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What games have you been playing, and what's your opinion on them?
What have you been playing lately? Discussion about video games and board games are both welcome. Please don't just make a list of titles, give some thoughts about the game(s) as well.
I've been playing a shitload of Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (which I'll shorthand to CO:E33). I'm honestly floored by how much I am in love with the game. I have only ever enjoyed one turn-based game before and that was Final Fantasy Tactics Advance for the GBA. I didn't really like the Pokemon games, I didn't enjoy the other FF games I tried, I couldn't get into Persona 3 when my friend suggested it. But I have been really enjoying CO:E33's combat. The addition of sweet spots, free aim, dodging, and parrying really goes a long way in making the combat more engaging and interesting to me. And each of the party members have pretty different and unique "gimmicks" (in a good way) that make each character feel different to play in your party. I have been having a lot of fun theory crafting and building different party combinations around skill interactions and game mechanics in a way I usually find tedious. The music is incredible; easily the best game soundtrack I have listened to since Outer Wilds. The art direction and execution are top-tier. I love weird and somehow beautiful eldritch horror style of the game. Overall I think that's really what I keep coming back to with every aspect of the game, it is just oozing with passion and focus towards being exactly the game the studio wanted to create. If I tried to explain all the reasons I love this game, I would be here all day. The best summary I can give is that today is my birthday, and the way I have chosen to spend it is by introducing some of my closest friends to this game. I'll try to quickly bullet-point some major points before I go to try and convince you it's worth it.
Honestly, the only "weak point" I've found in the game so far is that I'm super interested in the greater story that's taking place in the wider world of the game that's only been referenced obliquely for me thus far (I'm in the last act and could finish up the game now, but I get the impression that they won't focus on what I want to know about).
The upside of this is that there's absolutely potential for a sequel that explores those topics further, and I really hope it happens! Clair Obscur could absolutely become a series if they want to keep running with it.
Spending a bit more time thinking about it, my main issues are with the UI. I am finding it a bit difficult to plan and re-spec my party because there are so many influential components in different places. Character base stats, weapon stats/levels/effects, picto stats and effects, skill trees, and ability points for 3+ characters is a lot of info to try and juggle in my head at once since the game only lets me view segments of that info at once. It is a bummer because the gameplay makes me want to experiment builds and party combinations but I feel like I need an external app/spreadsheet to make sure my builds make sense before committing to respeccing.
I have been playing this game as well and I am pretty sure it will be the game of the year, but I have a different perspective than you. I LOVE turn based games, especially RPGs. I have played probably a hundred of them since the mid 80s, and this game is not a typical turn based RPG, for better or worse. Everything you said was correct and the game is great and well made, but I feel like the devs were heavily inspired by Souls-likes games (which I despise) and the very heavy use of the dodge/parry/QTE mechanics with very tight timings are going to push away a lot of fans of the genre. I was honestly ready to quit in the first two hours because of this. And had I known more about it ahead of time (I was trying to go in blind due to spoliers), I would probably have not played it purely based on that mechanic. Now that I am 12-ish hours in, I am more used to it, but I still don't like it. Everything else is great just like you said. This isn't surprising given how well Elden Ring did, I just hope it dies down a bit. I wonder how many people bought the game based on the hype and then hated it like Elden Ring (calling myself out again!).
I'm not trying to talk people out of the game as much as trying to stress what the game is so people don't waste their money if they end up hating the style of play. I really wish they offered a short demo so people could try it out.
I've had a hard time getting into it. It has that confusing "this is a different universe where nothing makes sense" JRPG sort of beginning. And the combat system with timed parries and dodges lands oddly with me.
I'm deep into this game too, and enjoying it very much. I think I'm approaching the end of Act II right now. I have to say I'm not a fan of the dodge/parry mechanics myself, and I think that if the 'story' difficulty option was not available I probably would have ragequit by now. I seem to have a very hard time getting the timing right for parries, and for some of the tougher bosses it is basically a necessity to beat them.
Besides all that, though, I love it. Such a well-realized world, and they are not afraid to do big, impactful things with the story.
The systems in the game can get very complex, especially the character builds, but like you said there's no need to minmax to progress, and I largely have just been sticking with what I've got until I unlock something new that's compelling enough to make me dive into the menus and start tweaking.
I say all this as someone who recently played through Personas 3, 4, and 5 and liked them, especially P5 Royal. I can see the appeal of the dodge/parry system and the QTEs, as it makes the combat somewhat more engaging. I just wish there were some accessibility options to tweak how tight those windows are.
Overall, awesome game and you should play it. Also it is on Gamepass if you happen to have that.
I have been playing a lot of MTG Forge's Adventure Mode.
Forge is a unofficial Magic: The Gathering client with a fully implemented rules engine and an up to date card database. I have played a bit of Forge in my time, mostly as a way to test out commander decks instead of gold fishing them. However, I hadn't played the adventure mode before as last time I had Forge installed it was still early in it's construction.
It's basically a modern take on Shandalar and you take on the role of a pixel art planeswalker traversing the world while building a deck by defeating opponents and buying cards from merchants. There are quests and boss battles, it's a lot of fun. It also has basically the full catalogue of cards at it's disposal even inclusding the latest spoiler cards. If you are familiar with MTG at all, definitely check this one out, it's open source and has releases for Windows, Mac, Linux and Android.
I LOVED Shandalar back in the day, I had so much fun playing it! Until I broke the game when I realized that if you had an effect that could happen at any time (say, for example, a Prodigal Sorcerer), you could tell the game to pause at any given phase (say, for example, the opponent's untap step), and you could also tap the opponent's lands, generating mana, which would then hurt them because mana burn was still a thing back then.
Long story short, all you had to do was play Tim and they'd never get another full turn.
Here's the release page for the android APK
Good rec! I haven't played MTG for a long time but that was cute and difficult. I ended up 2-2 with a vampire deck. It feels geared towards experienced players, like there wasn't an undo if something didn't execute as expected or if I accidentally hit next one too many times. I couldn't figure out how to see an effect description, like I couldn't remember Vigilance.
One of the NPCs also got to use its mana pool twice one turn for no reason I could tell. Turn 2 against a lightning elemental, got hit with incinerate, LB, and shock.
Starting off just flat weaker than most enemies is also rough (like less life or enemies getting a bonus cool artifact from the get go), but maybe it's less apparent if you're not as bad as me lol.
2-2 in one of the town tournaments? That's a pretty good result if you went for one of those straight away. And yea, some of the UI needs some polish for sure. An undo button would be great, so many times I clicked on the wrong card.
Some of the dungeons have effects on the mobs to make them harder, or maybe you just ran into a bug?
Yea it's a little rough at the start. I opted to start with a pile of blue/white/black cards (when you select pile you get mostly the colour you pick plus some allied coloured cards) and sold 20 of them to build a 40 card control deck. It wasn't great, but Bribery did the heavy lifting for me a lot of the time. I still died a bunch though.
Nah, haven't done the tournaments yet, 2-2 from random mobs. The lightning elemental was just wandering the over world so I guess a bug? The vampires have enough life link that I was able to persist past its opening barrage and overwhelm it despite the possible bug and 20-12 life diff. I've managed to do a lot better since then in general, I think now I'm around 9-3?
I swapped out some of the vampires for better ones and slotted lightning bolt in, not having one with red present feels criminal!
Any way, been having good fun with it on my phone! Thanks again for highlighting it.
I gave this a try and I'm impressed - did a Rise of the Eldrazi draft and won a set, though autosave didn't fire and I lost the draft and win... I'm sure there's something exploitable, but the draft system had decent priority selection, the AI picks signaled well, and the wheeling rares were obvious constructed bait as expected. Game AI wasn't terribly dumb either, though I don't think they have a good idea of their clock.
Something that game designers don't seem to exploit is how fun it is to build your deck against an escalating campaign. The GBC/GBA Pokémon and YuGiOh card game games don't have a ton of modern parallel. I need to play this more, but if it gets that feel I'm gonna devour this game.
Yea the AI is suprisingly decent although it definitely has weak spots for sure.
Last I checked (~5 years ago) they were using some sort of Monte Carlo simulation for the in game AI. I haven't tried a draft event yet, but that sounds fun, I'll have to give it a go. I know there is support in the game client (and maybe adventure mode as well?) for drafting cubes, I wonder how the AI would do at drafting a custom cube? I'm guessing it might do decent with a normal vintage cube but could struggle with something weirder like the 100 ornithopters cube.
Yea totally agree. Another thing I think would be cool is to remove a larger section of iconic cards from the drop / store pool and give them to pseudo-randomly spawned 'elite' mobs that you can defeat to get certain cards. E.g. there is a druid you have to track down in the green plane to get channel or fastbond from for instance.
The cards have single-number weights (ie the cards are 65 good vs 17 good) that the draft plain tells you as you go along, which I'm guessing are based on MTGO or MTGA pick rates and I'm also guessing the AI has some kind of weight -> color -> curve -> creatures/spells algo it checks against, probably similar to MTGA Quick Draft. If you gave it the cube stats/weights I'm sure it'd process it OK, but like Quick Draft it'd probably fall into repeated biases for certain archetypes that leave particular colors more free more often...
I'll give it another go, but I tried it earlier in the year on an Android device and it wouldn't work. Searching for the error message also didn't lead me to any useful solutions/workarounds. I really wanna try some of my decks before bringing them out for a game, I recently built one that seemed unique and interesting but turned out to not be so fun to play against.
I tried this out on Android, and it runs really well. I've had some fun playing Adventure mode with one of the preconstructed red-green decks. I also haven't played MTG for over a decade and forgot just how fast some decks can sale as I went against a slightly stronger deck that started putting out legendary cards in the first two turns and swept me by turn 5.
I'll probably play around with this when I have time, as my only other card game I've played lately is Slay the Spire which is much different.
I've got almost 80 hours in Horizon Forbidden West. I play the game exlusively for around two months now (I play no other game alongside this). The best testament to how good this game is is the fact that I actually am looking forward to jumping back in - It's like a kid's most favorite toy and I'm the kid.
From my uneducated guess (as I didn't look anything up) I could be somewhere in the middle of the story - I got Demeter, Aether and Poseidon and now I'm going for Faro's bunker in San Francisco. Well, actually I'm not going there yet, I have like a million other things to do. And I love doing everything in this game. It just captured me and I'm completely in.
Other games that achieved this are Horizon Zero Dawn and Witcher 3. I just couldn't put them away, they were so good! It is strange to see mywelf enjoying this kind of games that I didn't really play when I was younger. And I even go for highest difficulties - W3 from the start, Horizon in New Game+.
This is the VR version, right? How has playing it in a headset added to the experience?
I only wish it was. Forbidden West is Zero Dawn part 2, basically. Still standard action RPG, third person over-the-shoulder view.
I actually had the chance to play the VR one though, at my friend's house on PS VR 2.
It is corridor based (or at least the part I played) and you do the things you know from the Zero Dawn and Forbidden West - climbing, interacting, looking for the way ahead, fighting.
The fighting is (as it must be) overhauled, as you can't really run around. Seems like fights are at scripted times and places and you have to draw your arrows from the quiver on your back (do the hand motion of reaching for it and then drawing the bow).
The same goes for the climbing, you have to reach with your hands and do the pull-up motion. In the corridor part, you use analog stick (if I recall correctly). You can pickup things and interact (put something in a crate and then carry the crate and so on).
I never used VR before that and I adapted really quickly. The only problem I had was sliding down the ropes - the motion of going fast and also dropping altitude was too much to handle so I simply closed my eyes for these :-) Otherwise it was very immersive. I read that it tracks your pupils and knows where you are looking and it puts processing power at that spot basically meaning extra graphical details on the spot you are looking at (meaning worse graphics on other places of the image) - I can't confirm or deny that, as I just enjoyed the experience.
And one more thing, probably the most important - you are not playing as Aloy, but you meet her and she looks better than ever!
Very cool to hear your impressions on the VR experience.
The whole movement-in-space thing is a weird one. While I appreciate game makers giving you specific actions to do while predetermined events move you along, I feel like so many VR projects have proven that users can still operate the trackpad while doing actions.
If you get the chance, try out VR Skyrim or Pavlov. They're games that ask a lot from the player, but give the player the ability to move in 3D space while swinging a sword or shooting and reloading a gun.
With Horizon, I'm sure it's Sony's way of reducing barriers to entry for tech that isn't established, but it's also a little insulting for those of us who want more Half Life Alyx and less Harry Potter theme park ride at Universal Studios
Well, when you fight, you can also move to some degree in Horizon game. But to be honest, these kind of games doesn't appeal me in VR.
If I bought VR, I would use it for two, maybe three types of games:
Maybe add fourth category - sports games. And b this I don't mean running, javelin throw etc. but more like exercise in form of Beat Saber etc.
Funny, we overlap quite a bit. I picked up a Vive years ago and loved relaxing in Google Maps and with the odd full screen film.
You're right about racing sims. Playing anything from Trucking sims and City Car Driving to racing and rally titles with an actual wheel is beyond amazing.
For expiration, I've been really enjoying the reimagined versions of Riven and Myst. Skyrim also meets the need here - purely because of the scale.
Valve's commitment to VR has also manifested fully realized versions of Half Life 2 to go along with Alyx as well. It's unreal how well shooters pair with the tech.
One last thing that is unreal about the tech is if you're a designer of any kind. I was building 3D resources for a project in a program called Gravity Sketch and the experience was amazing. Still relatively early in it's development life, the experience of sculpting meshes is already unlike any other.
Riven and Myst would be awesome in VR. And also Talos Principle which is great even without VR.
For simulators it would be trucking sims and then games like Assetto Corsa, Automobilista - the real deal. I wouldn't try Need for Speed even if it was an option, as the arcade style doean't appeal to me in combination with VR.
Too bad it means investing 3000-4000€ to get going (VR headset, PC to run it, sim rig) and also place to put everything in. And then time to enjoy it.
You know, you could do it on far less. A used tethered PSVR2, an i7 with an RX580 -- you'd be surprised how low the barrier to entry is today.
I believe that it's much better today. Still - the money needs to be put into it. And I would have to find space for the rig. One day I will get there (probably).
I played it previously and I would say it mostly improves on the general gameplay mechanics of the original but also introduces several unfortunate things, though some are not strictly speaking neccesary to interact with.
What I really liked was the inclusion of flight, albeit very late, diving and generally more freedom in terrain traversal.
They could have just skipped the upgrade collecting hell and the game would be better in my opinion and it has the open world game syndrome of too much to do without enough variety.
story spoilers
Some of the story beats were pretty weird as far as I am concerned.I didnt particularly like the treatment Faro got, as well as the entire questline. In the Zero Dawn he was deeply flawed, here he is pretty much caricaturized.
The space colony returnees and the consciousness amalgamation they flee from also felt like unnecessary broadening of the scope. Personally I would have liked if they kept it more grounded. The first game already introduced a very rich lore possibilities but also stretches the willing suspension of disbelief budget pretty far.
That said, I did enjoy the game. I consider it one of the few high budget games I liked. Though I also think that the story, one of the main assets of the game, would have been better served with more creative freedom.
I didn't open the spoiler. I also can't fly yet, though I know I will at some point.
The world is open and vast and there isn't that much to do/variety. I do like it though. It must be done the right way though. I liked Zero Dawn, I liked Witcher 3, but I didn't like Skyrim - I can't point out what is different, but it was lacking in some sense. I also go on foot or use horse/mounts (although not that often) and I don't use fast travel at all (not even paid services like Silt Strider in Morrowind), so many hours of my gameplay are just running around. But that way I get to learn about the world and encounter and explore many parts of it that would remain hidden otherwise. I'm explorer and I like having all the map visible. Sometimes I get to areas I wasn't supposed to be (yet) due to this nature :-)
After Zero Dawn I was asking myself how the story could continue - Zero Dawn caught me by surprise and got me completely hooked on the story. But in Forbidden West, you already know the setting, know what happened and I wasn't sure they could pull it off once more. Yet they did. I like how Forbidden West is just like Zero Dawn part 2, it just continues the previous story. And they made it interesting again.
Horizon Zero Dawn and Forbidden West are the games that I put as examples of big studio games done right.
Both of these games are worth their full price. And this is said by someone who is unbelievably cheap and waits for 90% sales for almost all games.
Highly recommend the DLC for Forbidden West if you don't have it yet. Great story continuation and probably my favorite boss fight of the series. Planning to play it all the way through again on NG+ once I'm done with Clair Obscur.
I got Complete edition that includes DLC. I haven't unlocked it yet. And I will likely finish the game on NG+ in the future as well. I di that with HZD as I really really wanted to go through that great story once again.
Highly recommend the $10 upgrade to HZD if you haven't done it already, it's gorgeous. But definitely miss some of the mechanics changes in HFW (climbing and gliding in particular).
I play on Steam Deck and I have finished the game twice. Having said that I don't have real reason to buy upgrade due to possibly having performance issues and also due to finishing the game twice already. Actually I liked climbing more in HZD, it was more predictable.
Finished Bloodborne PC, second run because I missed half of the content on my first. Probably the most polished Souls game, perfect gameplay. I was a bit less engaged in the story than some of the Dark Souls though, but it's still as good as it gets. Thanks to the ShadPS4 devs for making that possible.
Not sure what I'll play next, I have Sekiro left from FROM, but maybe I'll try Clair Obscur (love the music already).
!!!! I had no idea this was in a playable state at this point. How did it run for you compared to the PS4 version?
I didn't either. I sort of halfway kept an eye on it, and the last time it was near gray-scale and running at 5fps.
I gave it a shot last night after reading this and it runs Iosefkas Clinic at 60fps no problems. I didn't enter Yharnam yet. Apparently the game can be played from start to finish without any problems.
Never played the PS4 version but it ran smoothly (mostly 60fps, except for a few areas) on a RTX 2070 (ShadPS4 v0.7.0). It crashes periodically but I didn't mind too much because the game load fast (from a SSD).
There's a few issues left though :
There's a sub for it that can help : https://old.reddit.com/r/BloodbornePC/
I gave it a whirl using shadPS4 0.9.0. Bit of a silly workaround - I didn’t have any means to extract my .pkg files because later shadPS4 versions removed the ability, so I had to download v0.6.0, extract and save off the games, and then upgrade to 0.9.0 to be able to download and apply patches and have everything play nicely on my current setup. I’m on a 3060 and am using the 720p 60fps patch, and while it’s not a buttery smooth experience, I really don’t think it’s any worse than my experience was on PS4. Especially with the added FPS and removed motion blur—that makes it feel so much more crisp. Worked my way through all of central Yharnam last night and beat Daddy Gas & CB without any major stuttering and only one crash in the sewers. What an incredible amount of progress that’s been made with the emulation. I’m truly floored!
This month I've been covertly playing Baldur's Gate 3. Why covertly? Well, almost four years ago I agreed to play Divinity Original Sin 2 with some friends and all was going well for the first handful of hours but things derailed soon after. Some players started splintering off from the group, skimming dialogue/not paying attention, not relaying information they learned in conversing with NPCs, making random choices (not reading), fighting everyone, stealing everything without even trying to be stealthy and so on.
Then it was a challenge to even get the time to play the game together. We have a fairly sizable gaming group which means it's not often where it's only the four of us so that we could continue Divinity without having to leave people out of our main gaming night. When the stars do finally align and we start a session I'm only able to briefly herd the cats before things fall apart again. I could ramble on about the issues of playing this type of game with this group but to cut this short we've been on act three for two years now. We've done a single session in 2025 that lasted about an hour before our resident kleptomaniacal murder-hobo fell asleep at their keyboard and we retired.
When BG3 released and the internet was abuzz with hype the same people that I was playing DOS2 wanted to jump on the train and play it. I refused and told them I would only buy the game if and when we finished Divinity because I knew the experience would largely be the same. As I'm the only one that's played the previous BG games I didn't want to wait until 2042 to continue the series, so I bought the game on GoG and have been secretly enjoying it quite thoroughly on my own.
I believe I'm nearing the end of act one after 45 hours and have been playing as a rogue Tav with my main party consisting of Gale, Shadowheart and Karlach. For a time I was bringing Astarion along but then he decided to help himself to a sanguine snack as I tried to sleep... not cool, man. Lae'zel was venturing with me for a time but ultimately she was just too sour and really bringing down the mood, so like Astarion she was banished to hang out in camp where I only have to hear her scathing judgements on occasion. Wyll has also been relegated to the camp after wanting to initially kill Karlach and for not exactly being forthright with some rather important information, but we're friends now after finding some common ground as we're both missing an eye.
Overall the game has been great but I wish I could get a good nights sleep for once. It feels like each time I try to rest there's a 90% chance that I'm going to be awoken by someone either trying to kill me or jump my bones.
Otherwise the only real complaint I have is about the camera system, like in Divinity, it's okay at best and outright frustrating at worst. It doesn't zoom out enough, the angle of adjustment is too small, sometimes ceilings/overhanging things won't fade out and obscure the view, sometimes ceilings won't fade back in, you can't fully stop it from moving in combat (you can turn off the snap to player on turn but it still moves around while casting spells/attacking). At least there is the tactical view which can help but even that has some minor issues. I feel like I'm constantly fighting with the game's camera, especially when a battle commences in a multi-level area. Despite that relatively small issue I would say that Larian has done a very good job continuing the series.
Would be funny if everyone else in your group did the same.
You know, I have a sneaking suspicion that one of them has. This player was the one that initially suggested Divinity and later made a few comments about how he had come to realize that they are games better played solo, a sentiment I mostly agree with now.
I'm still plugging along on Melvor Idle, the RuneScape-inspired idler. I've got two toons right now, my normal mode run and my hardcore mode run. The depth of this game and the patience required to complete it continue to surprise me.
On my normal mode character, I'm working on getting everything to level 99, so I can get the Maximum Skillcape. I put off Cartography/Archeology for far too long, and I'm paying the price. The mechanics of the two skills are very complex, and, unlike a lot of the other skills, you can't just set-it-and-forget it if you want to do it with any sort of efficiency. I'll get there in the end, though, and then I get to pop over to getting Slayer and Prayer to 99, then, boom, Maximum Skillcape.
On my hardcore character, I've started leveling Ranged, currently at level 63. If you know anything about OSRS/Runescape/Melvor, you know how hard progression slows down once you hit certain levels. I feel like the 60s are one of those plateaus, and then another major one in the 90s. What's the old trope with Runescape? When you hit level 92 our of 99, you're halfway to 99? Slow and steady, they say.
In any case, if you need a second game, something you only need to look at a few times a day for a few minutes, and you like watching numbers go up, I highly recommend Melvor Idle. It's the best idler I've tried. AMA!
Yup, 92 is 6,517,253 xp, 99 is 13,034,431.
In RS3, there are some skills that level up to 110 and 120, and in that 103 is halfway to 110 and 113 is halfway to 120 (and both are significantly more XP than 99, but RS3 has way higher XP-rates, I guess).
Hi, new here.
So I've been playing a heavily modded Cyberpunk 2077 with realism and immersion type mods in mind. I tried getting a steering wheel working with driving, but it did not work well.
I was also playing a lot of Schedule I, but ran out of steam when I realized there wasn't a huge end game. I want there to be more organic issues, more strategy, and more customization as far as like cosmetics and home cosmetics. Even like a tricked out car. I do think a game like this could benefit from more procedural generation as far as recipes and characters go.
I don't see people talking about Planet Crafter very much, sadly, as it is a phenomenal game.
I had a blast playing through the main planet a month or two ago, and came back with their moon update last week and blazed through all the content in 6 days. Played through the DLC and both moons as part of the expansion.
I love this game, it's so much fun and so addicting. A great blend of Subnautica and Satisfactory.
For those who may not have heard of it you are dropped a barren rock of a planet with the task of terra forming. You have to find natural minerals and resources on the planet to build machinery that will increase the oxygen in the atmosphere, heat up the planet, and eventually grow plants and finally animals. And with the new update, you can go to two moons of the planet as well to terraform those as well as connect the DLC planet to your main planet.
It's made by two devs with a lot of love and care out into the game. And if you are a fan of Subnautica or Satisfactory or similar types of games, I highly recommend checking it out.
I've been playing Deliver at All Costs, just go grab it for free from Epic Store.
It's an isometric open-area driving game where you blast through buildings while delivering packages. Gameplay's designed to be fun first, easy to understand and every mission has some sort of unique gimmick where you don't feel like you're repeating the same chore over and over again.
The first third is clearly more fleshed out than the rest but at the same time the game doesn't overstay its welcome. I could write more but I'm posting this just to notify folks who want to grab it for free to grab it. Though I definitely could see myself paying like $15 for it.
For the past several weeks I've been absolutely hooked on Abiotic Factor. I had played about 30-35 hours of it last year, but got frustrated when I reached a certain point with an enemy that you cannot kill, which randomly will follow you (quietly) and if you don't see it in time, kill you.
Finally, a year later I decided to give the game another go and I've made it well past that part, I'm at 50ish hours now and well past that part, though said enemy is still tracking me. But I've learned to listen for their audio cues and also have a "weapon" that assists in scaring them off, so in the 15-20-hours since I rediscovered this enemy, it has only killed me twice, versus what felt like every time previously.
I'm approaching the end of what is currently in the Early Access and I've read that it's supposed to be released this summer, so I'm really hoping that it hits that before I finish what's currently in. I play relatively slowly, only maybe an hour a day, sometimes not at all, so I'm hoping my slow pace will benefit me there.
With the release of Monster Train 2, I decided to begin playing Monster Train again. I had spent about 35-hours with it maybe 4+ years ago and put it down, but I'm happy to have picked it back up again; it works great on Steam Deck and/or with a controller, being just a great fit there. I have a majority of the teams at like 7-10, with one team (the Wildwood or whatever) only just hitting level 5; I absolutely suck with them, but I'm starting to get better with the new Champion unlocked.
The neat thing about that particular monster is that the game does eventually give you a way of containing it if you don't want to deal with the random encounters, though it is a bit expensive and power hungry. If you can't get that yet though, you can make a trinket that stops it from approaching you even from behind.
Oh, I definitely built that as soon as I saw it, which was a huge pain in the ass.
The Leyak has definitely been less annoying this time around, but I'm glad it's out of the picture for the time being.
I just got to Reactors and I'm debating if I should quit playing or not. My oldest is enjoying watching me play, but I also am keenly aware I'm about to run out of game here; but, I do also feel a bit like I'm rushing, because I might be a little bored with the game right now and I do kind of feel like the last few areas haven't been as good as the first few.
I really tried to get into Abiotic Factor, but I just couldn't. I then figured maybe I just needed to get friends playing with me and it would be more fun, since that is usually the case. I ended up with a person that found it too complicated, a person that found it not "action-y" enough, and a final person that 100% got it and was frustrated with the other two. The irony was, this was probably similar to the hypothetical office environment the game portrayed for the scientists. I'll probably give it another go after it leaves Early Access, but I don't think that was what was holding it back for me sadly.
I definitely get that. I grew tired of it on my first go of it a year ago and you definitely have to be in the mood for that type of game.
But it really sticks for me just because it's riffing so hard on Half-Life, which was just a huge game for me back when it came out; feeling like I'm a random scientist at Black Mesa just hits right.
My friends and I went in hoping for essentially a Half-Life themed Valheim sort of game, while at a very high level there are similarities, it's very much its own own unique game. I just wish it clicked more with me. As I said, I plan to give it another go once it leaves Early Access. Maybe going in with more clear expectations will help as well.
Ahh yeah, it's definitely much less freeform than something like Valheim. I actually really enjoy that about it myself, since it's so much more narrative focused, I feel like it really keeps me driving forward.
I booted up Black Ops 6 this week after a couple months of not playing and I still absolutely love this game. It's nice to be able to just queue up for team deathmatch and have some mindless fun while talking with friends on discord or whatever. There continues to be a constant stream of new content, as well!
I'm also still working on Star Wars: Outlaws. I reckon I'm about halfway through the main story. I recruited one crew member, did the Tatooine main missions, and still have another crew member to recruit as well as a bunch of side stuff. I continue to enjoy just exploring the game and living in the world! Being able to get food at the street vendors is a fun addition, for example (and also Nix is super cute!!). I'll keep plugging away on it, I'm enjoying my time! I do recommend this one to anybody who's a fan of assassin's creed style games, where you're kind of living in that world and can have fun exploring.
I was considering starting Doom Eternal since Dark Ages just came out (I loved Doom 2016 and just never got around to Eternal), but I realized yesterday that the Switch 2 is NEXT WEEK?!!?!? so that will likely eat up most of my gaming time soon.
Despite being a huge fromsoft fan, I will likely skip Nightreign unless it gets stellar reviews on release this week. I've also dropped off Destiny 2 entirely. I was still playing somewhat regularly the last few months, but I hit a point where I'm just tired. It isn't a game that you can really play for just two hours a week, you need to set aside 5-6 usually since there's new story content all the time. My last two regular clan members also fell off. I have another group of people I can play with if I want to, but I've just been uninterested, I've had more fun playing single player games and watching a bunch of TV/movies lately. We'll see if the new expansion ropes me back in, but things are looking pretty bleak for the game right now. There desperately needs to be almost a soft reset on the sandbox. It's nice to get new story content all the time, but ultimately I've been playing with the same general gameplay for 1500 hours now and am ready for a change. There are big changes to the armor and weapons systems coming, so we'll see how those feel, but that's more to do with acquisition of weapons/armor, it doesn't really change which abilities you use, how gunplay feels, etc. The game does still feel fantastic to play, it's just that I've done it all now.
RoadCraft
Squad I'm so in. The latest release from Saber, the team behind Snowrunner and Mudrunner, comes RoadCraft.
This game is not a new *Runner game, it is a new game in a new engine where you, shockingly, build roads (and other logistics).
I'm trying to be clear because apparently the whole Internet has decided this is Snowrunner 2, which is not the case. The marketing and everything is very clear it's a new game and yet there are hundreds of steam reviews bombing it because "the mud physics isn't the same as Snowrunner" and "you have to build too many roads" .
It makes me greatly sad for the developers, because as someone who likes doing logistics and enjoys you know, building roads in the game called RoadCraft, it's actually a pretty good release! It's got issues, namely the day one DLC which is pretty gross, I did not buy it. They also released the game in a similar (but not as bad!) state as Snowrunner with some bugs and lacking a lot of customisibilty you'd expect.
But the core game is good stuff, there's a load of content.
Some actual review so far
The game is slow, which I like, but it'll put a lot of people off. The first two levels are pure tutorial (but they don't really tell you that) so you spend a good 10 hours thinking "is this what the rest of the game is like?" but it's not. The first two levels are very linear and billboard all the different types of content quite clearly. Although I think it ironically doesn't do that great a job of explaining everything without looking through the ingame wiki yourself but I digress.
Once you plough through that, the next levels give you a lot more freedom (and more challenge!) to do what you want and it's great. The levels are huge and well designed (something Saber have always been good at) but these are top notch so far.
The gameplay usually revolves around identifying a route that needs either NPC or player traffic to go through (you might need to move a lot of resources or there are NPC trucks as parts of quests to complete goals for rewards). In either case, your usual Snowrunner hole full of mud won't cut it, even some uneven surfaces will have vehicles without AWD or diff lock get stuck. So you gotta use sand and asphalt to make sure these vehicles get there.
When they do it usually let's you complete the next task (maybe you need to move resources to feed a factory to produce a pipe to replace it for a main quest to power a town).
Most people seem to be struggling with the concept and think it's about trucking the roads like Snowrunner, when it's not.
I think something I should mention is this game is a coop game and I mean that the fewer players the worse this game is. One player would be miserable. There is very small AI/helper automation, but with 3/4 people together it is an awesome experience. The opposite to Snowrunner I'd say, where the more players just meant more people doing quests across the map that you'd never see.
There's some things which are different that I have mixed feelings on. Fuel and damage is gone, so there's no real thinking behind range or management of vehicles like that. I'm not super bothered by it because it kinda turns into a time sink and the game is already massive. They confirmed they'd add fuel as a hard mode too anyway in a future patch, but not damage.
There's no vehicle customisation, but there are levels. You get a "rusty" vehicle then you can buy a tier 1 and sometimes a tier 2 version in the store, which are much better. I wish there was a little bit of customisation, like cosmetic, just to make some of my vehicles look cool. But I am OK with the lack of specific upgrades as jesus christ it would be a nightmare to upgrade like 30 vehicles wheels separately. I'm fine with the tier system.
I think reviewers are being rather short sighted about problems with the game. A lot of issues the point out are either not issues with the long term game or an issue with their perception of the game.
Another thing many people seem to have forgotten was that Snowrunner was a mess at launch. It was buggy, mulitplayer barely worked, there was no hard more, no difficulty customisation and the first couple of levels were dull.
Overall, I'm having a blast, it scratch my itch very much in the right place. If anyone has any questions go for it.
I love Snowrunner, but the community around the game is dumb as hell. They scared me off Expeditions until I recently tried it myself with a free weekend and it's just as fun as Snowrunner.
That said, I haven't bought Expeditions or Roadcraft yet, because the Spintires style games (including Expeditions and RC in there) are a particular flavor and I feel like I need to finish Snowrunner before I pick up the newer games. I have line 150 hours in Snowrunner and am only just getting close to completing Alaska.
You're spot on.
And there's a god damn huge amount of snowrunner content, my freind and I played for like 200 hours and only just completed the third map (the first Russian one).
I tried a couple of the other later ones on my own and had a blast. A little bit of me would like to finish it but it's a lot of game.
RoadCraft is a different game though by the way. Unlike expiditions it's got a very different focus, is not let you stop you getting it. It does basically require a friend or more to play.
Oh yeah, I know it's pretty different, I just suspect it has that same feel, if you know what I mean. Slow and methodical.
Hopefully I can play solo, as I do have some friends who would play with me, but I just prefer to play games on my own 99% of the time, not to mention that's what my schedule allows.
You certainly can play solo but many of the tasks (and moment to moment gameplay) is built for coop.
Like there is exactly one truck with a crane. It's a small truck and the crane is medium strength.
Everything else you need a dedicated crane and probably a larger truck setup, so that means driving at least two pieces of heavy machinery to the site (more if you need to factor in any logistics to get the things there) then gotta do the old vehicle juggle to get the cargo on, then drive both over to the destination to unload (again, not factoring in say having to use a dozer to clear a path or a scout to open a gate).
It's a lot more back and forth driving than Snowrunner for one task.
I guess it kinda reminds me of harder core snowrunner where you'd have to setup your fuel and repair logistics in advanced before you even picked up any cargo missions.
Maybe you're OK with that!
I've been meaning to play, at the very least, MM2 for the past couple of years, but every time I fire it up, it just can't catch my attention. Good to know I'm probably not missing a whole lot...
But as you mentioned, the X series has always looked a bit more intriguing, though I haven't even tried it yet.
X4 is one I boot up every once in a while and walk through it. I never got good at the game, and I prefer starting fully kitted out rather than find all the secrets, but it's always a fun run from start to finish.
If you started the series with Mega Max X, which to be clear is a different game series, then you were always going to be in for a shock. The games were amazing on the NES, but I can bet that if I played them now it would be mostly for nostalgia. If you want to give them another try, I'd probably say that Mega Man 2 is the most approachable and timeless and if you beat that end enjoyed it, play 3 and then call it a day unless you're in love with the series by then.
I played the first 6 in the series as they came out, so I probably have a different perspective. Megaman (1) was in retrospect almost like a rough draft of the series where as 2 is where they nailed it and cemented the gameplay which is why I recommended it. MM2 was very popular, so as I am sure you now know, the gameplay didn't really change afterwards other than adding in the slide. So to me as a kid, everything after MM2 just felt like more of the same, which wasn't a bad thing per se, just never quite as fresh and cool. Though MM3 does have the throwbacks to MM2 in it which I appreciate.
There ends the Megaman rant you never knew you wanted! :)
Sidenote: I may in fact have a metal version of the MM2 Bubbleman stage music as my ringtone (performed by the Minibosses).
I'm still on Slormancer (see my overly enthusiastic review from last week), with sides of Last Epoch and a bit of Path of Exile II.
30 hours in Slormancer, I'm still in the mid-game, and still having fun. Though I slowed down a bit to not burn myself out, and I wouldn't mind an update with different & more organic layouts for the environments (along with bugfixes). The focus on crafting is becoming stronger as I'll need the best gear possible for the boss fights, and can't really rely anymore on RNG. I also kinda want to try all the Slormreapers (weapons) that can be remotely relevant to my build, so that doesn't make things go faster 😅
Speaking of builds, I cannot overstate how the real free respec aspect in Slormancer is important. In a game – an entire genre, actually – where the goal is to get as powerful as possible, it becomes obvious that other games are doing it wrong. What a pleasure to freely fine-tune (or completely revamp!) your build just to see if it works, and not get penalized for it.
I've read some takes, mostly on Diablo II, about how limited or costly respecs force the player to make meaningful choices, but the truth is that it only punishes players that make a bad choice, and forces them to follow guides. PoE II is also guilty of this, it's prohibitively expensive to respec your passives when you're still playing the campaign. Players should be rewarded for experimenting, not punished.
Timberborn
I picked this up (even though it's still in early access) due to watching Real Civil Engineer's "Timberborners" series, which is a lot of fun. It's a very sandbox-y colony sim, where your population is made of beavers, nature's engineer.
The new update (0.7) makes verticality much better/more pronounced, and long-distance travel is made easier, so it opens up many more play-styles that were prohibitive before.
This game really scratches that "make things better" itch for me, without being too difficult.
Still mostly Blue Prince. Still finding new stuff every session (1-3 runs). Still lots to figure out and do.
Outside of the it’s V rising with a buddy and Conquest of Eo.
Edit-
And now that I've got a moment, I'll shill Conquest of Eo as easily on of my favorite 4x.
It's a very unique take on the genre that does a good job of streamlining out a lot of the wasted time/bs. It DOES take several runs to get comfortable with how it does that, and it's very much a learning experience since it's asymmetrical (AI is playing by different rules), but it leads to a very tight game design that makes you feel like what you actually picked, rather than "generic faction 38" where they all blur together. The different classes (Alchemist/Necormancer/Artificer in base, and Demonologist/Astromancer with DLC) all play very differently, and it leads to you looking at the map differently each time.
On that note, it's usually a static map. You can play random maps, but that was added later. The different starting positions and the different classes really make you think about how to approach the (MASSIVE) map differently each time. If you're remotely into 4x I cannot recommend it enough.
I thought I'd be done with Bannerlord for a time, but turns out I'm not. I'd intended to just do some combat to train up my characters, but things quickly developed into what I suppose is the next chapter of the story. Here is yet another collection of fun shots.
In the spirit of it I figured I'd recount what happened in a more storybook sort of way.
The story as of today
It is the summer of the year 1115. A messenger arrived from Beniseth in the Scheme Room - Tharos, the leader of the Vizartos clan, was dead. The assassin had been completely successful; no one knew of him. His wife Comatasa had been elevated to the position of leadership. Tyranae returned the messenger to Beniseth with a simple directive - Help Comatasa join her husband in hell.
Tharos was only recently elevated to clan leadership. His predecessor Sichanis was a storied war leader, before and after his clan joined the kingdom of Grandis Larcennae. Multiple times, he led his own armies, conquered territory and provided support to King Mallgoth directly. He passed away in his late 50's, a victim of time. Tharos was less remarkable. Though also a war commander, he never led an army, and did not provide much support himself to either Sichanis or Mallgoth's forces. When Yanagoth rampaged and eliminated Vlandia from history, he was not present in her armies. When Sichanis passed away in 1114, Tharos' ascension was the result of formality and procedure, not the result of extraordinary service or glorious deeds.
Not everyone can be in the siege. The heroic halls do not accommodate many. But for one of such little reputation to demand Tyranae abdicate, to demand those who built the realm should give it away...at the very least, be someone first, before becoming something. That was the central, guiding wisdom of her father - to say to the world, "this is who I shall be" and waver not once in that commitment. Any time Tyranae thought of him, she would remember his wisdom. "Rip and tear, until one is finished," he would often say, "and make sure they see your teeth... oh, and stomp their shit so bad they don't fuck with you again, yeah." The words never left her.
Tyranae had marched with the infantry in Yanagoth's sieges, and the cavalry out in the field for the entirety of the war. She pushed the battering ram at Ostican while her mother charged its gate. In the final struggle at Hertogea, she was among the first through its blasted walls and fought through to the keep. Abdication was unacceptable, the thought of it was odious. So, without hesitation she opened the doors to the Scheme Room and set about eliminating this possibility.
Game talk/New Rules
Tyranae knew she could win, so she stomped, and that means assassinating the leaders of the rebel clan until I get one who understands the score. It's *my* game, like hell some AI dipshit is gonna get an opportunity to drive my kingdom to ruin. It happened to be too, that just prior to my scheme working, we got invaded by the Western Empire (I suppose they were taking advantage of the change of leadership). The war was a good opportunity to solidify the good relationships and isolate the folks trying to rebel. The Scheme Room is supercharged in this context - what used to be a coin flip is now a 9 in 10 sort of move, because it's our kingdom. We know where the targets are better than anyone.I decided I would not utilize the giant hoard of money to change any of my relations with folks. We only grow stronger through battle, that is our way. Now that there is a history to it, I've decided to imagine some more about the characters. Along with that I've set myself the rule that I have to abide by the personalities I create for them. I can't do what's optimal for the game, unless it happens to fit with the characters.
The four siblings all fought together in the last war, each joining as they came of age and all until its end, so they have an unbreakable bond and commitment to mutual advancement. Whether that bond is stronger than the obligations of leadership remains to be seen. Tyranae is daring and cruel, with a deep attachment to her father. Bolverkr is brutish but also very intelligent. Porg... is Porg. He came like that. The only thing Mallgoth was bad at was siege engine production, and Porg is a specialist in siege engine production. He goes his own way. Kalevala idolizes her mom and sticks close to her sister.
That all means:
As ruler, Tyranae is willing to be just as meticulously ruthless as her parents, but pulls the trigger sooner. Where before I might have spared a rebel faction for a while instead I am immediately moving to destroy it. Mallgoth would have done the same, but only when his wife found the most opportune moment. Too, Mallgoth would find rebellion nostalgic, and would have wanted to see it play out a bit.
(It's also the case the rebellion wouldn't have occurred because no one dared fuck with Mallgoth, the four-time king slayer. I've decided his "peasant legend nickname" is "The Last Battanian", and he is famous for saying "There can be only one!")
Bolverkr fights in the infantry, and thanks to the Warlord Pack (mod) reads books (his skills are growing faster than everyone's). Porg fights with exotic weapons, dresses in ostentatious desert kingdom armor, and comes in clutch when we're sieging. Kalevala wears her mother's armor, trains Roguery and Tactics (for the Scheme Room), and often does arena battles. They're all young - Tyranae is the oldest at 23, Kalevala the youngest at 19. The war experience set them up to handle big war parties and the desert adventure honed their martial prowess.
The other two children, Plibbert and Petunia, are significantly younger at 13 and 11. They have not been old enough to fight, and they've not consistently been with the rest of the family since they were 7 and 5. Yanagoth also had them when she was in her early 40's. Plibbert is unstable - I chose his stats at random. Petunia is cunning and silver-tongued, with some points in Roguery and Persuasion. Their only attachment is to each other. Plibbert causes a bunch of shit and Petunia uses wit and guile to get him out of it. It's highly unlikely I'll be able to play as them for a very long time, but the chance exists. Permanent death has always been possible for every character, just way unlikely for younger folks.
The Diplomacy mod is what enables the intrigue, and Fourberie is what allows me to respond to it in the way I've decided. The Western Empire looks like the best target, and I think the deal is that we're going to base our next grand strategic goal on how that goes - if it's easy, then I suppose conquest of all the Imperial lands will follow. If it strains the internal relationships of Grandis Larcennae, I'll have more scheming to do.
I have finished Zero Escape: Zero Time Dilemma.
I've said all I have to say about the gameplay in my last post, so I'll only talk about the story on this one. There are some good ideas buried in there, but I was disappointed by both:
Spoilers for the main storyline
The first of the antagonist's motivations is to ensure that he is born in the future, but this doesn't make sense because he's just a copy created using the Transporter in one specific timeline. There's no need for him to ensure it happens in his timeline, and in fact, it doesn't happen at all during the 'true end' timeline which was supposedly his goal all along.
The second of the antagonist's motivations is to encourage the protagonists to work towards finding the terrorist who causes humanity to go extinct in the future. This comes across as completely unconvincing from a character who is willing to kill off 3/4th of humanity to save the rest. He's willing to pay any price to get even a little more certainty that this will occur. Why would his ultimate goal be a timeline where he has no assurance of that occurring at all? For that matter, if he can see the future by reading the minds of shifters, why hasn't he just worked out how to prevent the bad timeline during the last 100+ years using his vast resources, crazy super powers and control of the Transporter? Surely a more logical strategy than jumping through all these hoops to motivate 9 people to help him and hoping that it works out.
The ability to shift timelines is introduced in the second game, but is subject to a lot of conditions (including becoming infected by a lethal virus). In fact, the entire second game is based around setting up one particular timeline jump which requires literal decades of preparation. However, in this third game, characters jump timelines all the time with precision control, and most of the rules around how it's done and what is required are just thrown out the window (along with lore used in both the first and second games, like more powerful espers suppressing the powers of less powerful ones nearby). The end result is that basically none of the events in the story matter because the protagonists can just jump to a different timeline where they succeed (as they do in the true ending), and it's a mystery why they bother with playing the death game at all or putting up with the bad endings. This is particularly stark in the 'original history' ending where Akane apparently intends to go through the complex set up for the one timeline jump in the second game all over again, despite half the protagonists already knowing how to shift.
Spoilers for other plot points
Just a couple of examples which come to mind:Near the very end of the story, the antagonist kills the dog (who is friendly to everyone and has little plot significance), but no reason is ever given for this. It's totally out of character for the antagonist who is established as being someone who has a precise reason for doing everything, and it's also totally unnecessary since the dog is about to die along with everyone else in 5 minutes. It just feels like something thrown in for shock value because the dog doesn't die in any other scene in the game.
The antagonist is revealed to be 120+ years old, but no reason is given for why he's still apparently perfectly healthy (and still alive at 170+ in the second game). It's just something thrown out there to make the story work and never addressed again.
I'm left with the impression that the writer had some interesting ideas planned for where this story was headed at the time of the second game (the storyline around Diana in particular is good and really adds to the Luna storyline from the second game), but they were just thrown into the pot wholesale in this third game without refinement or sufficient attention given to the connective tissue between those ideas which is needed to make them convincing to the player and sand away all the logical and narrative inconsistencies. As a result, the more the player thinks about the story, the less sense it makes and the less rewarded they feel for engaging with it.
I also played through World's End Club (Japanese language) over the weekend. This is an adventure / novel game with light platforming elements about a group of kids who witness an apparently world-ending event while on a school trip.
The good: The art style and character designs are very simple, but really colourful and clean in a way that makes me think of the art from Pokemon or maybe a Level 5 game. As a result, the game looks great even when it's scaled to 4k (while still running well even on my rather potato computer).
The meh: It's from Tookyo Games, so of course it has the usual death game / traitor among us / plot twist elements, but the writing is clearly pitched at a younger than usual audience and has a relentlessly positive 'friendship overcomes everything' tone to it, which is a really stark contrast to the 'kind and trusting people are the first to die' tone in the rest of this studio's ouevre. This is fine for what it is, but it's played completely straight and ended up feeling too juvenile for a middle aged player like me.
The bad: None of the platforming is particularly difficult, but some of the characters have an uncancellable animation delay of about a second between the button input and the activation of their abilities. This ends up being pretty maddening and can often get you killed when trying to counter an enemy move. It's not enough to seriously hinder progress through the game, but it does make playing certain characters significantly less fun than others.
The game is only about 10 hours long, which I also appreciated. I would love to see more developers try their more experimental stuff out in games around that size.
Semi related: I just purchased a Retroid Pocket 5 in order to properly dig into old Saturn titles while on my exercise bike.
The YouTube crowd that buys these things is excited about the device, but those guys often buy whatever looks like their favorite childhood console, so I'm skeptical of their enthusiasm.
I've played some well made emulation handhelds in the past and some pretty shoddy ones, so I'm curious if anybody here has experience with Retroid products.
No experience with Retroid, but I have several other devices, including a Miyoo Mini, TrimUI Brick and an Anbernic RG405m. The Miyoo was my favorite for years, the Brick is meh, as there isn't any good software for it yet and it has a very obnoxious hardware bug. I love the 405m.
The Pocket 5, like my 405m is Android, which means it will take some setup and tinkering if you're unused to it, but I personally like the ecosystem. Plus it seems that the 5 is trying praise everywhere you look; I haven't seen a single complaint about it and I usually bum around the normal circles for these things.
Can't offer any other advice, but I've certainly looked at the 5 and the Flip more than once, but I just can't justify them when I've got these other handhelds, as well as a Steam Deck.
I'd have followed suit if I were a Steam deck owner, and frankly, I find it difficult to justify duplicating what my Anbernic Arc (the most under loved handheld) can do.
That all said, the Switch emulation and Steam streaming is what has me psyched - especially since there's an official grip that was just released.
If I'm as glossy eyed about it as everybody else has been, I'll post some thoughts.
I looked at your Anbernic device before springing for the 5. Having a low cost streaming device with that calibur of a setup was very tempting.
Streaming is pretty nice! I don't do it too much anymore myself, but it feels so revalatory when you first start off doing it. Though, I did it with my phone and a Bluetooth controller when I first started, instead.
But yeah, that's how I feel every time I think about getting a new handheld: do I really need this? What would this do that I can't already?
The impulse to just buy, buy, buy is so strong, and it's moments like this where I'm blown away at what consumers we all are.
Caves of Lore - an indie RPG made by one person over years.
It has a solid pixel artwork and the exploration manages to create a solid base experience. The story is scattered around in keyword based dialogue and various texts and actually manages to deliver on the lore part.
There is also various jank that is probably to be expected and can be worked around but definitely harms the experience. UI, especially inventory is not really there, it is functional but cumbersome. For inventory it is also significantly added to by the large amounts of various loot. The moon and rune puzzle mechanics are not explained all that well.
My biggest gripe with the game is the unceasing fights. Thankfully there are no random encounters but mobs are everywhere and the player is effectively expected to fight them to not fall behind.
Personally I would rate in as solud for what it is but really in need of polish. Sequel seems to be in the works so hopefully it manages to improve on parts of the experience.
Certainly looks neat! I went to look this up on Steam and it turns out it's already on my wishlist; it looks a lot like Skald: Against the Black Priory, which was awesome, though I don't feel it packed the polish you describe for this one.
StarVaders (Steam Deck): I've been feeling the itch for a tactical, arcadey sort of game and this was a game I heard about last week. Think Slay the Spire + Space Invaders. You control a little ship that starts at the bottom of a tall grid. Enemies spawn in near the top and progress down. Your goal it to clear all the enemies. I'm really enjoying it.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (PS5): I finished the game at the beginning of the long weekend. I really liked the story, I thought it earned its twists and maintained it strength throughout. I've seen some discourse around how it ends; I think it pulled it off. In all I'd give it a 9/10.
I've been playing a lot of Old School RuneScape recently. The game is receiving its first new skill update later this year in the form of Sailing, which promises to introduce a new way of exploring the game, along with many new locations and skilling methods.
At the moment I'm quite close to "maxing" my character, which is when you reach level 99/99 in each of the game's 23 skills. I'm currently at total level 2250 of 2277, but the game's exponential experience-per-level, along with differences in levelling speeds between skills, means I'm still about a sixth of the way off — and apprehensive that I won't "max" before Sailing is released!
Star Wars Jedi: Survivor: I just finished this after getting Star Wars pilled by Andor season 2. Not just a great game but a great piece of Star Wars. I really hope they try - I know they won't - to include these characters in whatever Star Wars stuff Disney does next. Seems like a real waste not to. And really hoping the next game turns out since the director of this and the previous game (Jedi: Fallen Order) left Respawn and started his own studio.
Haste: I would describe this as an indie "Sonic Like". It's SO much fun, and so satisfying to play. It just seems a little under baked but it does look like the game is being actively updated.
No idea what I'm going to play next! Maybe that Star Wars Outlaws game from Ubisoft, or Battlefront 2.