword combos must be precise in the final levels or you're going to get stuck. Practice now, thank yourself later.
On that note, of the game's 3 difficulty modes: Easy lets you button-mash your way through the entire story if you just want to be a tourist, no skill required. On Normal, the game will still feel like a cakewalk for most of the first half, at least up until you reach the first real boss, but will get quite challenging by the time you find yourself in the titular realm of Yomi. On Hard, it's Sekiro-level difficult start to finish and every single enemy will test you. These are worth mentioning because you should know that you can change the difficulty literally at any time, so if things feel too frustrating or too boring, nudge it in one direction or the other for a bit and you'll have a more enjoyable time with it.
I did finish it, and I very highly recommend it if the idea of "2D Sekiro-lite directed by Akira Kurosawa in 1955" is appealing. While at the end of the day the game is a lot more style than substance, there's enough meat on the bone with dueling to not be brainless, nor too boring since the game's pretty short and you can drop the difficulty to Easy long enough to speed-run a frustrating section if you don't want to waste more time on it. And the style is so well done for what it's trying to achieve that the game's few legitimate faults didn't prevent me from having a great time channeling Toshiro Mifune as I slice through General Kaguro's lieutenants running through the streets of a burning village that looks straight out of Seven Samurai.
Skul--A side-scrolling roguelite platformer, and though not without its charms, a fairly missable one. You're Skul, a skeleton in the Demon King's army, off to single-handedly recapture the King's castle after it's been seized by heroes using the power of Dark Quartz. You traverse through short levels that rotate out randomly, beat all enemies to unlock the next door and get a treasure or boon on the way, beat bosses that also rotate out, die and start again after buying incremental upgrades with the Quartz you collected on your last run--the gameplay loop is essentially the exact same as Hades and similar games, just on a 2D plane.
The supposed differentiator of this game are the skulls you can collect during your run and replace your own head with that change the weapon you're swinging, the magic you have, and most entertainingly, your entire appearance. There are about 100 skulls to find that all do different things, not at all created equal, and they each change your li'l dude to a new costume or physical form that the game's charming pixel graphics make it delightful to run across one you haven't seen before. This is a fairly fun idea and mechanic, and the game's single biggest strength.
Unfortunately, even with that, you're otherwise in for more of the same of the thousand or so copycat roguelite, Metroidvanialite games like this. Which would be fine if you just want another one of those to kill a bit of time with, but Skul seems to be chasing a trophy for just how much you have to repeat the same gameplay loop. Like Hades, its core design assumes that you're going to die enough until you grind enough to unlock enough to be able to withstand enough to get to the next incrementally higher stage, until you've run the loop so many times you can powerlevel your way to total victory. What Skul doesn't do well however is understand how not to wear out its welcome before then, with so much grinding required that you'll get sick of seeing the same mix of 4 level layouts and 5 or so enemies (variations of knights and treants in the first part) before you finally obtain enough Quartz to get another 5 hitpoints or increase your attack strength by 13%. Not all 100 skulls or the other weapons or artifacts are available in the RNG straightaway, so you're going to find a lot of the same stuff, often, and for a long time until you've beaten your head against the wall enough. Also, you have a strangely large hitbox for such a little guy, so be prepared to experience what are going to feel like a lot of "cheap shots" as you try to brute-force your way through another run.
This could be a lovely little game to spend occasional afternoons with despite that there's zero here you haven't seen before if you've played any 2D pixel Metroidvanias in the last 5 years, but I have to say that this game prioritizes quantity over quality too much. The grind frankly feels like a F2P mobile game for how much time any meaningful incremental progress takes, or at least it did to me. There's too little to distinguish this game from better examples of the genre for me to recommend it, which is a shame because Skul himself is kind of adorable.
No Straight Roads--Vinyl City, which is conceptually "what if Tron was about the music industry", has been taken over by EDM as the only music available to citizens. In the opening sequence, friends/roommates/bandmates Mayday and Zuke want to revive the lost art of Rock and Roll and set out on a quest to do so, by competing in an American Idol-style reality show to bring guitar-based music back to the masses. Unfortunately the judges are themselves EDM moguls and it takes no time (well, the length of the tutorial actually) before they all hit the red buzzers and toss the band Bunk Bed Junction to the street. Then, as Mayday and Zuke commiserate on a rooftop overlooking the city, the NSR (corporate governing body of Vinyl City) shuts down power to most of the metropolis to ration the dwindling supply of electricity and unsurprisingly only the rich and elite get to have power. Mayday and Zuke are instantly radicalized with class consciousness and decide to take back the power for the people with Barre chords, quite literally.
This game is incredibly stylish and instantly reminded me of some of the better recent kids' cartoons in both visual presentation and sense of humor. If you liked, say, the recent reboots of She-Ra or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (and I did, for the record), this plays out a lot like one of those series. If you find those kinds of show entertaining, you'll be instantly at home here--despite some initially very corny dialog about The Unending Power of Rock Music, particularly from the wide-eyed Mayday, the dialog has frequent sharp and funny moments and I chuckled out loud quite a few times. You end up liking these characters, both the heroes and the villains, and between the wit and the music and a very consistent visual style, it all ends up being a good time. Though, I absolutely cannot help but point out that even though you're supposed to use Bunk Bed Junction's savvy with "three chords and the truth" to bring down a city full of Skrillexes, it's the EDM that actually stands out on the soundtrack. Bunk Bed Junction's music frankly kind of sucks. Maybe there was a reason EDM took over after all? Ah well. Your side's already been picked.
The game is not a "pure" rhythm game, more an Xbox-1st-gen-style 3D brawler, but timing your combat moves to the rhythm of the music is the major component of the gameplay. It's not exactly "trying to get 100% on Dragonforce's 'Through the Fire and Flames' on Guitar Hero"" level of difficult, but you can't just button-mash your way through any of it, you have to sync your movements and attacks to the beat. Mayday, the guitar player, swings her axe (guitar) and is powerful on single hits. Zuke wields a pair of drumsticks like an escrimador and specializes in fast combos and long attack chains. If you're not playing with two people, you can switch between both at any time during the game, and you will need to since the non-active character can passively heal while you're fighting.
I definitely recommend this game if the idea of playing a light and easygoing modern-day Saturday morning cartoon ("modern" = think Teen Titans Go!, not Ren and Stimpy) is appealing to you at all. It's fun, it's funny, it's easy to pick up, and without giving any spoilers, the boss-level setpieces are large and legitimately impressive. But if you're an adult who is sanguine to a more Gen-Z-style type of entertainment but don't find it entertaining yourself, you can safely miss No Straight Roads--the gameplay is fun enough but not so engaging that it'll carry you through the kind of dialogue and humor that is clearly meant more for your kids than for you. But I'm a middle-aged dude who found it a rather charming way to spend a few afternoons, so.
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Comment on Tilderinos in ~talk
deathinactthree Link ParentA couple of my close friends and I (US PNW) have a concept of this called "Boys Chat", a playful name for us getting together every Thursday or Friday at a bar or restaurant in our neighborhood to...There's a concept of "Men's Shed" I've heard about, where other countries will build a space for men to just gather, and be.
A couple of my close friends and I (US PNW) have a concept of this called "Boys Chat", a playful name for us getting together every Thursday or Friday at a bar or restaurant in our neighborhood to chat about whatever. Work, pets, video games, movies, music, politics to a lesser degree because we don't argue about it, or something that is stressing us out. We never talk about our relationships (we are all with long-term partners), good or bad except in the slightest passing reference.
It's not that we don't have any other spaces in our lives online or offline for this, we do. The point is to intentionally create a supportive space where we can talk about stuff in those areas we don't have space elsewhere in our lives otherwise, even when it's not heavy or meaningful. Like, as in literally a movie you saw that no one else wants to hear about. It's yammerspace.
I like that. I'm coining "yammerspace".
Here in middle age it's one of the better upgrades to my life that I've made.
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Comment on Tilderinos in ~talk
deathinactthree Link ParentEchoing (late) pretty much everyone else in that we have only had a few interactions but you seem like a delight. It's not surprising to me that some people get invited but wash out. That's up to...Echoing (late) pretty much everyone else in that we have only had a few interactions but you seem like a delight.
It's not surprising to me that some people get invited but wash out. That's up to them, and their prerogative, and I see it on some of the other private Internet spaces I'm in. A site like this isn't going to be for everybody, though what I've seen in practice so far in my two-ish years here is "unwelcoming to assholes", and, welp.
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Week 1 Discussion in ~games
deathinactthree LinkBit of a delayed start but dropping in my bingo card to confirm participation if nothing else: deathinactthree's bingo card Mode: Standard Bingo! Finished 0/25 Has dinosaurs Nominated for The Game...Bit of a delayed start but dropping in my bingo card to confirm participation if nothing else:
deathinactthree's bingo card
Mode: Standard Bingo! Finished 0/25 Has dinosaurs Nominated for The Game Awards You control a party of characters Uses procedural generation A romhack or total conversion mod A modded game Has a review score above 94 Single-word title You can save/pet/care for animals Considered a classic From a series you have never played Has a lives system ★ Wildcard Has great reviews, but not your usual type Has a time limit From a genre you don’t normally play It’s already installed Has driving Has both combat and puzzles Has a cozy vibe Adaptation of other media type (e.g. board game, movie) Is considered cinematic Is one of the oldest games you own Has a score system Popular game you never got around to playing Not sure whether or not I'll be able to meaningfully get to much in Week 1 due to current work schedule, but I should have plenty of time this weekend to dive into it. If I manage anything before then I'll edit this comment, otherwise have a writeup in time for next week's topic.
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Comment on Project N - a fork Daggerfall Unity seeking to add all of Tamriel in to the Daggerfall engine in ~games
deathinactthree (edited )Link ParentI put maybe around 250 hours into Daggerfall after finishing Morrowind (and the chunk of Tamriel Rebuilt that was released, which was most of the province) in the mid 2000s and wanting more TES,...- Exemplary
I put maybe around 250 hours into Daggerfall after finishing Morrowind (and the chunk of Tamriel Rebuilt that was released, which was most of the province) in the mid 2000s and wanting more TES, so it was quite a bit of time after its 1996 release.
if you're a person who can immerse yourself in a character and really role-play within the world, deciding on a character arc, you'll likely have fun with it. I am not that person and this is why in ultimately fell off the game.
In contrast to @Beardyhat, I am very much this person, so I had a great time with it despite its flaws (which I'll get to).
Beardy is 100% right that this game only really clicks if you make your own fun. But Daggerfall gives you a TON of room to do so, more than any other game I've ever played. It's meant by design to be the PC equivalent of a TTRPG, so if all you want to do is kill monsters and tick off quest boxes, you'll be pretty underwhelmed. If you have an idea of who you want your character to "be"--their backstory, their morality, the kind of reputation they want to have (which is a thing), their factional preferences, their general vibe--and take your time exploring the story and the world while actually roleplaying the character as much as the game allows, the game really opens up some really interesting experiences. And having an idea is important because character creation and the skill system is so deep that it's impossible to be good at everything--you really need to decide who you're gonna be, and what you decide will completely dictate how the game plays out.
Example: there's a quest you can randomly get where an imp Daedra several towns over has set himself up as Mayor and someone contracts you to get rid of it. If you want, you can just fast travel to the town, walk in the front door of the Mayor's residence, blast the imp with a fireball, and fast travel back to get the reward. Standard RPG stuff....but not very fun and not at all what Daggerfall is designed to do.
When I got the quest, I arrived in town in the afternoon and decided I would wait until nightfall to see if I could catch the imp unaware, as I was playing a Dunmer nightblade (rogue with Illusion magic). So to kill time, I spent a few in-game hours shopping for clothes, browsing a bookstore, and dropping off some armor to get repaired. When night fell, instead of barging through the locked front door, which is a crime if the guards see you breaking and entering, I cast a Chameleon cantrip to reduce detection and free-climbed up the back of the stone tower with my high Climbing skill. As I suspected, there was an exit door on the tower's roof, also locked but no guards around. I attempted to pick the lock but my skill was too low and after a couple of attempts I ended up accidentally breaking the lock. Crap, I said, and in instinctual frustration I just swung my swords a couple of times at the door. This had two effects: it dropped my Chameleon spell, and the door swung open. So I had access now, but no invisibility to guarantee sneaking up on the imp and no mana left to cast it again because I always play low-magic characters in TES.
I made my way down the tower a floor or two and found the imp. I failed my Sneak check so the imp was aware of me but didn't immediately attack. So instead of my original plan of backstabbing it, I used my Impish language skill (which is a thing!) to try to see if I could talk it into leaving. It said no, and attacked. I killed the imp after a short fight.
All good, right? Well, no--remember how I said bashing the lock dropped my Chameleon spell? A couple in-game days later while in an inn on my way to Wayrest I received a letter that a member of the Thieves' Guild saw me that night breaking and entering the Mayor's residence and gave me a choice: join them, or become regarded as competition and die. My rogue character does not play well with others and is not a fan of authority, so I trashed the letter and didn't dignify it with a response. They were as good as their word though. For several in-game weeks later I had to keep my head on a swivel any time I set foot in a town at night, because they regularly sent assassins after me. Not every town and not every night, but often, until I figured out how to clear the bounty on my head, which was its own adventure.
That was just one very minor side quest, nothing to do with the main story, and it spiraled into what became a much longer story of fighting Guild assassins on city rooftops at night while figuring out how I was going to keep them off my back to safely get to the secret meeting with a noblewoman at a certain tavern in Wayrest at the appointed day and time, because time matters and if you don't get there for the meeting then it alters the main quest.
When Daggerfall is firing on all cylinders and you're willing to meet it halfway with your RP motivation and imagination, everything is like this and it delivers an experience that literally no other PC game ever made does. Morrowind comes close IMO and is probably my all-time favorite game, but isn't nearly as complex with truly "emergent gameplay" as Daggerfall can get with its various interlocking story and world mechanics. What you choose to do (or not do) often has direct consequences that lead naturally into more complex stories and the farther you get into it and the more choices you make, the more the overall narrative really starts to feel like playing in a really sticky TTRPG campaign and not like you're just showing up to run on the rail of someone else's story.
Unfortunately, it must be said, a lot of those cylinders can and do misfire. Daggerfall has a lot of bugs, some completely game-breaking. Sometimes suspension of disbelief is a little forced when you're entering the Mages' Guild to claim a contract or a royal hall to petition a king for something and all of the static 2D NPC sprites look like absolute dogshit, even for 1996. Dungeons are incredibly long and complex and it's very easy to get lost or stuck with no way out even with the rotatable 3D dungeon map you have. You're also going to clip through dungeon floors semi-regularly, so keep your save games updated and in rolling stages in case your last save screwed you. Some mechanics like buying a house you can't furnish or investing in a shop that doesn't generate meaningful income are interesting ideas that don't have any real practical value and feel very unfinished. The game can become extremely frustrating when its several dozen evergreen background systems end up conflicting in weird ways or simply breaking the game entirely and making you reinstall, which will happen at least once.
But man, when it all clicks? There is absolutely no comparable PC gaming experience anywhere.
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Comment on Announcing the Backlog Burner event for November 2025: Shrink your unplayed games list this coming month! in ~games
deathinactthree Link ParentI'm in!I'm in!
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Comment on Controllers that work well with CachyOS? in ~tech
deathinactthree LinkI was using a PS5 controller which worked just fine in ZorinOS, my only real complaint was that the battery life was oddly low, like Linux was polling it too often and keeping it awake maybe. Then...I was using a PS5 controller which worked just fine in ZorinOS, my only real complaint was that the battery life was oddly low, like Linux was polling it too often and keeping it awake maybe.
Then a friend gave me his spare EasySMX X15, which looks admittedly a little goofy but I find I like it better. No issues pairing via Bluetooth, no responsiveness issues, comfortable in the hands, build quality has been great, battery life is great. Not expensive.
I confess I'm not positive if rumble works because I don't play any games that use rumbling and I sincerely couldn't care less about it. It also doesn't have the touchpad, there are buttons that replicate clicking the left/right sides of the touchpad though, which has been fine for me. Otherwise I recommend it.
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Comment on Forgot Chrome's unusable, any recommendations? in ~tech
deathinactthree LinkEchoing the recommendations in here for Zen. I switched to it from Vivaldi after Chrome nuked ad blockers and it takes a minor amount of adjustment UI-wise but I find I prefer it. Firefox...Echoing the recommendations in here for Zen. I switched to it from Vivaldi after Chrome nuked ad blockers and it takes a minor amount of adjustment UI-wise but I find I prefer it. Firefox extensions and Sync work, uBlock works perfectly, I never see YouTube or Reddit ads, etc. I particularly like the minimized audio player controls in the sidebar, useful if you're listening to a YouTube music playlist or streaming Spotify or Apple Music etc. in a background tab without switching over to the tab.
I've tried pretty much every browser out there, including the experimental and goofy ones, and here in 2025 in a post-Manifest landscape, it's the best browser going if you just want something simple without a ton of bells and whistles that just plain works.
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Comment on Luigi Mangione wants death penalty count tossed in US CEO murder case in ~news
deathinactthree Link ParentIn terms of incompetence and Occam's Razor, it's not conspiracy at all to say they didn't orchestrate it but picked up the first guy that "looked right", stuck a gun in his bag (according to...In terms of incompetence and Occam's Razor, it's not conspiracy at all to say they didn't orchestrate it but picked up the first guy that "looked right", stuck a gun in his bag (according to reports), and tried to nail him for it. It's the very definition of incompetence.
Not saying either way whether he's guilty, I have no idea, just saying it's kind of on par.
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Comment on I dream with a new mainstream handheld console that is neither an extension of a regular console experience, a smartphone, or a wine-powered Linux machine in ~games
deathinactthree LinkI'm going to ask a stupid question, and for context I just spent the last couple of days installing emulators on my OnePlus 13 and bought a Backbone controller for it: what's the Steam Deck not...I'm going to ask a stupid question, and for context I just spent the last couple of days installing emulators on my OnePlus 13 and bought a Backbone controller for it:
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what's the Steam Deck not doing that you wish it would? Seems to fill that need--it's Windows games but it's still right there--although full disclosure I don't have one.
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is it that mobile games on phones aren't covering that spread technologically or that you don't like what's available? I'm not advocating for it at all (hence emulators) and too many are F2P grind fests but a lot of popular franchises have mobile versions for full-price offline versions of their games, and some are mobile only.
I have my own answers for this but curious about your take.
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Comment on ‘Very significant’ Jack Kerouac story discovered after mafia boss auction in ~books
deathinactthree (edited )LinkI don't have an opinion on what I'm about to say, but this feels like a ChatGPT version of Kerouac so I'm not shocked that it was cut. Even for him it's a bit too hagiophric (is that a word?)....I don't have an opinion on what I'm about to say, but this feels like a ChatGPT version of Kerouac so I'm not shocked that it was cut. Even for him it's a bit too hagiophric (is that a word?). Doesn't add much. I say this as someone whose email handle is based on Dean Moriarty and has been for just over 30 years, and who has met Gary Snyder and Lawrence Ferlinghetti in person. (I swear that's not my entire personality, heh.)
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Comment on What game is your personal "Silksong"? in ~games
deathinactthree Link ParentIt was Elden Ring for me as well. I came to the first Dark Souls a little late because I didn't buy a PS3 until 2012 but became obsessed with it after a few frustrating hours before it "clicked"...It was Elden Ring for me as well. I came to the first Dark Souls a little late because I didn't buy a PS3 until 2012 but became obsessed with it after a few frustrating hours before it "clicked" and I was able to git gud. I played it religiously for over a year, completing maybe two dozen playthroughs with various challenge builds (including doing a OneBro run) and becoming somewhat dominant in the PVP scene. Even after a year I felt like I was still figuring out new things about the world's mysterious lore, especially after the DLC dropped, and the story blew me away the more of it I came to understand.
I eagerly snapped up DkS2 and 3 when they were released but although they are good games, they didn't quite capture the same magic for me as the first. 2 is mechanically great and fun to play but the story was pretty weak and felt like an afterthought. 3 felt better put together story- and atmosphere-wise but honestly tried too hard to be hard, as it seemed to assume (not unreasonably) that most players already had the experience of beating the first two games, so it was a brutal slog for all but the most diehard. Bloodborne and Sekiro are terrific games that I couldn't personally get into at all, but I won't bore the class with all the reasons why.
But Elden Ring totally recaptured the feeling of playing Dark Souls again for the first time. The scale, the exploration and beautiful landscapes, learning things about the world, the fear and wonder of discovering things like Siofra River or Leyndell or the Academy, and maybe most importantly that the challenge level is almost perfect--it's incredibly hard as hell in places but never truly impossible. It exceeded every expectation and I would get up at 4am or 5am many mornings just to get a little more progress before my workday, something I've never done with a game before. It was easily the most engaging experience I've had with a video game since.........well, Dark Souls.
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Comment on What's a product or service that you use but don't want to pay for and why? in ~life
deathinactthree Link ParentNewpipe for Android and using uBlock Origin on Firefox-based browsers (doesn't work on Blink anymore) means I haven't seen a single YT ad in years.Newpipe for Android and using uBlock Origin on Firefox-based browsers (doesn't work on Blink anymore) means I haven't seen a single YT ad in years.
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Comment on What common misunderstanding do you want to clear up? in ~talk
deathinactthree Link ParentOh, that answers my question in my other comment. TIL!Oh, that answers my question in my other comment. TIL!
Definitely feel like my life is marked by eras. Some longer than others, some I'd consider "micro-eras"--my life and the kind of person I was were significantly different at the ages of 17-18 than any of the 5 years before or after that 2-year period. My one summer spent living in Vermont, maybe 4 months, was an era unto itself. Same with the following summer I spent in Detroit.
The easiest way to split them is by geographic changes, as they usually coincide--or, arguably the cause of, though I'd say that's not strictly accurate--with my personal changes in everything from how I looked, how I dressed, what kind of jobs I worked, the kinds of people I associated with, and even my modes of speech (I have that thing where I subconsciously absorb accents very quickly).
0-16 was all basically the same despite the usual upheavals that come with your parents divorcing, getting moved around, and generally growing through and out of a childhood spent in extreme poverty. It wasn't a happy time. I only have maybe 3 pictures of that entire period and I never look at them. The more about it that I forget, the better off I am.
17-18 was an insanely chaotic time unique to itself. I hit my growth spurt just ahead of it, got in incredible physical shape (ah, the ease of youth), had my first relationship and felt "true love" for the first time, watched it burn out, dated around a lot after that, learned pottery and painting, read the classics voraciously as I pretentiously fancied myself an intellectual. Gained a love of specialty coffee which is relevant later and hung out constantly in the 90s cafe culture that seems like such an artifact out of time now. I still miss it. I was someone I probably would not like at all now if I'm being honest, and I cannot honestly say those were halcyon days at all, but there was that exciting vibrancy of finally starting to feel comfortable in your own skin at the same time as everything you "seek out in love and art" is brand new to you and therefore thrillingly novel. Because you're still young and dumb and don't know anything, heh. This was not at all the best or most important period of my life but I realized as I was typing that I just felt like saying something about it I guess...these days in my old age I don't have any reason to discuss it or think about it much in other contexts, but it was the first time in my life that I truly started to feel a distinct sense of self, rough and ephemeral though it was.
That said, I just realized I'm going to bore all of you and myself if I try going through every period, so I'll quickly say:
My college years were punctuated by the periods in Vermont and Detroit but both summers actually had little impact on anything before or after them. They were "pocket lives" in both cases and although plenty of interesting stuff happened that are stories for another day, they were essentially bottle episodes.
Otherwise college years were defined by a lot of struggling emotionally and financially but also meeting my best friend and my wife, learning to roast coffee professionally, and starting my still-going love affair with martial arts which literally turned me into a completely different person. Grad school cost me a fortune in student loans but it was a great experience and I'd do nothing differently there. But still, in those days I was mostly discontent and restless and anxious about my future, overworked and underpaid and desperately wanting out of my hometown, so 25-year-old me would be very surprised and not a little annoyed that 50-year-old me now looks back on that period with a lot of fondness.
In 2006 I graduated with my Master's degree, got married, moved to Seattle, and got hired into the first job of my now-career all within a 6-month period. '06 to '12 was absolutely what I'd consider the halcyon days, easily the happiest period of my life before or since. I was getting established in my career that I turned out to be quite good at, I separately (side business) finally realized my dream of owning and running a popular coffeehouse and roastery, I advanced enough in martial arts that I ran my own school next door to the cafe for several years, my wife's creative career took off. We had plenty of money (not rich, just my first-ever taste of financial security), interesting work, fulfilling hobbies, a great circle of friends. I have more bar stories of that period of time than of any other stage of my life, to the point that more than once I've been told I was suspected of making it up. But it was the one era of my life in which I frequently felt joy, was present for it and aware of it, and grateful to be aware.
So of course there was going to be a downfall. We ended up deciding to move back to my hometown because we finally had enough money to afford buying a house, but Seattle property values were already getting out of reach. This kills the cat. It was an awful mistake for my mental and physical health that in some ways I'm still paying for, despite the fact that we moved back to Seattle five years later because I hated living in the South so much even though our material conditions were significantly better than when we first left. It was a very dark time for me personally. That was definitely its own era, and easily the worst one, to the point that I don't even really want to talk about it this much. A period of severe alcoholism was a result, now resolved. A smoking habit was also a result, not at all resolved. I absolutely hate the person I was then and I would love to forget it all but I must force myself not to, to carry the picture of it in my mind, to remind myself how bad things can get and the importance of choosing and actively pursuing joy in what time remains to me.
Which brings us to the current era, thrown off a bit by the pandemic, but broadly consistent. Well-established in my career but out of the coffee business now probably forever. Materially very comfortable as a result of that career, but with still a lot of anxiety about the future due to gestures around at everything. Still studying martial arts but at nowhere near the same intensity as when I was 25, because I simply can't anymore, my fighting days are over although I'm largely okay with that. Good friends around me but I also don't go out as much. Basically settling into middle age.
The life I'm living now is much calmer, more quiet, slightly wiser, and with people and personal habits both good and bad lost along the way. To the point of the OP, I do feel like the person that lived through each of the above paragraphs was a different version of myself, for better or worse. However, I strongly doubt that this is the final phase, despite my (very intentional) username. As the poet Stanley Kunitz wrote in his 70s in "The Layers", which is a poem pretty much about this entire post concept: "I am not done with my changes."
Anyway, thanks for coming to my TED talk.