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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 thoroughly enjoying Vintage Story. I had written this off a few times as a minecraft clone or whatever, and admittedly it kind of is that, but it is an extremely well-engineered and immersive survival simulator with its own unique vision for what the world is and what the role of the player should be in that world. Highly recommend it to anyone that is into the FtB minecraft modpacks or who enjoys games that model effort in crafting.
After doing another 2077 playthrough after its "final patch" played some various casual games I don't entirely recall and am back in BG3 now that it has also had its "final patch". Playing as-evil-as-possible this time with a Dark Urge Gnome Rogue with Astarion and Shadowheart (so far). Played as Karlach the first time (shortly after release) and had Wyll, Gale, and Lae'zel in party with the occasional swap out for Jaheira or Minsc.
So far I've:
Chopped off Gale's hand instead of pulling him out of the portal.
Recruited Wyll when he mentioned Karlach just to see what would happen.
Recruited Karlach, despite Wyll's protestations, to purposefully piss her off later.
Killed Wyll for being mouthy toward Karlach.
Killed Lae'zel immediately upon meeting her in the cage for being annoying on my first playthrough.
Rescuded Haslin just to see what would happen after I raided the druid camp. Nothing it turns out other than him just leaving, but that might be because he was in camp and not in my party?
Killed all the Tieflings, pissing off Karlach and making her leave.
Am now in Act II and just rescued Minthara.
While I am evil, I'm not a monster. I have Scratch, I have the baby owlbear, I did a very fast load-last-save after accidentally killing Steelclaw during dialog. I give into the Dark Urge at every opportunity that doesn't kill someone I want kept alive, there's a lot of blood on these tiny gnomish hands.
Going to ask a question that sounds sarcastic, but I mean in earnest:
How can you play like that?
I struggle so much stepping outside my own choices in rollplaying games, I can't play evil runs, I feel so guilty! But also, part of my feels it'd be fun to see a different side of a game if I could just get over that guilt! I'm still only on act3 of my first (mostly) goody two-shoes bg3 run, but durge sounds like it'd be fun on a second play someday
I'm with you. I have ~1200 hours in BG3 but I'll never complete all the achievements because I just don't want to do spend my in game time that way. I hate it when completion in games is tied to evil play.
Could never do low honour mode in RDR2 for example either.
Many games, BG3 especially, can have a lot of morally ambiguous decisions. While I am undoubtedly doing an evil playthrough, not all good decisions are "good" anyway, they're just the lesser of two evils. Only being able to play the "good guy" gets boring quickly.
Haven't played RDR2 yet, having put far too many hours into RDRevolver and Redemption, and knowing that RDR2 is even larger I know it'll be a game I get lost in for many hours. Good to know I can play it twice with a "low honor" mode as well.
I've just finished my RDR2 play, ended around 120 hours. Some things in the game annoyed me but for the most part it was good. Take it slowly, I'd say.
It's a role playing game, so I just play the role. I didn't know anything about the dark urge going in (I make it a point to stay away from all game related forums so I just know what bleeds through via osmosis), just knew that it was the player background you could pick. I made my character with a friend and she chose a gnome rogue, which I decided to play sneaky and assassin-y. Then the story was pretty dark from the start and I immediately got the chance to indulge with Gale's hand and just went for it.
I played goody-two-shoes first time, knew I wouldn't make all the same decisions this time, but with the Dark Urge decided to just go full evil as much as possible. I'm also playing as a smart-ass and very independent. No Absolute BS or True Soul or even worms. I'm just here to kill anyone that gets in my way and lie to their face about it so they'll turn around for a knife in the back.
It does take some pausing from time to time as first instinct is to be "good" and not choose the evil option, but I've always had an absurdist sense of humor and a let's see what happens attitude in games.
Got through most of Act II last night, kinda ticked that His Majesty is dead now after I killed Isobel at Last Light, am about to go back to Moonrise to face Ketheric after killing Aylin for Shar's storyline (having saved both her and Isobel the first time) and since I already killed her lover.
I have finished Horizon Forbidden West. It took me 140 hours in which I completed kinda everything there is to do in base game. I don't have upgraded all the weapons and armor, but there is no fog of war remaining on the map. I do not fast travel in the way of "click this button, select where you want to be and BAM you are there", I use in-game "fast" travel system in the way "you can ride this animal" and I go on foot everywhere most often, actually. I played the game since around start of april until like a week ago totalling 4 months of gameplay. I seldom play another game when I have such a big one to play, so it really took me 4 months to finish Forbidden West.
The game was perfect! It is the kind of game that I love. I like story driven games, even those that are kinda cinematic experience (ie. Mafia, be it original or Definitive edition or even Mafia 2), but such games lack the long time fun. Horizon isn't like that, it's more like Witcher 3 - the world is full of things to do, people to meet and quests to finish. And it didn't get boring at any time for me.
It is action RPG just like Witcher 3 is. You have some life, skills, quite a few very different weapons, different types of attack, thus different armor types, you can mix it up to suit your play. I definitely got to like specific weapons and specific style of using them and it worked for me through the whole game. There are advanced melee techniques which I didn't master as I suck at action RPGs and I'm not willing to give in and perfect it all.
I play on Steam Deck, which Valve says isn't compatible dues to poor performance. And they are not kidding this time. I set it to kinda medium graphics with a few tweaks (because on low you don't even get shading and it all looks really bad) and I had to enable FSR. The game works, but... it runs 20-25ish fps, sometimes 30, other times tanking down to 15. It is really rough ride. I limit TDP to 11W to conserve on battery and also because going full tilt (unlimited power = 15W) doesn't really add that much fps (from 25 to 27 and drops battery from 90 minutes to 60). But since I have no other means to play this game and I love playing on handheld, I do it this way.
It still looks amazing on such little display. I wonder how it would work on full details on say a TV - it must be like a movie! I'm not all about "it looks good or I don't care", quite the contrary, but I still have to say how beautiful the game looks.
The story is a free continuation of Horizon Zero Dawn and it is made in such a way that you could play the games back to back and it would all seem like you are playing one long game. If you do that, get ready for at least 200 hours of gameplay. And I haven't finished Forbidden West DLC yet! Back to story - it is great. If you loved the first game, which I did, you would love the second one as well. I'm not spoiling anything here, if you want to know about story, read it up on ie. Wikipedia. I will add that many characters you meet are very well made, have their personalities and you will remember a lot of them (maybe not by name, but by their personality or passion). Aloy, the main protagonist, person you are playing as, is the most memorable of all. It is basically Lara Croft, you will love her. She is superbly voiced and looks stunning.
I said I haven't finished DLC and I have another info about it - It runs poorer than the main game. It clearly has higher hardware requirements and doesn't fit into Steam Decks 16GB shared memory by about 4GB (~12GB RAM and ~8GB VRAM with high textures; dropping to medium textures gets you to ~6GB VRAM which still doesn't fit by a long shot and doesn't improve performance significantly). I will finish the game though. It is worth it.
This one gets high praise from me and proudly sits very high on my hall of fame of videogames. Other games that are praised like this one include (in no particular order): Half-Life 1 (great story driven FPS, unique in its time), Morrowind (hardcore RPG that kick you into hostile open world landscape to die many times in various ways, again something unique), Final Fantasy X (the best story in a game I have ever experienced, I lived the life of main protagonist and felt all the things he went through, really unbelievable experience), Horizon Zero Dawn (unexpectedly great story that was superbly uncovered through various hints and facts), Mafia: The city of Lost Heaven (great characters and story and progress; basically Godfather made into the game; the game was inspired by Godfather, it is not based on the movie or the book) and a few others.
I played the Battlefield 6 beta for 12 hours this weekend. We are so fucking back. The game feels incredible and it really does seem like they’ve learned from their mistakes in recent titles. This feels like a return to form of the battlefield 3 + 4 days, I just had a ridiculous amount of fun. The game also seemed to run and function pretty well for me. They pretty much sold me on it and now I’ve got the release date marked on my calendar!
I’m still also plugging away on both Star Wars Outlaws and Expedition 33. I’d like to try to beat both of them in the next month or so so that I can justify picking up Donkey Kong Bananza and Ghost of Yotei. I reckon I’m halfway through both of them and I’ve been in a Star Wars mood, so likely finishing Outlaws first.
I’ve still been rolling on Wow Classic as well, but the BF6 beta derailed me this weekend. I’ll likely go back to WoW in the next week or two when I feel like hanging on discord with friends instead of playing a narrative game. Otherwise nothing too exciting for me, lately. I’m moving next week and I’ll be low on cash for a bit so I’m trying to just get through some games I’ve already got that I need to finish.
I spent about 12 hours in the Battlefield 6 Open Beta this weekend and I gotta say, it looks like DICE is finally back on track. The graphics are as good as ever with surprisingly smooth performance, the destruction's back and as gloriously over the top as ever, the gunplay is solid, the sound design is phenomenal as always, the movement is fluid but not too twitchy, the new drag and revive feature is actually incredibly fun and a great addition, and the existence of a class-weapons-locked conquest playlist gives me hope that we'll have those options for other gamemodes in the full release too. It's not perfect of course, with the biggest issues being auto-spotting where so much as looking near an enemy even if you didn't actually see them will spot them, thus making people just way too easy to find and shoot, and some of the current maps just being awfully balanced in different gamemodes, especially Liberation Peak. The UI is also kind of mediocre and not very intuitive compared to the older titles. Still though, the foundations are very strong, so barring EA doing something catastrophically stupid for their PR, this game is going to sell like hotcakes. But remember, DO NOT PREORDER.
I've really been craving some big vehicle-based action lately, which the old Battlefields were somewhat uniquely capable of scratching. The beta has been mostly fun, but it hasn't really scratched that itch. The maps are small and the action is chaotic. After not playing any online FPS for a while, I'm afraid I'm just enjoying it as a short-term diversion.
Otherwise I mostly agree with your points. Overall BF6 seems like a pretty good package at this point. But I really wish one of the big maps were available during the beta weekends. I need to know whether the big tank/chopper/jet battles will scratch that itch.
Good news, they've announced we'll be getting one new map (and some other new things) in the next weekend, and chances are it's going to be a proper full-scale map. Might be damn near impossible to stay in the air as a helo though, if they're annoying enough every engineer is going to be carrying a stinger as their secondary.
Supposedly the new map is going to be Empire State and be infantry-focused, aka small. So idk. But I'll still play it and probably have fun, so whatever.
Making a committed run at Cyberpunk 2077. I had a Nomad start before 2.0, rolled a Corpo int/gun build. I just finished the quests with the Hatians (starting at M'ap Tann Pelen) and it made me feel some sorta way. I also bounced off this quest (but did the Panam one) and didn't pick it up until 2.0.
Major decision spoilers
I backed NetWatch, let the agent get away with his data and wake up the women I needed, did the Alt Cunningham scenes for some *stellar* lore. Then when NetWatch breaches and Alt disconnects the Hatians, V's delivery hit like a gut punch. "...Disconnected them?" resonates as he realizes his decision killed all these people with the flip of a bit. I've done some dark things in some games but that *sucked* to experience, which I think is a great thing. It didn't hit as bad as Jackie dying but was still up there.Without revealing the spoiler above, the game carries an emotional weight to it that I find fascinating. The Delamain car one as well, which I get to redo. There's a lot of interesting philosophical exploration of a lot of concepts in the game (SoulKiller as an opinionated endpoint of the Transporter problem, at which point is an intelligence deserving of life, all sorts of wacky transhumanism). Despite being GTA with metal hands, a lot of the game carries itself with surprising weight, despite the Idiocracy levels of irony the setting itself is constructed to show. I knew this game was this good, but am stoked to experience it, especially in its final form. The Balatro quest is a little immersion-breaking though.
Update: Holy shit is this game's MSQ short. I'm at the cusp of act 3 and actually need to circle back and hit Panam and Judy's quests still. I wanted to keep going for continuity and got the "Point of No Return" warning, which apparently means all your sidequests are failed at that point, so I want to go back and actually hit a bunch of stuff.
It's weird because I wasn't trying to power through the game, but want to at least hit the rest of the quests, make a save point, fold in Phantom Liberty at some point (can I do that on an existing save?) and then finish it off and maybe start again with another character soon.
That said, it's a good game with a great story. It's done so well and seamlessly that you'll knock out four quests without knowing it.
More puzzle games!
I played through Chants of Sennaar and it was delightful. Using the language barrier/translation as the central mechanic and the base of the story conflict is great design. The pacing was a little bit slow just because of how big some of the environments are (but they're gorgeous, so it's worth it) and despite that it took just over 8 hours to do everything, but the difficulty/complexity ramps up very nicely and the in-game hints and tracking are more than sufficient.
Then I saw the fourth Syberia game sitting in my GOG collection all by itself and decided I should pick up the first one so I've started that. The classic point-and-click experience is interesting and I'm liking the game so far (though I haven't gotten very deep.) I then saw that the mostly-unconnected game Amerzone came first and I'm debating when/if to pick that one up too.
I have recently played all Syberia games back-to-back. The fourth one was very good, I liked how they made the time period change and the story.
The third game was kinda let down. The puzzles were ok, but the story wasn't that good.
I've jumped back in to my 45-hour Elden Ring save file after trying out a different character class for some time. I suppose I don't have too much to say about it that hasn't already been said; it's just fun and interesting to explore and I'm really enjoying being a caster, a play style I discovered I enjoyed back in Dark Souls 3.
I've also been putting a load of time into Civilization 6 on my Android tablet. It's really hitting right, right now and after many false starts, I'm beginning to near the end of my first playthrough as Nubia. Well, I say nearing the end, but I'm actually about half way through the game, but it's the furthest I've played in a great while.
Magic-focused builds have surprisingly huge variety in ER, especially compared to melee builds that focus just on powerstancing status weapons and going full unga bunga. I did my second playthrough when the expansion came out as a sorcerer, and by the end I was using half the damn spellbook, from swinging giant magic swords to shooting a giant magic greatbow to throwing giant rocks (with magic). Remember that some staves have an innate power boost to certain spells, even when wielded off-hand. If you're not using a shield, it's basically free damage. Also, don't sleep on Carian Slicer. It might have almost no range and doesn't do poise damage at all, but the low fp cost and rapid cast speed makes the potential DPS kind of nuts.
Oh yeah, I have tons of spells.
Sometimes I worry that being a Sorc makes the game a little easy, but then I'm thrown into where I just was Gelmir Hero's Grave and remember that somethings are easy and some are harder. Carian Slicer definitely is a workhorse in tight spaces like this one, though the area is still a challenge, being forced to move quickly and shunted into tight spaces with enemies and no good way to defend.
Settling into a middle ground of Arma 3 mods while itching for a slightly different single player experience (I know). Not as hardcore as full milsim multiplayer setups with mods like ACE/RHS/etc. or an epic co-op experience with Antistasi, but my set is tuned just right for what I want. Completed the whole Arma 3 bundle from a recent Steam sale and discovered two standout mods working together: The Forgotten Few 2 and SOG AI
The Forgotten Few 2 especially on Tanoa (the map from the Arma 3 Apex DLC) with SOG AI is what I would call the closest experience to the original Ghost Recon and Hidden and Dangerous games that I've been craving for, and I didn't have to wait for a new game to do it. The map is a gorgeous set of South Pacific-themed islands with a nice balance of lush forests, rolling hills, some urban towns, and enough water for boat insertions.
Pick a mission, outfit your squad (and turn on/off an extra AI squad), plan your insertion (and have the helis stay behind for close air support if you want), do the objectives however you want, pick your extraction then return to base, all on a persistent campaign on the same map. Every time you finish a mission the persistent campaign advances a "turn" where map control shifts around and generates a new set of missions for you to pick. Along the way you earn "progress points" which after reaching a set number you win the campaign.
Permadeath is always on and your squad gains fatigue and veterancy, so there's a lightweight XCOM-style personnel management in between missions. You pick from a choice of land/sea/air insertions and extractions, jointly or separately. You have air and artillery support, but beware of nearby anti-air emplacements so they're not "free win" buttons. They have cooldowns and maintenance so must be used strategically over the course of a lengthy campaign.
The atmosphere really settles in once you're playing hours into a campaign and a few missions deep behind enemy lines, crawling through a forest in the blackest of nights with only your NVGs on and only the sound of crickets or the idle chat of a distant enemy patrol. And if you're up for something spicy, do away with fancy modern tech and start a campaign on one of the Vietnam maps like Cam Lao Nam.
Other mods I use:
I've considered Arma 3 for single player and you definitely sell it well based on your description! Would need to build a new computer to run it since my laptop would probably not do to well running jt
Do you find the dlc necessary or a nice to have?
Personally I consider the powerful map editor and being able to make your own fun as part of the endless "gameplay". Arma 2 gave us DayZ, and Arma 3 has Antistasi and the original PUBG. So the more DLC you add, the bigger the sandbox to play with in the editor.
Apex is the one I would call an absolute necessity. As far as modding is concerned, many "vanilla" mods assume you already have Apex. It also comes with a fun scenario called Old Man, which is a bit more like Far Cry in terms of openness and mission design than a straight up milsim. You play as a civilian able to wear disguises and such. Also helps that Tanoa is the best performing map out of all the official ones on my rig despite having patches of dense jungles.
You can also play the Apex campaign with SOG AI. It was originally designed to be a replayable co-op campaign so you'll get some AI buddies now instead of running it solo.
Marksmen is very nice for the DMRs and scopes. You'll be pixel peeping across great distances a lot in this game.
Contact for Livonia and SOG Prairie Fire for Vietnam maps are nice to have. Gorgeous maps, but requires a high-end modern CPU to brute force them into playable performance.
Laws of War and Tac Ops have well-regarded single player scenarios but I haven't played them yet.
I've mostly been playing ARPGs as of late.
Path of Exile II: I'd like to like it, but I can't. I'm not knowledgeable enough to articulate what's wrong with this game, but I can't stick with it. I'll probably try again a bit when the new season launches, but I think I'll let it cook a bit more until 1.0
The Slormancer: picked it up again this week to grind some more. I have a good homemade whirlwind Knight build that's fun to play against mobs, but it's terrible against bosses as I mainly rely on "life on hit" to not die. Adam Nostrus 1 or 2-shots me if I make a mistake, and the fight drags for too long. I'll probably level up the Mage or the Huntress with a more focused build.
Last Epoch: also waiting for the new season, though I don't expect much. Liked it for ~100h (playtime since 1.0), but IMO there are too many stats and too much loot. If you need a loot filter by level 5 to remove 95% of drops, maybe there's a problem.
Torchlight II: still good, a nice little heir to Diablo II. I played it back when it came out, it feels a bit stiff, but I like the simple stats, and the gear drops are often meaningful. Better with mods, too.
Project Diablo II: a great surprise, I discovered it 2 months ago, and honestly I love it. It's a mod for the classical D2+LoD (not Resurrected) with a ton of QoL improvements to make it palatable in 2025. Full online support, playable with a controller since this season, it's unironically the best ARPG I've played this year.
Honorable mention to Diablo III, which is still an excellent couch coop game on consoles.
Holy moly, I did not realize controller support had been added to Project Diablo II! I honestly wish this also was added to the PC version of Torchlight II, but I know that'll never happen at this point.
This one keeps me entertained enough The King is Watching.
(But some bosses are so much harder than what came before, not sure it's right).
I played the demo a while back, and it seems like a good game, but I was very very bad at it.
Started and abandoned Banishers Of New Eden. Wasn't clicking with me and the game starts off on a super contradictory note that made my head spin. Not for me.
Started and abandoned Wuchang Fallen Feathers. I like me some souls games, but something is off between the performance, and the visuals. It looks nice in static and bad in motion.
So I've started another Demon's Souls run. This time as a Royal. I always play as Royal.
I'm mainly waiting for Elden Ring to release on Switch 2. I'm hoping it's going to be a good port, as I'd really like to start another Elden Ring run. But not until after the S2 release, at which point I'll decide if it's to be on the Switch 2 or some other platform.
Hey, I also started and abondened Banishers this week. I like the fluid movement and I guess I liked the story. I might come back to it later. It was just so... dark and I wanted to playing something a little lighter. (Bright action rpgs are hard to find!)
Im curious, what is the contradictory note you're referring to? (I have a hunch, but I want to know what it was for you.)
Oh no, collapsible spoiler text shows up in the collapsed view :( sorry
Er. How can I prevent this? Add more useless text?
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Spoilers
You spend the prologue being told how bad spirits are and that they must be banished or otherwise dealt with, including our friend, then we're supposed to just ignore that we're hanging around with one now.Still going strong on Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor.
The game is like a straight shot of dopamine to my ADHD.
The amount of satisfaction you get when you have a OP build and the bugs are dying enmasse and the sounds of XP being collected until you level up. Getting those legendary or epic upgrades in the loot boxes. 🧑🍳🤌💋
Plus, rounds are nicely timed, so I can fit in rounds during chores.
Had to take a break from The Hundred Line this week as I came down with dry eye and reading for extended periods became pretty uncomfortable.
This week's low word count games:
1. Dark Souls Remastered
I am pretty terrible at souls games. When it comes to action games, stuff like Zelda or Nier Automata is more my speed. However, the whole 'the kingdom is in ruins and everyone is cursed' bleak dark fantasy vibe of this series appeals to me and occasionally I get the urge to go back for another try.
In my previous attempt at this game, I bounced off at the run from the Undead Burg bonfire to the Undead Parish bonfire (for those who haven't played, that's right at the beginning of the game). I could get past the first boss, but would then just fall into a cycle of dying over and over again without progressing in levels or knowledge.
For this new attempt (using a bog standard warrior with longsword and shield), I changed my mindset and started playing like the world's most careful adventurer:
Even against weak enemies, I would always try to bait their attack first and stab them during their recovery animation.
Whenever possible, I would try and kite single enemies away from groups and eliminate them one by one.
When facing an unfamiliar enemy, I would just stand there for a while with my shield up and observe their attacks and openings, rather than engaging immediately and trying to react on the fly.
This was the change that made the biggest difference. It feels like once you've learned their moveset, every opponent in the game can be broken down into an 'if X, then respond with Y' set of gambits, with the rest just being practising execution.
I paid attention to how many souls the game was giving me. If I was getting enough to level up on a run and the destination wasn't yet in sight, I took it as a hint that I was underleveled and trekked back to the bonfire.
I tried not to button mash even if I was getting my butt kicked. This game has input buffering (especially noticeable with long animation moves like the heavy attack or the roll), so panicking and queuing up moves usually resulted in death.
And so on. I'm still dying, but it's almost always because I lost patience with the above approach and tried to cut a corner. Moreover, the game feels comfortable to play now, which is a point I never imagined that I'd get to.
I'm currently in the depths in search of the second bell and may keep playing in short sessions while setting a manageable goal each time (killing a boss, scouting a new route, lighting the next bonfire, grinding out a new upgrade, etc).
2. Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice
I originally picked this up after completing Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, but bounced off at:
Yep, early game again. I would constantly spend 5 minutes each time killing the mobs around the boss, only to then be slaughtered by the boss in a couple of hits without learning how to deal with them.
Again, I've been trying to change up my approach:
I initially assumed that you should stand next to bosses and try to deflect everything so that you can deathblow as fast as possible, but it feels far safer to circle the enemy and poke them once they've committed to their attack.
e.g. I found that the big ogre guy, who I died to plenty of times in my previous attempt, could be trivially beaten this way just by dodging around him in a circle and stabbing him whenever he enters an attack animation.
I'm sure that won't work against every boss going forward, so I'm practicing the full range of counters whenever I can too.
If you die, the game lets you revive once with no penalty, so I'd just go back to the last statue whenever I died to keep my exp. If I had to fight a boss, I'd just grind to a point where I could spend all of my exp on an upgrade first to ensure none got wasted when I did die for real.
If I found myself fighting more than one person, I'd just run away. Similarly, if I needed to heal mid-fight, I would just run / grapple to a safe spot and do it there.
In retrospect, it's obvious that this is the intended gameplay given the premise and all the tools the game gives you to make a quick exit, but I was too focused on the 'cool sword fights' aspect in my first attempt and often bit off more than I could chew when clearing out mobs.
I would actually use my prosthetic sub-weapon. In my previous attempt, I'd get so focused on deflecting that I'd completely forget I had it, but there's basically no downside to using it liberally since it can be refilled so easily.
I haven't spent as much time on this as Dark Souls, but I've now beaten the second general guy (I forgot how to get access to the monk's stage) and again I may just play on and off while setting small goals.
I'm.currently playing through Sound of Drop - fall into poison -, a horror visual novel about some sort of haunted aquarium dimension. My main thoughts as I play: wow, I really want to go to an aquarium! xD
It's got some good horror atmosphere going on. I'm trying to unlock every bad end/death I can before progressing the storyline, and while not all of them have CGs explicitly depicting the deaths (which is fine by me, since uh... At least one involves parasites), they do make use of the UI elements to help depict them. For example, blood splattering over the background, a slicing effect when someone gets decapitated, a view of the ocean's sky from the protagonist's perspective as she drowns, etc. Also, I really like the UI for the menu, it feels so sleek and I like reading the descriptions of the rooms on the pause menu.
I'm playing it on my Steam Deck, so I can confirm it does work on that. The annoying bit is that while the B/A button progresses dialogue, I have to use the trackpad as a mouse to click on "Log" or "Graphic" or anything on the start menu. And the cursor needs to be on whatever I want to click, so remapping a button to be a mouse click doesn't work. Maybe there's some other workaround I don't know, but it's a mild irritation in the long run so doesn't really bother me that much.
So, just finished it.
Minor update regarding controls: Turns out I can use the right shoulder button to open the log, and both shoulder buttons to scroll through it. Also found out the right joystick can also be a substitute for the cursor. Wish I knew that earlier since I found it near the end of the first play/read through, but I still had two "true" endings to unlock. I also found out I could remap a button to be "enter" and that'd let me use the menu with just buttons.
This game was made with Ren'py, so chances are these controls apply to all games made with it. So letting anyone know! (Tip to identify if it's a Ren'py game: I've noticed visual novels made with it always seem to have "Q. Save", "Q. Load" and "Skip" buttons. The first two in particular seem to be mainly a feature of Ren'py.)
As for the game itself: definitely a bittersweet ending for me. I'd rate it I think an 8/10. Good story overall, had some creepy moments, but also a lot of weak moments where the horror wasn't fully expanded upon. I'd say this would be a fairly decent introduction for people looking to get into horror visual novels if they're iffy on horror. Nothing too gory ever shows up visually (though the descriptions are DEFINITELY brutal), and the core story is pretty heartwarming overall.
Also, the game has some yuri undertones between the protagonist and her best friend. Never gets explicit, but apparently the devs made two more games that are much more about yuri, so I'd say it was intentional. So, that might be a plus to some people.
Further thoughts in a spoiler box because I'm gonna ramble, though I'll try to avoid spoilers in case anyone wants to play it.
Rambling on the Game
So as a visual novel, it's more novel than game. There are, what, 27 "bad ends" according to guides? And some of them are literally just the same bad ending but with a slightly different path to get there. Note, rather than proper endings they're actually just deaths.
The game has 4 "true endings". The first two were the endings for the original game (and honestly they're near identical), and two more were added when the game was remade which is the version that got translated. And those two new endings... Well, they change the narrative quite a bit. So much so I was left wondering if one character was in the original game or added for the remake. You still need to play through once to get the two new endings, so it's interesting to see how the final tone changed.
Endings 1 and 2 are near identical, but endings 3 and 4 are wildly different. They diverge at an early choice in a NG+ run, so without spoiling anything: 3 happens if you agree to go, 4 if you decide to stay.
And of those two new endings, 3 is easily the "golden" ending" while 4 is much more bittersweet. While playing through 3 I could sense "wait, this feels like 'actual' true ending progression" so I looked it up, and people agreed that 3 is good and 4 is the saddest ending of all. I like to try to end VNs on a good note, so... I ended up just, flipping through the two routes a LOT. Literally up to the credits of one of them. 3 has all the big information reveals, which 4 touches upon but focuses primarily on the emotional aspect. So with the way I played, I partially spoiled myself on some of the reveals in 3. Which... May have been less than satisfying.
I finally settled on finishing 3 first once I realized 4 was indeed the one with more emotional focus, but... It's definitely a bittersweet ending in comparison. It feels like a more proper close to Mayumi and Mari's relationship. But the weird thing is, ending 3 has a unique theme for the credits. The other true endings all use the same song as the opening. So, that makes me feel like maybe 3 was intended as the ultimate, "truest" ending after all...??
So yeah. Flipping between the routes like that probably hindered how I perceived it. Honestly, I think all the endings have their own bittersweet notes though. The fourth ending is definitely the saddest, but the first two endings also... Well, if you play the game you'll know what makes them bittersweet. And Ending 3's reveals are what make that one bittersweet.
Ending talk aside: I loved the visuals in this game. The ocean has always felt beautiful to me. My biggest complaint is that there weren't more CGs, both of the horror aspects and some of the prettier scenes. The horror CGs are honestly really tame for the most part, it tended to avoid showing dead bodies except for maybe one scene. A lot of the deaths had very gruesome descriptions so I wouldn't want CGs for every single one, but... Come on, the deaths that did have CGs avoided showing the bodies. Would've been nice to see an actually severed head (is that weird to say?).
On the other side, there were also some scenes I wanted to see because they sounded so beautiful. One in particular described how the tank walls were gone and fish swam in the air, and I would've loved to see that instead of the usual background that had tank walls. Especially since the backgrounds actually did change a bit in various scenes. The jellyfish had probably the most memorable change, though it also didn't show a change when the tanks broke despite multiple scenes having that happen.
The one other thing about the art that's worth mentioning: this game almost, almost has "same face syndrome" going on. Three of the characters have near-identical faces, but it's a weirdly justified case since it's intentional. Two of them were sisters and noted to have often been mistaken for twins. The third character has no relation, but the protagonist explicitly notes that she strongly resembles the younger sister.
Thing is, this is a game with a small cast, so the fact literally half of them have near-identical faces sticks out. Especially since those three appear together on many screens. These three are also the only girls who directly face the camera, so it's even more noticeable. That was honestly kinda distracting since I knew it was intentional, and was trying to figure out if there were any minute differences in the eye shape or anything else...
That aside, I love the designs. I... actually kind of want to dress like the purple-haired girl, I think?? It's different from the rest of my wardrobe, but on that note, I could see the protagonist's outfit being part of my closet. I honestly spent a lot of time minimizing the text just to appreciate the character models, heh... The designs definitely fit all their personalities.
The cast is all fairly fleshed out for the most part, and I did care about the core cast in the end. I think the game could have been improved with some more proper bad endings, and maybe adding a way to check character profiles or the aquarium map. The map does show up in the pause menu after all, would've been cool if it was interactive.
Overall had a good time playing it. Definitely got a bit needlessly philosophical and rambly at points, but I enjoyed it anyway. It was fun to visit Manten Aquarium, and now I really want to visit one in real life :D
Metal Bringer. It's a twin stick shooter roguelite where you operate mechs in combat. Each is generally composed of a ride, head, and weapons. During your runs, you'll be able to gather blueprints to start runs with better components and also "apps" that essentially serve as a sort of talent. You can swap parts freely in the field and harvest pieces from destroyed enemies while also being able to gather and analyze new apps in the field.
I like the aesthetic and the gameplay loop feels good. Good variety of melee and ranged options. For making mechs work in a roguelite, it strikes a good balance of being able to craft your own mech without being overly detailed. I do enjoy the more detailed mech games, but it would bog down the gameplay here too much. There are also optional puzzles scattered around the maps that are a nice break in action and give decent loot.
The camera is serviceable but kind of a mess, though show me a 3D twinstick shooter or mech game that has an excellent camera, I'll take it. Plot is meh, but also, not here for plot in a mech game. You'll find some documents scattered as you explore that fill out the world. Hades set a bar with having interactions with strong character and plot back home between runs, I notice its absence in other roguelites. Metal Bringer's version of between-run-calm is tweaking your mech and talents.
There's also a huge spike in difficulty from the floor 2 boss to floor 3. I'm focusing on the app install aspect on my runs and looping around the second floor to farm them, hoping I find something or figure out something that will help me out. Or maybe it is just grind out and get the full stacks of app upgrades.
Despite using more text to criticize the game than praise it, I am enjoying my time with it! I rank it as a 2.5 on my scale of 1-4. Basically, "I recommend this, for fans of mechs/roguelites." There are better mech games and better roguelite games out there that I'd recommend first to the general gaming audience, but fans of both will have a unique, fun experience here blending the two.
What games from the genres would you recommend?
Oh jeez either of those could be whole topics themselves, let's see what I can manage. There's also such a variety in each that it'd be easiest to do recommendations in a more conversational format.
Roguelites
This genre is very wide since you can stick roguelite mechanics onto virtually any other genre. There's also a lot of them since indie devs can stick roguelite mechanics in their games to enhance replayability. Slay the Spire is a turn based deck builder, it played a big role in blowing the genre up. Vampire Survivors created a whole subgenre of essentially "bullet heavens." FTL: Faster Than Light is also a legend in the genre for spaceship management. Balatro was real popular recently, the poker setting didn't appeal to me, but "make number go big" did scratch the monkey brain for a lot of folks.
There's so many different types, but ultimately, if I had to recommend a single roguelite to anyone, it'd be Hades. Supergiant are masters of the craft and Hades was a culmination of everything they'd learned from their first three games. The combat feels great, it is stylish and good looking, there is a solid plot with great characters. A lot of roguelites toss you right back in a run after losing one, but Hades brilliantly gives you a pause to explore the House of the Dead, chat with characters and develop plot before the next run.
(Teeny aside, I was sticking to roguelites which can be considered distinct from roguelikes by some with the key defining difference being lites have meta progression between runs and likes have none)
Mechs
This genre doesn't get enough love, and I myself haven't engaged with it as much as I like. But I consider them on a spectrum between "action mechs" and "mech sims," where the sims are very involved with stats and feeling like you're piloting a machine versus action mechs feeling more like controlling a superhuman and may not even have adjustable specs. I quite like BattleTech's MechWarriors for the sim side. I most recently played 5, which feels great with my throttle and flight stick, but can get grindy and repetitive. Some standout titles that veer closer to action mechs but with varying degrees of simness include TitanFall 2, Armored Core, Zone of the Enders 2, and Daemon X Machina. I haven't played the first three yet though, they're on my play list. I started Daemon X Machina but just wasn't feeling it at the time. I feel like there has got to be a good Gundum game too but I haven't sought one out, somehow haven't engaged with the franchise yet. There's also turn-based mech games including Into the Breach and BATTLETECH, but turn based mechs doesn't hit the same for me.
Despite not having played it yet, if I were to recommend one to someone as their first mech game, it'd probably be Armored Core 6. It has that FromSoft polish and they know what they're doing in the genre. Their earlier titles were fairly definitive at the time.
I hope this ramble gives you some interesting stuff to check out! I'd bet there are bigger fans of either genre that could give better guidance, but feel free to prod me for a more specific recommendation.
Have you played MechWarrior Online? It is hands-down my favorite mech game. It feels extremely stompy, it's PvP but combat is highly strategic. An underpowered team can mop the floor with a team with heavier firepower purely out of positioning. It likely holds second on my list of games with most hours played right behind WoW.
I have not, maybe I'll give that a go thank you! Generally I veer away from PvP, but a mech game may get me to do it. I did quite like Hawken in the day.
Something about this reminded me of a game I haven't thought of in ages: Shogo Mobile Armor Division. I remember having a load of fun playing death-matches with my college friends (circa ~1999-2000).
Oh yeah this looks like a sick vibe alright thanks for the rec!
Balatro, specifically on my phone. It works so well and I have it everywhere, and now it’s hard to stop playing! I have managed to do achieve many of the challenges and goals, but I keep coming back to it.
I went through what got added in updates for Monster Hunter Wilds, and with the advent of the lossless scaling plugin on Linux I got back in the swing of trying to make that game work in a halfway playable fashion on my steam deck.
---project talk---
I think I've gotten as far as I can go. The guide/mod is about as fleshed out as I can make it. I've toggled all the toggles, tried a book's worth of launch commands, tried all the performance mods. If you do everything on that page, on an OLED deck at least, you can have a more or less consistent experience the whole way through and at the endgame. It keeps up across everything the game has to offer.
The trade to make is having to work through input latency and some visual artifacts. On the small screen it looks more crisp. I can't vouch for every weapon, but the stuff I play (sword and shield, long sword) works just as well as on better hardware, I can accomplish the same stuff and get in the zone wailing on things. Menus are a matter of slowing down a little, because there is a permanent lag to it, but I've got it to where that stays consistent too, so it's something you can get used to. It feels a bit slower, so you might find it's easier to play when you're not as alert.
Perhaps ironically, the deck has been the more consistent experience, between it and my better equipped laptop. The laptop got really bad - the game broke for me more than once as updates came out. It feels like I have to do slight adjustments on the settings every single time, to have a stable and smooth picture on that machine. On the deck it just goes along in the same way the whole time, so I ended up playing more on it by a lot.
I was very happy to see it got well received. I found articles on gaming sites I'd never heard of, that's more than the last time I put something out. One guy confirmed I had met my goal by telling me a story of being entertained on a work trip during a difficult period. That was the target, ladies and gentlemen we gottem. If I had to estimate how long it takes to do, if you're comfortable navigating the file system I think you could get it done with a half hour of effort - some of it just involves waiting on a program to work. i can't guarantee results on an LCD model, but what feedback I got indicated it worked well enough for them too.
---game talk---
This afternoon I ended up in a fight with 7 monsters, and the game just kept going right along. I kept up with my target, game didn't chug, we went all over the map.
I was hunting an alpha Doshaguma (think a mammoth and a tiger put together) along with a pack of three others. Eventually I worked him down to where he wandered out to the big sand dunes, where the pack got jumped by two junior Dune worms ("Balahara"). As the alpha got into a turf war with one of the worms, a white feathered dragon ("Arkveld") swooped in, the music changed and the other worm got slapped around. While this is happening, I'm runnin up on my target, getting what few hits I can while having to dodge and slide away from the remaining monsters. It was intense as hell for about a minute, tons of dodging and repositioning with only some occasional hits. Eventually, the lesser doshaguma got into fights with the worms as the alpha broke from the pack. I chased him down, jumped off my bird dog and killed him with one final slap, it was perfect.
At this point, my guy looks like a swashbuckler and I don't really need to take the build further. I like where the updates are going, the harder monsters are fun to do and the ones they've added have been good. The Lagiacrus quest was awesome, I really hope they do more unique stuff like that. I still feel like they haven't hit the edge of where combat can go. I played a mod for a while that made the monsters a teensy bit faster, a bit more aggressive, with some more health and it made every monster a lot more interesting. It needs a little adjusting for the updated stuff but makes the base game a whole lot more fun. Going back, it's that the same heights get hit but for much less time - they could absolutely do an expansion in the same old way, one more map and a few more monsters would be great. More dynamic environmental stuff would only make it more fun, the unique arena stuff was phenomenal.
My only request is gimme more spicy music. I like a lot of it but I'd like some longer, bigger pieces. I enjoy the recomposition of themes from the previous games, monsters gotta have their theme songs, but the loops feel kinda short to me. Some feel like a straight downgrade, because the characteristic instruments are subdued a bit too much - Mizutsune is a good example of that imo. I still enjoy the game as much as I did early on, but I will admit the mod played a big role in that because I hope it foretells what an expansion does. Adding a new move or two on top of those kinds of adjustments would get folks way into it again, I think.
MTG: Online (PC): I've begun playing more leagues, I haven't done well but learning a lot about the current Modern metagame. I finally sat down and read through the top 6 most played decklists to identify their key pieces and points of interaction that my decks have with them. My Grixis Shadow list is in my favorite mid-range archetype but I feel like it's missing quality interaction with the top decks. Cards like Stubborn Denial feel too slow and there are a lot of creature decks so I'm thinking about how well the deck would support Counterspell or if something like Mana Leak is better in that shell. So I'm currently testing a netdecked Dimir Control list to figure out what works about it. I also want to do another league with lantern now that I have put together a more well-defined sideboard strategy.
MTG (Paper): No paper games this past week and the commander pod hasn't been able to fire. But I did finish a Satoru Umezawa deck. During construction I swapped out some cards I didn't feel like ordering in favor of stuff I had sitting in a binder. While goldfishing I realized that I had included an infinite turn synergy (Thousand-Faced Shadow + Rune-Scarred Demon + Beacon of Tomorrow + Some other ninjitsu creature). It's a pretty fragile combo because it just chains one turn after the other, requires unblocked combat, and any type of interaction breaks it. So I'm leaving it in for now.
Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound
Have continued to play a bit of this. I do enjoy it in bite-sized chunks. The combat is fast-paced and crunchy, with a modest tool set that rewards quickly adapting and sequencing based on the pattern that enemies spawn in. So while the game flows really well you will also find that taking a beat to read the situation and devising a plan will lead to faster/better outcomes.
Bosses are appropriately challenging. They generally take me a couple tries but the game is generous with giving you a checkpoint immediately for the boss and no punishment for failure. Their attack patterns are tightly scripted so you have ample opportunity to figure out where precisely is the best place to be positioned. I've heard others say it feels like a rhythm game because of how pattern based the combat is. I tend to agree though it is doesn't require the microsecond timing that rhythm games generally do.
Ok, I played more...
Death Stranding
I'm gonna talk some about my experience as a new player going in blind, no spoilers really, but if you want to go in blind don't read this.
I'm in the middle of chapter 3: Fragile right now and I think I'm now in the late beginning of the game. It's finally thrown me out into the world and let me just do stuff without it feeling as tutorial, hand hold-y and story heavy.
If you read my posts you know I love a stupid life simulation game and this is up my street but jesus I am shocked this game was aimed at the mass market because there is a lot of completely ordinary delivery jobs to do.
I enjoy it, but it's my jam. I don't know how this held the attention of the average gamer though.
The story and the progression beats holding it together are pretty good though. I was skeptical at first but it's pretty solid.
It feels pretty tight as you get drip fed about the world and you can start to tie it together in your head to make sense from the insanity to start.
Some of the acting is weird. I think it's intentional direction, but it's odd.
I have the feeling it's because they wanted Sam (the player character) to be reasonably quiet and unassuming, but it ends up a lot of people monologue at him and he doesn't even grunt or acknowledge their existence.
Which is odd because there's some really good interactions through delivery terminals where characters say something to Sam and he reacts and it feels really immerse. The you get a cut scene where an important story character is talking one to one to him and asking him direct questions and he's basically idle animation, no audio.
It's good, I'm having fun. I'm still trying to find my pace of how long to spend in one area before moving on. I thought I would hate the online stuff, I hated it in dark souls, but they've made it work well enough here. It feels like it'd be way too grindy without the help from other players too.
Edit: I forgot to mention the emails are also manic. They've got these great voice actors and really good, memorable 3D models for all the NPCs then they have these guys send too literally walls of junk mail. Now I get they are trying to make them seem a little more alive and like they are doing stuff while Sam is away saving America, but the tone of these emails are all identical. You meet this wonderful NPC who's a bit somber, but likes Sam for the work he does. Then you get emails from the guy like "HEY SAM ITS YA BOI JASON 👌👌👌👌👌 I WENT FOR A WALK TODAY AND IT WAS RAD 👏👏👏👏👏👏" and every email is like this, no matter the author which is wild. Makes me think they wrote a few hundred generic emails and made them randomly send rather than custom emails from each character which is upsetting.
I have played some Mafia: The Old Country.
Before I start with Old Country, let me recap what I thought of previous Mafia games I've played:
Mafia 2: Absolute amazeballs. Excellent story, great gameplay.
Mafia 3: The story seemed interesting, but I got really bored of the repetitive gameplay before managing to make serious progress with the story
Mafia 1 remake: The story was alright. The gameplay was okay - guns still felt a bit spongey from M3 gameplay
So onto The Old Country.
The story is pretty much cookie-clutter Mafia 1 storyline. You can break out your bingo cards as you'll be able to fill out some squares with this game. Still though, the story seems to be quite entertaining.
The presentation is excellent as always, and I would go as far to say this is the best Mafia in terms of presentation. There is that cinematic slickness that feels very GTA, but it is clear the game is pretty linear.
Speaking of gameplay, this is the best gunplay and melee I've ever experienced in a Mafia game, hands down. The gun doesn't feel sponge-y, but has a real kick to the weapons (it has that TLOU2 gun sway, but I feel like here it adds tension to the gunplay rather than feel annoying). The knife, though? chef kiss Whoever thought of having a 1v1 knife fight with slash, stab, dodge, and parry was a genius, and the way it is done in The Old Country feels exciting and fresh. I think at some point I'll get bored of parry mechanics, but as of yet, it always feels fresh and unique to every game, so I'm a fan of them.
Oh, and I can't not talk about the price. Death Stranding 2 is selling on the PS5 store for £70 - £80 if you get the Digital Deluxe version. Mafia The Old Country is selling for £45. I genuinely thought that the game would feel cut-back, but apart from traffic density (this game has no vehicle traffic whatsoever) and the stealth missions being insultingly easy (just wait for the NPCs to finish talking, and then to leave their backs facing to you so you can go and choke them out. Every time) the game feels incredibly polished and well done - it seems like the team knew their limits and just stuck to their guns, which is absolutely incredible and I'm super happy for them!
After 100%ing Taiji, I've been playing Diplomacy Is Not An Option, a gift from @CrystalManta !
It's exactly what I expected - a city defense game similar to Kingdoms and Castles, where you develop a base with troops and fortifications (while managing population levels and various resources) and defend against progressively stronger waves of attackers. The mechanics of the game are suitably addictive. The implementation is pretty good; I like the UI other than the icons being a little samey sometimes, and everything seems fairly polished and bug-free.
A campaign with plenty of maps is included, although they don't significantly deviate from the formula: You're a lord who's stomping down peasant rebellions, and the peasants are doing their best to get rid of you and your tax collectors (early on you're given the chance to side with the peasants instead, but both sides seem equally unlikeable). Each map is preceded by humorous cutscenes which maybe go on for a little too long. No one thought of proofreading the (written) dialogue either, which is sorely lacking in punctuation!
The "medium" difficulty is a bit tight when it comes to timing; attack waves come soon enough that you don't quite have enough time to develop things to your satisfaction. One design decision I really loathe is how maps are absolutely packed with waiting enemies (who are not part of the attack waves), and you're told you have to kill every enemy before the final attack wave, as every surviving enemy will join it. This forces you to split your attention and precariously balance controlling whatever troops you can muster as they go around the map squishing all those pesky peasants, while also trying to make sure your base grows at a steady pace and that you have enough living soldiers to deal with the attack waves - are you training enough of them? Perhaps too many? If you train more soldiers, you have fewer citizens that can be invested into jobs that will let you develop faster later on, so going too far off the mark may lose you the whole scenario. And timing is tight enough that you end up having to "pause" the game a lot (by which I mean freeze the simulation, which allows you to queue up any amount of decisions before resuming). I feel like it would have been more fun if I could focus on just developing my base and dealing with the attack waves.
Previous
Been playing through Far Cry 5 again, but this time modded. You can read my previous comment on my first playthrough. The mod that I am running just reduces the accumulation of resistance points, which allows for me to play through all the little side quests, before liberating an area. Overall I am enjoying this play through more as I get to do more of the game, and feel like doing side quests are working towards the campaign. I think there are three main complaints that I have with the game now that I have modded the resistance points to be balanced:
There is not enough variance in the weapons. The amount of weapons is artificially inflated by having multiple versions of the same gun, with almost nothing to differentiate them. An example of this artificial inflation is in revolvers, where FC4 had two revolvers, an early game low power revolver and a late game magnum revolver. In FC5 there are four revolvers, but they are all slight variations of the magnum.
There is no restrictions on weapon attachments. In FC4, you were limited on some attachments were not available for certain weapons. An example is you could not put a silencer on a shotgun in FC4. However, almost all attachments are available for every weapon in FC5. In FC4, the limitation encouraged you to complete special challenges for signature weapons, which have unavailable attachments (like a silenced shotgun), but FC5 does not have signature weapons and instead have prestige weapons (which are unlocked from the start, so that you can get the game unbalanced).
Knowing the ending, I find it a bit less engaging. But that is partially due to not liking the game's ending.
This week for our roguelike podcast’s 75th episode, we covered a titan of the genre with Spelunky!
I remember getting brutalized by it 12 years ago, beating it, and thinking “great I’m NEVER playing that again”, only to have a lot of fun revisiting it this week.
It’s truly timeless and elegant, but you can sort of see some of the wrinkles. It being locked at 720p feels rough in a full screen 1440p monitor, but it plays amazingly smooth and clear in the Steam Deck.
It’s interesting to hear my cohosts reaction who had never played it and how progression systems have had their impact in Spelunky wake. I’m glad no-progression roguelikes still exist, because sometimes firing up a game for the first time and seeing the meta progression wall ahead of you can feel more daunting than dying once every 45 seconds.
Just finished the story part to Strikey Sisters, and its much more enjoyable as it goes on as the presentation does add a lot. However, it seems it much more enjoyable to play in co-op.
Just started Ironcast, and am having a blast with it. It's more roguelike than puzzler, and luck has a lot to do with your success. All the same, I am really enjoying the steampunk setting behind it.