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Save Point: A game deal roundup for the week of February 25
Add awesome game deals to this topic as they come up over the course of the week!
Alternately, ask about a given game deal if you want the community’s opinions: e.g. “What games from this bundle are most worth my attention?”
Rules:
- No grey market sales
- No affiliate links
If posting a sale, it is strongly encouraged that you share why you think the available game/games are worthwhile.
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Steam has a 2k Sale on. A lot of things are >80% off.
Stardew Valley is 50% off on Steam:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/413150/Stardew_Valley/
Noted by @steve in this post that there's a possible final major update for the game on March 19th. It's an excellent chill game that has sooooo much content, totally worth it even at full price.
also note that this is the third or fourth “final update for realsies” he’s put out. it’s an incredible game even if he is for realsies this time.
Steam has a Dinos vs Robots sale here:
https://store.steampowered.com/category/dinos_robots
I wanna say Detroit: Become Human and Talos Principle 2 are the highlights that I'm seeing here, I wanna pick up Ultrakill at one point too.
I had a lot of fun with Gravity Circuit (Mega Man but with punching).
MegaMan Zero basically! It looks interesting, I'll add it to my list haha
Nice! Talos Principle is definitely on my list and its steam deck friendly. Thanks for pointing that out.
Horizon Zero Dawn is only $12.50 USD on Steam right now too, which isn't a historic low but still a pretty good price: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1151640/Horizon_Zero_Dawn_Complete_Edition/
This is great price for at least 60 hours of gameplay of this excellent game!
For any possible buyers - don't spoil it for yourselves, don't read up anything on it, buy it just based on you liking action RPGs and based just on the game screenshots (medieval warfare against sci-fi robots). Go in blind and you will love the story!
Despite not knowing a whole lot about this game other than what I remember from the release trailer ages ago, I've been wanting to play it ever since it finally came to PC... but I also didn't want to pay $70 for it!
I picked it up right after I made my comment, and have played for a few hours already. So far so good! But also so far it seems more like Stone Age warfare against sci-fi robots, rather than medieval. Still a super cool concept though, and for a slightly older game (2017) it still looks great. The gameplay is also pretty good so far too... it's basically Farcry: Primal but against robotic megafauna, and I'm not complaining. :P
p.s. The Complete Edition PC port is great too, BTW. On my 3070Ti it runs perfect (120+ FPS) on Ultra settings in borderless window mode, and it even supported my ultrawide 3440 x 1440 resolution without me having to mod or tweak anything either. The only thing I needed to change was the FOV from the default 70 to 90, but there was thankfully an option for that in the settings.
Have a good time with this game! It is stone age weapons at the beginning of the game, you will get new stuff through the game. The story is great and if you don't know absolutely anything about the game other than how it looks, you will have a great time learning everything about it.
If you could, keep me posted (in this thread) here and there, please, I would love to see someone go through the game and their feelings how it all unfolds and clicks together!
Will do. I don't know how much time I will actually have to devote to playing it over the coming month though, and I'm also especially slow at playing most RPGs since I'm a completionist, so tend to spend an inordinate amount of time exploring every nook and cranny to find all the secrets, earn enough currency to buy everything, tinkering with different builds, etc. But I'll still try to remember to post whenever I encounter something that I find particularly interesting, or reach a story milestone. :)
Then ypu are in for 100 hours instead of 60 :-) I'm the same as you, I have to go everywhere and explore everything and my first playthrough with DLC included was 100 hours bang on.
LOL, yeah, whenever I've looked at HLTB's Completionist times for games, if I add another 50% more to that, it's usually been pretty close to how long it's taken me to finish that game. So 100 hours sounds about right for my HZD playthrough.
HLTB is without DLC though :-D I finished the base game in around 60-70 hours while doing basically everything and not using fast travel. That was medium difficulty.
I have replayed the game on Ultra hard half a year later just for the story (and achievements, did one side storyline as well and just a bunch of side quests) and clocked around 40 hours. That would also.somehow correspond to HLTB.
I'm pretty sure the Complete Edition HLTB times actually do include the DLC, since all the DLC (including the Frozen Wilds expansion) is included with that version of the game. And the HLTB Completionist time for the normal version is only 61 hours vs 76.5 hours for the Complete Edition.
Sorry, I missed it's with DLC in your link. Yeah, 61 would seem about right. I think DLC is longer than 15 hours though, I still think you are on a 100 hours ride :-)
Game Spoilers
I can see where the Medieval elements come in now. I got to the main town, and met the mercenary in basically what amounts to brigandine/lamellar armour... but also met a bad guy with a light machine gun at the end of the brave trial. Anachronisms abound! :P
Oh boy, there is so much waiting for you!
Spoiler
Well damn, this just got super scifi. I went into my first robot factory bunker thing, and it looked crazy futuristic inside there. Also kinda meh as far as the mechanics go though, unfortunately, since it was just a long linear path with some pretty weak enemies all throughout, even at the end. But still super cool looking, and it was nice to finally see where all the robots come from.
Overall, Ive been pretty satisfied with the combat so far though. Lots of reasonably difficult fights, even on medium difficulty. But the robot factory fights were pretty easy and underwhelming because my expectations were set so high. The pack of robots just outside the factory were way harder than everything in the factory. :/
Yup. And wait until you know more.
Are you questioning the story or the game world yet?
Spoiler
Other than the standard questions I presume most people would also have had at this point in the game (E.g. what's behind the door in the mountain? Is it a Fallout style vault with people living inside it? Who is Aloy the daughter (or clone) of? Why did the robots turn on humanity? Etc.) not really. Based on all the lore data entries I've found so far, the world seems pretty straightforward; Climate change caused massive societal problems, robots rebelled or went rogue somehow, the World went to shit, and society regressed as a result of the catastrophes. I've seen nothing to indicate the story or game world is anything other than what's been presented at face value so far. But based on what you asked, now I'm thinking I maybe missed something... either that or you think I'm further into the game than I actually am, and so should know more. I haven't even made it out of Nora territory yet though. So please don't spoil anything if there is more to the story or world. ;)
I won't spoil anything, don't worry :-) I just wanted to know what you think so far. Don't over-explore or anything like that because of my question - you're doing great and I think you didn't miss anything at this point.
Ah, okay good to know. I was worried I somehow missed something major. :P
Hah. I do that anyways. I've already found the majority of the collectables for the first area, including all the datapoints. And I fully intend to go find the rest before I finally leave the Nora lands. :P
I over-explore too. I just wanted you to know to don't do that because of my question. If you are going for datapoints, you will have a great time with the game story-wise! You don't even need to find all of them (the major ones are more obvious, you will understand when you find them), even though you will probably do so without too much of a hassle.
It's great to speak to someone playing the game for the first time and listening (reading) what they found out and how the game is so far! I have finished the game kinda exactly a year ago and replayed it three months ago, memories are still live!
Spoiler
Finally made it to Meridian. Pretty cool. Has an Aztec culture mixed with Thai architecture feel to it. Also found Olin. Dude was just trying to save his family, and he doesn't seem like an evil person, so I let him live.
But now I am wondering who the mysterious Focus hacker is though! I'm really starting to lean towards this being a Fallout style Vault type situation, especially based on the other ruins I found with the people who committed suicide, and the other with the special armor inside it. So I'm assuming the woman who I look like, and the hacker, are probably Vault dwellers of some sort.
p.s. Only major criticisms of the game I have so far is some of the minor character's voice acting is terrible, and the inventory management is a massive PITA too. I wound up using Cheat Engine to make every inventory item stack to 999 so I didn't have to deal with constantly running out of inventory space even after I upgraded all my bags to max level.
I understand why you made your inventory stack to 999. I didin't as I considered it a part of game where you have to manage what you bring with yout (what you need) and forfeit the rest. It was PITA though.
You seem to be raising great questions! I'm looking forward to your next comment!
The datapoint from the other comment - You will find how significant it is.
Spoiler
Well, Maker's End had most of the answers I was looking for.
She's not my birth mother... unless she's immortal or cryogenically frozen somewhere. ;) The computer there said "Greeting Dr. Sobek, you're 355,500 days overdue"... which is 1000 years ago.
Elisabet Sobeck became Chief Scientists at Faro Automated Systems. She designed "green" robots to reverse climate change, but resigned after Faro started making weapons. Faro then somehow lost control of a self-replicating, biomass consuming "swarm" of "Peacekeeping" robots. Sobeck then forced Faro to fund the creation of "Project Final Dawn" to save humanity from extinction, although what that entailed, who knows. I assume cloning tech in the mountain vault to keep humanity from going totally extinct.
And I am also picturing a 12 Monkeys kind of situation regarding how the robot rebellion started. That Center for the Liberation of Bodiless Intelligence or other AI rights activists probably hacked the swarm to "set them free" or something.
Also, pretty awesome that Lance Riddick was playing the hacker, Sylens. I knew I had heard the voice before but didn't put it together until he showed up as a hologram. RIP to a fantastic actor. :(
Yes, that's the place where you get some answers :-) And you get whole new set of questions as well.
You are advancing quickly! I'm can't wait for anoher updates! There is still so much to learn!
This game is one of my top games ever and that comes from someone who play on PC since 1998 and did some NES-clone gaming probaly even 5 years prior so I have played quite a few games... And why it's so highly praised by me? We can have this discussion after you finish it :-)
I'm going to be weirdo - would you mind adding me as friend on Steam (I presume you play it there)? I can PM you invite code or whatever. I will understand if you say "no".
Yeah, I'm hoping I can finish it this weekend, so I can get back to reading Cloud Atlas. :P
Not weird at all. And I don't mind at all either. I have a bunch of people from Tildes as Steam friends already. Sent you my friend code via PM.
Wow, you have quite some goal for this weekend! Thanks for the code.
I'm not much of a reader. I rather play games in free time. But sometimes I have to scratch that itch... Now I'm reading Adam Savage's book about crafting/making stuff. Great read from experienced maker!
Oh, nice. I'm a big fan of Mythbusters, and Tested. I didn't realize Adam had published a book though. I'm going to have to check that out!
Finished the game, all the side quests that I could find, and the expansion. It only took 47 hours, but I also didn't 100% it though, nor do I feel the need to, TBH. All that's left is collectables stuff (the rewards from which kinda suck), and a handful of datapoints that I missed, which I can just read on the wiki instead.
It was a great game though, and I really enjoyed it. I especially liked the quests and story for the expansion area too. But I don't know if I would classify it as amongst my "top games ever", even though it's one I would still wholeheartedly recommend to others. It was absolutely worth the $12, and I likely wouldn't have been disappointed even had I payed full price for it... which says a lot!
However, if I had to criticize anything gamplay-wise, it would be the inventory management being a PITA. As well as the fact that the mounts were super clunky and didn't feel much faster than just running, so I almost never bothered using them. IMO it would have been way cooler, and more useful if we could have mounted the flying robots instead.
And my only story criticism is that the amount of exposition in the vaults was way too much. E.g. The vault under the Shadow King's palace took me well over an hour, mostly spent just listening to things, and not having much else to do since the fights were easy AF, and the puzzles rudimentary. And the exposition was also presented in a pretty uninteresting way, mostly via audio datapoints and holograms. I feel like they could have tried to make it a bit more engaging. That's a pretty minor complaint though, since the story itself was excellent and really intriguing.
p.s. I didn't realize there was sequel, which I'm also glad to learn is actually coming to PC this month! So I'm definitely going to have to play that now, especially with how the first ended. I might even pick it up at full price too, just so I can jump straight into it before I forget any of the story from the first one. :P
For others: spoilers ahead in this thread (if it continues)
I'm glad you liked it!
It is amongts the beat for me simply because of the story. Since all I knew was just medieval vs. robots when I bought the game (I didn't even watch a gameplay or read a review) I went really blind. I didn't even read/catch the loading screen that says aomething about Earth.
I didn't care about the world that much until I realized that the ruins (I mean on surface ones) are houses from our own era, that there are traffic lights and there were crossroads sometime in he past. That those are some high-tech tanks that are wrecked everywhere.
When I found a few data logs (I think they are called vantage points? Those where a man talks about apocashitstorm) I started questioning myself if this is distant future on the Earth. That it must be. Then why are all people equipped with such crap weapons and armor? Then I saw that advanced armor in the bunker and it was clear that once the mankind had technical knowledge and was advanced. Then again - how did we end up like that?
When I reached top of FARO building in Maker's end and saw Sobeck argumebting with Faro, it was jaw-dropping for me. It dawned on me (pun intended) and I realized the scope of the story. Until this point it was just action RPG (adventure) game with fancy enemies. Since then it was great story driven adventure with enemies becoming minor nuisance.
When I went into Zero Dawn (under Sun ring) it was another sequence to he story that left me questioning many things again. But it also delivered many many answers. Once again - jaw-dropping. When you go into Mother's mountain (hope the name is right) and realize for sure that you actually are Dr. Sobeck, her clone, respectively, and you were born to remake Gaia/project Zero Dawn, it was just cobtinuation of excellent story. Realizing that Faro one again fucked up big time is just the topping on a cake.
I was totally blown away by how the story is build and how perfectly it is executed and delivered. It was one hell of a ride for me. I haven't played that many games that were of such quality. This is one of the best in my eyes and it's all thanks to the setting, story and how it is served to the player. I don't care about skills, number of weapons, enemies, quests, collectables... even the inventory space. The story itself absolutely overpowers anything that may be wrong on this game (for me, that is).
I'm looking forward to Forbidden West too. I hope it runs on Steam Deck at least somehow okay-ish. If it does, I'm buying it. I may do so for full price as well (which is something unheard of in my case).
HZD is also the only game I have played twice in one year. I finishedit in February 2023, I got that Horizon itch after he summer, so I bought Lego set with Tallneck and built it and it is proudly on display in our living room (wife doesn't approve, but she tolerates it). The itch didn't go away though, so I jumped into the game once again in fall to get those New game+ achievements and to re-live the story once more. Truly a masterpiece in my opinion.
DLC not that great. It was great in terms of gameplay, but not that much story-wise.
I had the chance to play a few minutes (maybe an hour) of that Horizon VR game on PS5 and seeing the robots "with your own eyes" is great experience all by itself. Not worth the money for me though... I'm cheap :-)
That guy was a straight up narcissistic sociopath. He was a great villain, but holy hell was he just the absolute worst human being ever. I got angrier and angrier with him as the game went on the more I learned about him and his actions. And when he finally killed all the Alphas working on Zero Dawn, the people working so hard to save humanity and clean up his mess, and then he intentionally deleted all the world's collective knowledge, I was genuinely furious! He justified it with all sorts of bullshit about letting future generations start fresh in innocence, removing the burden of knowledge, blah blah blah... but I think it was actually for a much more selfish reason. Even if he couldn't admit it to himself, I think his ego simply couldn't handle the idea that all future generations were going to grow up knowing that he was the one responsible for the end of the world.
This is why I love the story so much. It runs deep and is well connected together. It's a masterpiece adn I love how it is served to the player - first through datapoints and vantages, then by holo projections of history/archive data, then you come into Zero Dawn's facilities and see for yourself. Aloy coming "home" to see her "mother" (herself) is nice ending for such game. And Sylens... What's he up to?
I'm questioning myself about Forbidden West - the moment of surprise is lost (I mean what the world is and how it became to be like that), would it be that great of a story without it? Only one way to find out.
If you are achievement hunter, give it a go once again on Ultra hard. The game is much more challenging even with all of your arsenal. Not that hard though :-) I'm not a good player and I finished it without troubles. HZD is one of not many games (probably max of 3) where I deliberately wanted to 100% finish it with achievements. I wanted all the game could give me.
On the side note - which enmy, or rather machine, do you consider the worst? I mean the one you didn't want to fight (again) and rather tried to go around?
Definitely both flying types. Mostly because they could spot you from miles away, would follow you forever once aggroed so you couldn't just ignore them and run away, and it was also a PITA to hit their vulnerable spots. It wasn't until I finally got the Improved Icerail, and modded it with very rare +damage mods that I could finally deal with them more easily.
The Sawtooth was also pretty challenging at first too, simply because its only vulnerable spots were on its ass and underneath its belly. So I typically just avoided them whenever I could. But once I got powerful enough weapons to one or two shot them, they didn't matter as much. However Stalkers remained a challenge all throughout because of their cloaking and how ridiculously fast they were.
I really enjoyed the combat though, which reminded me a lot of Monster Hunter.
I haven't played Monster Hunter. Funny fact - I kinda thought I was buying Monster Hunter game when I bought HZD :-D This shows how blind I went into it.
I hated flying and stalkers too. Glinthawks became rather a nuisance lter when you can shoot them down easily. Thunderbird wqs challenging through the game though. On Stalkers I deployed tactic of being hidden until I saw the "shadow" then I shot the arrow that strips components (can't remember the name) which stripped them of cloaking and then it was quite easy. If I couldn't spot them cloaked, shotting nearest mine made them show up on the scene. Once you can override them it is also much easier.
The only machine I actively avoided was Rockbreaker. I killed like 3 in the whole playthrough. I actually feared them -being armored all the way with weak spots being big (their paws) but machins being quick and travelling under the surface with long ramge attack... Yeah, I wanted to avoid them everytime.
If you try and play on Ultra hard, be ready for dodging. More tha attacking :-)
The Monster Hunter games are way way better than Horizon Zero Dawn when it comes to the combat mechanics, IMO. But they can't hold a candle to HZD when it comes to story since, like a lot of JRPGs, their stories are pretty nonsensical, bordering on incoherent, and are full of over-the-top and often annoying characters. However, that said, story is not really their main selling point or focus. It's all about the monster battles, which they absolutely excel at. That and them being coop makes a huge difference too, since being able to play with friends makes everything better. And despite them lacking in the story department, I have over 130 hours played in MH: World, and only slightly less on MH: Rise.
Also, damn, I never thought to lead off with Tear weapons on the Stalkers to remove their cloaking first! I usually just riddled the area with tripwires, traps, and proximity grenades to deal with them instead.
But I actually didn't really use Tear specific weapons all that much, since my primary arrow type had pretty good Tear anyways. The only time I really ever used Tear specific weapons was against that huge robot with the missiles and drone launcher on his back, and machine guns on its face. That one I would always equip the Tear Canon, run straight up to it, and use it to strip absolutely every component off of it before doing anything else. They're actually pretty easy to kill once they have no armor anymore, you can use their own heavy weapons against them, and the only way they can attack you is in melee or by charging up their mouth laser (both easily avoided). :P
And TBH, I didn't find the Rockbreakers to be that difficult either for similar reasons. Their attacks were pretty easy to avoid once you know the attack patterns, so I barely ever got hit by them... other than the first time I fought one in the quarry since it took me by surprise. I only avoided them because they took so damn long to kill because of how much health they had, and how much time they spend underground where you can't do any damage to them.
I meant the arrow type that has tear damage but also that specofic noise and kinda audio vibrations (circles) coming from it when it lands a hit. That way you don't even have to hit the cloaking subsystem at all.
I was suprised how I didn't even need or used half of the arsenal. It all came down to fast bow, precison bow and bomb slingshot. Precision bow being the opening shot of the fight (and many times this first shot was also the last one in a fight), fast bow for doing huge damage in short time and bomb slingshot whenever the situation didn't playout to my liking.
DLC was different though. I remember using various weapons there.
Maybe I should have fought Rockbreakers some more to learn some tactics. I did the quarry one (hardly lived through it) and then stumbled upon their site by chance. And then there was one in a side quest. That's all. Ever sine then I took a big hike around their territory every single time.
And the big one - Thunderjaw. It was very intimidating when I saw the first one. But they are quite easy. I usually shoot their weapons down with precision bow from behind some cover and then it's just target practice...
I'm so glad you liked the game and shared so much about your first gameplay with me! It's great when I see someone playing the same game that left me... touched, I guess? It sits beside Half-Life, Final Fantasy X, Talos Principle and maybe a few more games that I value and praise the highest! For me, this really is a masterpiece. One of a kind. Thanks to setting of the game, combination of fantasy and sci-fi and massive thanks to story and how it is served and executed upon player. I know I keep saying it all over, but I just have to. HZD had massive impact on me, I didn't know and couldn't anticipate what was waiting for me when I bought it.
The story definitely touched me as well. I didn't cry, but I got close a few times, and it tugged at my heart strings, for sure. :)
Yeah, I didn't mean "touched me" in a "I cried" way, but it just worked with me really well. It was almost like I was part of it. I wanted to play the game more to know more about he world and the story.
I have already named some, but there were a few games that were like this - Talos Principle has this strong driving force to it too.
And Final Fantasy X is still the best game I have ever played (story-wise) - I was there wih them. I played everyday for a few hours because for some period I lived my second life in Spira, I had to join my party and help them. This hasn't happened since. But HZD is close.
Spoiler - Really interesting datapoint I found
I'm not sure I'd call it an action RPG. Unless I'm forgetting things there isn't any bespoke leveling systems. It does have a lot in common with them though.
I'm not exactly what I'd call it. A cinematic combat sim? Open world adventure game with fighting? The best way I think I can describe it is that it's an action-adventure game that is close in presentation to something like Assassin's Creed. It's something that's in the melange of a lot of AAA games but it's got a whole lot more creativity involved to spice it up.
I would definately recommend it, though. I played it on PS4 but with this kind of price I might consider buying the PC version, even if I won't necessarily play it for a long time (if ever).
I came out of Witcher 3 with that action RPG comparison. You are right in that it is more Assassin's Creed though (I played only Black Flag, might be different from newer ones). It will be more like action-adventure. Although there are skills involved... It is hard to categorize this.
But it is one great game nonetheless, if you go in absolutely blind, you are there for unforgettable ride!
Toki Tori and Toki Tori 2 are on sale on Steam for less than 2.5€ combined. They are cute puzzle platformers, each one play very differently to the other, both will get you thinking. If not for you, then maybe buy it for your kids (available on other platforms too, Switch for sure, don't know if it's on sale there right now).
Deep Rock Galactic for $10 on Steam!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/548430/Deep_Rock_Galactic/
Probably one of my favorite games in general, it's super fun with friends.
Humble has a Bundle for the new GDQ Event:
https://www.humblebundle.com/games/games-done-quick-frost-fatales-2024
Be sure to set your sliders if you're donating! Dicey Dungeons is a favorite of mine, if you're into games like StS and Balatro, it's sort of similar.
Epic Games Store Free game of the week: Aerial Knights Never Yield
https://store.epicgames.com/en-US/p/aerial-knights-never-yield
Second endless runner in a row, but free is free -shrug-
Game: Mount & Blade: Warband
Store & Platform: Steam
Discount: 90% off
End Date: 7 March 2024
Reviews: 🟦 Overwhelmingly Positive (97% of ~123,000)
Opencritic: (not on OpenCritic)
Steam Deck: 🟨 Playable
ProtonDB: 🟩 Native
HowLongToBeat: 78 hours (Main Story) / 276 hours (Completionist)
Happy Women's Day! (Week? Idunno)
Steam has a sale for games by Women led studios.
https://store.steampowered.com/sale/womenday24#supporters
The only game I know of here is Mini Motorways, which was pretty good if you liked Mini Metro iirc. Please point out any games that might be good!
Nomads of Driftland: The Forgotten Passage giveaway on GoG:
https://www.gog.com/en/game/nomads_of_driftland_the_forgotten_passage
Dead Cells and all it's DLC on sale:
https://store.steampowered.com/curator/32971341/sale/deadcells
Note if you have a couple of the DLC's you might be able to get it cheaper in a complete bundle:
https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/30317/Dead_Cells_Medley_of_Pain_Bundle/
One of the best Roguelikes, imo. Fast and responsive combat and difficult to boot.