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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 got Hades right after Christmas and I have been blown away by how beautiful the game is and how well done the dialogue is (and how much of it there is). The grind is starting to get a little frustrating, though. I'm ~30 runs in and I feel like progression has slowed a bit, I've gotten to the final boss several times but I haven't been able to actually beat him yet. I kind of feel like I'm going to have to luck into a broken build to be able to get over that hurdle.
Some tips on getting over the initial Hades hump:
Keep upgrading that mirror. The upgrades make a huge difference.
Choose boons that are better for bosses. The faster you deal damage, the less time you have to spend with Hades. Some gods are good for mobs (Poseidon), others are good for dealing tons of damage to one target (Athena).
Learn his attack patterns. You don't have to be perfect, you just have to not get hit quite as often.
Thanks! I've definitely been upgrading the mirror as much as possible. I do feel a little stuck on what boons I should be looking for. I feel like I latched on to a few early on that let me get through some of the later stages, but the last couple of runs I've been trying to choose other things (for prophecy reasons and to get out of that rut) and experiment some. Also, your point 3 is definitely something I'm working on, but I'm struggling with timing in general with this game. I think part of it might be that I've played hundreds of hours of Enter the Gungeon, and so I've got a lot of muscle memory from that game that doesn't quite work with this one. I think the I-frames for the dash must be different than the dodge roll in EtG, because I'll dodge at a time that feels perfect to avoid an attack, and still take damage from it. It's definitely taking some adjustment.
I suggest getting the "dash twice" mirror upgrade - if you constantly double-tap dash, you basically double your dodge window.
It took me ~50 runs to finally beat the boss. I'm currently at run 80 or so, and still enjoying it. I play 1 or 2 runs now and then, rather than trying to grind it all out. I keep discovering new and interesting combinations of Boons, and there's still stuff to unlock. And the story isn't played out entirely yet.
Incredible game, loved every minute of it, even when getting demolished repeatedly by the end boss.
I beat him today, twice in a row! Just needed a few more runs under my belt, I guess...
Been playing Disco Elysium and it sure lived up to the hype. I find myself glued to the screen for hours when I start playing and I'm already planning my next playthrough while I play.
It's just a fantastic combination of a well done presentation, on point writting and combining the adventure click-and-point genre with RPGs that ended up in one of the best games I have ever played.
FYI, an updated version of the game is coming in a few months. Might want to hold off on your second run until then.
Oh yeah I know, very excited to play it. But honestly I may end up playing this more than twice.
I've been playing Stardew Valley obsessively since 1.5 came out. My reaction to every new addition to the game is "yup, I wanted that, great!"
For Christmas I got Azul, which is a delightful board game. The general idea is that you're trying to tile a wall, while racing against other people also tiling walls; the first one to have a row on their wall done triggers the end of the game. Placing tiles in certain configurations awards points, most points wins. It's a deceptively simple, but relatively deep game, and it's especially entertaining for me because everyone in the family, from my six year old through to myself can play and be competitive - my six year old son has won twice, and we're not the sort of family that takes it easy on kids just because they are six. At the core, the game is about pattern recognition and identifying how best to fill out your board. Overall, this has quickly become one of our favourite boardgames to play.
My son and I have also been playing a fair amount of Terraria lately, which I think is one of the all-time great video games. A lot of the time people describe it as "2d Minecraft" which is true-ish, but maybe doesn't give you the real feel for the game. There are a lot of differences, but I think they're certainly in the same genre. I haven't played much Minecraft; from what I did play, I preferred Terraria, for the sidescrolly feel. My son mostly enjoys setting things up so that he can kill me; one day he asked me to play and when I logged in, the spawn point had a lava pool filled with spikes right under it and he immediately started giggling his head off. He also likes to pour lava into whatever I'm building, or drop dynamite on my head. He does get into building things though - we have a roller coaster that he's spent a lot of time on, and a jungle gym, and a prison. It's interesting to see what he thinks of building, and he's gotten the hang of wiring pretty well, and figured out how to make fountain that pumps real water all the time, which was pretty impressive.
More Phasmophobia: had to try out the new prison map and play it with a group of friends. I love that game. It's such an accessible horror experience with regards to you not having to have fast reflexes or aim well (for most of the game). I'm really hoping it encourages more devs to try out co-op horror games-- I know there's already a fair amount, but I feel they're so focused on combat or agility when they don't need to be.
More Overwatch: I'm just an addict to quick multiplayer experiences, I think especially now during quarantine. And there's enough roles (Mercy, Rein, Brigitte) that don't require A+ aiming to be good at.
Walking Dead: Saints and Sinners: I kept picking this game up and putting it down, but have now just started doing 1-2 days at a time per (VR) session. I really don't like that the zombies re-spawn so shamelessly (e.g. you go around a corner, go back, suddenly zombie), especially in a game centered around resource management and immersion, but it comes with another more welcome flaw of the AI NPCs (non-zombie) being really dumb, like Oblivion dumb; they investigate a sound for 2 seconds, don't notice dead bodies, and barely have any awareness. Another flaw is the mechanics seem a little finicky at times; I keep dropping my crafted weapons when really I mean to holster them. Or I'll mean to stash an item by putting it over my shoulder and into my backpack, but it somehow misses and just crashes on the floor -- but whatever, I'm having enough fun, and there aren't many other VR games like it, that I'll put up with 'em.
I picked up Lonely Mountains: Downhill last night and already can tell I'm going to put a couple hundred hours into it at least. It has the same spark that the older Trials games (HD and Evolution) had for me, the devs nailed the physics feel and the aesthetics are beautiful.
That is a surprisingly difficult game. I wasn't expecting it to be so hard, especially given the low poly, child friendly aesthetic. I didn't quite get the same spark from it that I did with Trials (which I also have hundreds of hours in)... but it was still pretty good, and I can definitely see myself playing it a fair bit more.
p.s. It's on Xbox Gamepass for PC, for anyone who wants to give it a try.
I decided to drop WoW even though I was greatly enjoying Shadowlands. I feel like being part of a raiding team is a bit too demanding for my free time nowadays, and I don't get the same enjoyment by casually playing the game. So...
Hades! I bought this a few months ago, but WoW and other stuff in life kept me busy. Now I've escaped Hades a few times and I can see myself sinking dozens of hours into this game still.
Old school Runescape. I've played this game for most of my life now (huh.), and there is something very comforting about it every time I come back. Now I've been doing a lot of woodcutting while working from home. I could use some friends to chat with, so hit me up! I'm Luomu Jake in-game
I was finally able to play Black Mesa after finding out about GeForce Now, which allows me to play it on my old-ish MacBook. As a huge fan of the original Half-Life game (1997), it's needless to say that I'm loving it.
On a side note, GeForce Now has been the finding of the year for me. As an Apple user with no interest in spending big bucks on a Windows gaming machine, or on a console/TV setup, I had pretty much given up on gaming and just played the few titles available for Mac once in a while as they came out (like Firewatch or Inside). With GeForce Now I'm able to play a lot of titles available only for Windows at maximum graphic settings, and don't even have to download GB after GB on my meager 120 GB SSD to install things locally. I just buy it on Steam and press play in GeForce Now, and off I go. I'm honestly still stoked by the possibilities this has opened up for me. Had no idea cloud gaming was this advanced!
Started my second real playthrough of Omori. It's still so amazing even after seeing most parts for the third time now (even though on this route through the game some things should start getting pretty different). It's story really is incredible, I am always noticing new amazing small details on the way. It's also a pretty great RPG game, after going through the game fast on the first playthroughs, I am going to try to 100% the game, get all the achievements and stuff cause it's so great.
My Xbox Series S finally arrived yesterday. The first game that I played was Diablo 3, first online with friends and then locally with my roommate. He is not much of a gamer but is obsessed with Diablo and never played the third one. He doesn’t really know how to use the gamepad but he’s learning. It was a pretty cool experience, but I found the game too easy even on hard. I think I’ll increase the difficulty today. Or maybe restart on hardcore.
I also played Life is Strange with my girlfriend. She enjoyed the story but she literally never used a gamepad before. Things gamers take for granted are comically hard for her. Simply manipulating the camera and movement is beyond her. It’s easy to forget how the basic patterns of gameplay were etched in our brains through decades of iterations. I switched to Rayman Legends and things were better, but it was still too hard for her. We had some laughs and she told me she enjoyed it, so I’ll persist in my educational efforts. I’m open for suggestions of games for newcomers.
About the console: coming from the PS4, it’s so awesome to have a huge library of cheaper backwards compatible games, as well as the Game pass. I don’t care that much about exclusives, so the Xbox is the most sensible choice for me. Everything about Sony is more expensive and less consumer friendly. Besides, every Sony console in my friends group presented a lot more defects than Microsoft’s. Right now, 4 out of 4 PS4s in my group are either broken or having serious malfunctions. That didn’t happened with Xbox Ones (in multiple versions) AT ALL.
I also liked how small and elegant it is. The Xbox Series S fits nicely on my table without clutter. Turns out I do care about looks.
The quicker loadings are really a game changer, especially due to my ADHD. I gave up on my games due to atrocious load times. The most traumatic was Witcher 3, that I intend to give another shot now.
Besides, my friends got Xboxes for this generation. I wanna play more with people.
Stardew Valley: With 1.5 being released and a thriving mod scene, my wife and I modded it up and are building a farm together. It's really nice. In 1.0 the world was small enough that I felt that with ideal routing I could do everything there was to do every day, and thus had really rigorous goals and pathing. With an extra village, more people, more maps, etc, it's just not possible to hit all the marks. And that's freeing. I can do what I want to do each day, secure in the knowledge that there's no rush and no way to be the fastest. It's a companionable experience.
Caves of Qud: This has been one of my consistent go-to's for a while now. It's a open world post-post-apocalypse roguelike with truly delightful writing, and while I've reached the end of the plot as it currently exists, I still come back to it to play around with novelty builds. I'll leave you with a description of one of the more powerful bears: Though their ursine kinsfolk oppose gravity and chase prey up the splayed branches of trees, the barkbiter knows what natural philosophers know: with some beseeching, the tree and its occupants will descend of their own accord.
Aside from the other games I've been playing, I wanted to share this one :
The Corridor
As the store page says, it's only ~30min long, but it's quite amusing. Give it a try if you have $2 to spare.
Spoilers in here
I don't think I've laughed out loud at a game that many times in such a short timespan. It's very creative. I think my favorite part is when it pretends to exit, makes veiled threats about your computer, then blacks the screen out and tells you to go away.I finished Cyberpunk 2077. Again.
Ending spoilers
I went back to a save before Chippin' In, replayed that mission with the "correct" dialog choices", and went straight to the Hanako. It turns out (Don't) Fear the Reaper isn't a joke, and they make you work for that secret ending. I walked into Arasaka tower, and got blown away by the lobby guards. They're all level 50. I was level 36, and a sneaky netrunner build, so completely and totally unequipped for a standup fight. I took a couple runs at it and went back to my pre-Hanako autosave to level up.
I did all the side gigs, minus a couple boxing fights, and leveled up to 49. I also crafted a bunch of epic Armadillo armor mods, which just add more armor. I got my armor up over 1000. And then I crafted Comrade's Hammer, which is a single-shot legendary pistol that does an unholy amount of damage. These things, combined a bunch of Cold Blood perks, and my legendary System Reset and Contagion quickhacks, made (Don't) Fear the Reaper fairly easy. Tense, because I couldn't quicksave through it, but I got it in one shot. I cheesed Adam Smasher a bit by hitting him with a repeat of Contagion to stun, and then shooting him. Comrade's Hammer has a fairly slow reload so I could usually only get one or two shots in before he needed another stun. Still downed him fairly easily and blew his head off.
However, this ending isn't the "happy" ending. I'd guess my first ending, V going nomad, was the closest to a happy ending. But I did get a lot more voicemails in the credits thanks to all my friends surviving.
Now that I can safely put down Cyberpunk until some DLC comes out, I've started Murder by Numbers. It's combining Picross, which I love, with visual novels, which I don't love. I'm all of 30 minutes into it but I'm enjoying what I've seen so far. The puzzles are bit simple.
Picked up Return of the Obra Dinn because it was on sale for like $12.00. I'd heard good things about it, and I've been reading the book The Secret History of Mac Games, so it fit right in. I've only figured out about 6 of the deaths so far, but I feel like I'm making progress. The style of the game is really impressive, and the gameplay is pretty fun.
Hades - After clearing it a few times I got into speed running and modding it, so this will probably be here for the foreseeable future. One of the easiest games to speedrun too, since most of it is just "pick the right rooms/boons and kill things fast."
Doom Eternal - This was really good. Everything fits pretty well and I had a blast. Waiting until the Ancient Gods part 2 to play it on nightmare all over again.
Ghostrunner - Passable story, but some good action. The first boss fight and the final level were the highlights.
Pillars of Eternity: This is a good isometric, party-based RPG. The writing is especially good. The art is quite nice, too. A few minor criticisms: I understand why they designed the UI and UX the way they did, but it would have been nice to be able to rotate the viewpoint, even if strictly at 90 degree angles. On occasion, interactables, NPCs and the environment obstruct one another. Also, even though the levelling and character advancement system seems rich, there seems to be almost no grinding at all. Every item and every creature seems manually placed in each (sub)map in the game world, and there are no creature spawns or random loot. Combine that with the map and dungeon layouts, and everything seems very linear. It makes it seem like every playthrough will give you exactly the same amount of XP for each portion of the storyline you advance, for each area you clear. This contrasts with [classic] roguelikes, where you can decide between playing aggressive, for faster rewards with increased risk, or playing conservatively, slowly grinding up your stats to play it safe. Nevertheless, the story and world history are interesting, and the voice acting and overall audio are decent.
I didn't think Pillars of Eternity was trying to go after roguelikes, it seems pretty well cemented in classic cRPGs which were all designed similarly.
Maybe so, but I don't have a lot of experience with isometric RPGs, so the experience was a bit dissonant for me. I'm willing to keep playing some more, though.
Yeah, in the cRPG genre the opportunities for grinding are more tightly controlled so as to give the developers more control over the difficulty curve. Unless it's been mistuned, you'll never really get a breakout run where you can roflstomp everything. This is intentional, in part, because they don't expect you to play it through more than once.
I bounced around with my games this past week:
Teardown: started this and got through the initial missions. So far, it is fun and not what I expected jumping into it. You essentially complete heists with a fully destructible voxel environment. I'm going to keep playing this when time permits.
Noita: I'm a little past 30 hours with this game. I still haven't beaten it but have gotten close. Unfortunately, I'm losing interest in this game and doubt I will play it seriously any more. Roguelikes only maintain my interest until I hit a wall and my progress is halted. I can only play through the same early cave patterns over and over until I get bored. It sucks because I'm one achievement away from 100% achievements.
Metal Gear Solid V: The horse riding in this game is weird. But the shooting is fun. The game hasn't opened up yet but I'm cautiously optimistic.
Counter Strike: Global Offensive: I have played this version of CS on and off since the beta years. I don't play competitively since I can't guarantee I will ever have more than 30 minutes uninterrupted, but war games and casual are good enough for me.
Dark Souls 2: This is Dark Souls. I have never been able to get into Dark Souls. I tried many many times with the first game before fizzling out. I figured if I played the second game, the spark might be lit in me. Alas, 4 hours was all it took for me to close out the game and not look back.
I've played pretty much all the Soulsborne games (including Bloodborne and Sekiro) multiple times... except DS2. There's just so much about it that feels wrong about it to me. I don't want to say it's missing the spirit of the Souls games but only because I haven't played through it more than once to say it for sure. I end up dropping out early in each subsequent attempt. It's not so much that it leaves a bad taste in my mouth so much as a bad film, if that makes any sense. It tastes like Souls but it doesn't sit right at all.
I think that Bloodborne, Sekiro, and Dark Souls 3 are the best entries in the subgenre that will help new players click with their designs the most, depending on what one hopes to get out of them, but even as a longtime fan of the genre I'd suggest staying away from DS2 until you have a couple of others under your belt. It has its fair share of fans but it's definitely the dark horse pick. I've never heard of anyone that only likes DS2 out of all the various Soulsborne games, for example.
The ironic thing is that I actually own nearly all Soulsborne games. The only game I am missing is Sekiro. I think I actually played Bloodborne up to about the 5th or 6th hour and had the most fun with it. I still ended up dropping it and moving on though, likely for the same reasons I quit Dark Souls 1.
These games just don't click with me for some reason. Either I'm too ignorant or too impatient, I reach a point where I fail at the game's challenge and end up moving on to something else. Currently, with Dark Souls 2, I picked the Explorer class and am trying to play the beginning of the game with the daggers. Now every time I pick a fight, I end up regretting starting out with this class because the daggers are terrible and don't deal enough damage. Realistically though, I feel there isn't an ideal class for me to start out with because they will all have some trade-off that I will regret when I hit a wall with them.
I want to enjoy these games and understand their appeal. I just can't get on their level for some reason.
That pretty much sounds like my journey getting into the games myself. There was a lot of failed attempts and moments of frustration that led to me putting the game down and coming back months later. If you find yourself compelled to give it another shot some time later, then I'd say you're on course to understanding the games. I don't think I beat the first Dark Souls game until my 15th attempt, and 2 years after I first got it.
For me, there's something instinctual behind the series where even after you swear you're done, you find that it's alluring again so you go back to figure it out. And each time, something new clicks and you find yourself getting in further than ever before. Go back and try Bloodborne again if that's the one you gravitated most to, I can almost guarantee you'll find yourself getting further than before, and quicker, and will develop a better understanding of the game almost immediately.
If there's one piece of advice I can really give to anyone wanting to get into the games, it's that they only thing you should be worried about it learning your weapon and how to make use of the scaling when levelling up to increase your attack power with it effectively. Don't worry about losing souls, items, dying, min/maxing, or anything else. As soon as you find a weapon you're having fun with and then basically design your character around that weapon, the rest of it really falls into place. For me, it was the Halberd in Dark Souls that made it all come together.
MGSV is so, so good. It took a while for me to get what it is going for, but by the time you get into the second large location, you should know if the game is for you or not. If you're a MGS fan, prepare to be disappointed in the lack of content in the story department.
Yeah, it feels good. The advice that I received was that the game will open up considerably by Episode 3.
I'm not the biggest MGS fan story-wise. They are fun games to play but I can leave the overly long cutscenes out. The cut scenes are probably what I hate most about the game right now. Just last night I watched a few minutes long cutscene, I regain control and run about 10 steps, triggering another few minutes long cut scene. That type of thing is just plain stupid to me in games. Just let me play!
After literal years of listening to my partner talk about "wizard chores," I downloaded Destiny 2 for free... And then quickly played through the initial storyline and bought Beyond Light while it was on sale.
I don't think of myself as a gamer, really, despite it being one of my main hobbies. I guess since I didn't grow up playing video games I assume I'm not "good enough" at them. (Which I know is silly.) As a result I'd totally dismissed games like Destiny 2. A multiplayer game with platforming plus shooting things? I assumed I'd only let everyone down and hate it.
But nope! Turns out I love the meditative zone I get into while collecting orbs and shooting aliens. I'm not amazing at aiming and I do accidentally jump off cliffs to my death, but it's so much fun playing Gambit or exploring the world with my partner. And I love the clothes/shaders. (Can we all just dress in layers and armor in real life?)
I chose a Warlock to start with, and I'm finding the original Void subclass is kind of perfect for me. The floaty jump my partner hates actually helps me a lot in platforming, and blasting enemies with a super that can hone in on them helps with my sometimes-a-bit-poor aim.
My only regret is that I didn't start playing sooner, since a lot of the older content (like, entire planets??) is gone at this point. But that's okay, I'm having fun now~