Ok, so my partner has gotten the recommendation from one of his spinal cord injury groups that a Meta Quest 2 would potentially be really good for him as way to feel less "closed in" this winter and that many of the games can be played stationary (he has essentially no control of his legs and uses a power wheelchair).

I don't know anything about any VR games, so I'd love thoughts on the system, what to look for if we buy secondhand, if a different system would be better (money is a barrier, so I don't want to spend it all on a new system and not be able to afford games), and what games would meet his needs?

Thanks y'all

So I've been playing a lot of Helldivers 2 recently, and was wondering if there would be much interest in the community for a Tildes LFG / Discord situation to find pick up games.

Anyone else have an interest in the game still?

EDIT: Apologies for the slow response / organization to this thread. Life is busy.

I have generated a permanent invite link to a 'HELLDIVERS' channel on 'The Oak', my personal use Discord server: https://discord.gg/sqepxdu7dK

Join that and say something in the helldivers chat channel, and I'll tag you as an HD2 player for general pings.

Or if you'd like to add me on steam: https://steamcommunity.com/id/Acorn_CK

My rarely used twitch is the same name, twitch.tv/Acorn_CK

EDIT 2: My timezone is PST, although I play late (generally 9pm-~1am)

I'm completely hooked on this game.

My buddy and I have been sneaking in some Satisfactory at night when our families are in bed. If it makes it funnier, you can picture it like a secret love affair. Late night messages, slipping in and out bed trying not to wake the wives, and mid-day texts about our big plans (with our factories). Friends, I literally play this game in my head when I'm not able to play for real. And it's just as good since most of it based around planning.

Anyway, I'm surprised by the depth. A lot of it is intentional while a lot of the rest is the natural result of players kind of hacking the build mode to do things you can't normally do such as curves and 1 meter vertical conveyers.

What are your favorite tips and tricks for this game?

A loose definition of a “chore” game would be:

A game in which you repeatedly do relatively unexciting tasks to work towards a larger goal. The fun often comes from:

• A sense of progress/completion that builds over time
• Fighting entropy/restoring order
• Converting effort into currency
• Unlocking quality of life features over time that make the tasks easier/more engaging

A perfect example would be PowerWash Simulator. In fact, these games are often called “simulator” games or have the word in their title (though not always, and not all “simulator” games are specifically “chore” games).

Which ones are your favorites? What do you enjoy about them?

I'm looking for something to keep me busy / focused on with minimal actual concentration, planning or learning required. Things that you can't look away from while playing or you lose what you're doing. Nothing that involves interaction with other people.

Things that have worked for me for this in the past are Bejeweled 3 lightening mode, Insaniquarium, driving around mindlessly in Forza Horizons.

I'm kind of terrible at anything that requires twitch reflexes, so anything that punishes you for slowness isn't great. Bejeweled it's not a problem because the game is basically identical no matter how you score.

I've long enjoyed Foxhole and X4 and was wondering what other games has similar logistical systems. Both give the same satisfying feeling when you look at the big picture of how the games are a complex interplay between the immediate gameplay, and what is being simulated "behind the scenes" to enable it.

The descriptor in the title is a bit of a mouthful, so let's break down what I mean.

Complex
To exclude typical resource game mechanics, where you "just" mine resources which gives you resource points that you can spend directly.

Required & Supporting
In Foxhole the main objective is to push the front and win the war. And players can focus on that and never have to really think about how they get their weapons and ammo. But at the same time the logistics is the entire reason they even can fight.
In X4 you can fly about and do stuff and acquire ships while relying on the AI empires economies. But there has to be some alive economy for the game to not go to a standstill.
In short, logistics systems that are required by the game, but not necessarily by the individual player.
This excludes games where the logistics system is the game, like Factorio, Dyson Sphere Program, Satisfactory, etc.

Real end-2-end
To specify that there should as little cheating as possible. Though obviously there is always some cheating in games. Both in X4 and Foxhole, every resource is tracked right from harvest, to refinement, to the end product. And all steps require real moving of goods by AI (X4) or players (Foxhole) between factories, other intermediaries, and end users.

So what other similar games are there? I was thinking of EVE Online, but I think only the player orgs in null-sec have real economies in that game, and you could still play it if they all suddenly stopped.

I was looking into getting a whole bunch of mods for Fallout and Skyrim and it seems like Nexus is the only game in town. I am not really in the mood to go back and forth 600 times between client and webpage to click on every time I wish to try a collection. I wouldn't mind it if they just severely throttled my downloads, they could just run in the background. But if I have to click the mouse thousands of times every once in a while, I'd rather not mod any game, to be honest.

And although I understand that this is a service and "there is no free lunch", the price they are charging in Brazil is too much for me to be okay with paying. A month of Nexus costs R$51.82, which is 12 bucks more expensive than a month of WoW. I really don't wanna be a "choosing beggar" here, as I know that it is not Nexus's fault that my currency is worth shit. But if there's a cheaper alternative I'll have no problem whatsoever paying for it.

Hi and hello all and fellow southpaws,

With the increasing option to pick from genders between characters (unless heavily tied into story and designed that way) it feels like the next option would be to have left-handedness become an option.
As a lefty I always felt a little "left" out (pardon the pun) in games as soon as I saw a gun or weapon being held in the "wrong" hand.

I know CS2 makes the option available if you dig a little, which is a great start.

So my question is, do you know of any other games that deserve a call out for already having this? Games that might need this (character fantasy) or just a shout out in support of the idea, feel free to discuss below.

Cheers!

Hello,

I am struggling with a relatively useless personal issue, I am finding it very hard to play the aforementioned game mentioned in the post. My close friend has this heralded as his favorite game ever (tied with Majoras Mask) and possible one of the best of all time, and since the remake came out he very graciously lent me his copy. I have just gotten past the first major boss (Hooktail I think his name is) and just playing this game feels like a chore.

The combat is very slow, the dialogue is so overly childish, the story is your typical Nintendo fan-fare story. Even the music, which Nintendo does a great job most of the time, I find just average. I find the Rogueport theme music to be overly obnoxious for some reason, and too grating to my ears for a central city/hub which you're visiting a lot.

I really want to know what I am missing out on that makes this game so beloved by people other than pure nostalgia because I just can't see it. I know it's completely fine to not like games, but I feel a game as acclaimed as this should usually be liked by most people, and I think I usually fall into the subset of that lol.

Ironically enough, this is the same friend who introduced me to FromSoftware and I have loved all of their games.

My general question ... where do you folks go when searching for replacement parts for aging technology, particularly pertaining to game consoles? I've come across iFixit, and of course there's Amazon and eBay as well, but I've been having some difficulty finding a particular part.

My specific issue is, I have an old Dualshock 4 (model CUH-ZDT2U, with PCB/motherboard model JDM-055) that is on the outs. It started experiencing some stick drift, so I took it apart to clean the contacts in the joystick housing to the best of my ability. In doing so, one of my kids managed to get a hold of the controllers' guts and break off the vibration motor wires from the board.

So, after taking the board and chassis to a local Makerspace, I got the wires soldered back onto the board. So far so good! However, the stick drift is still an issue and the vibration connection isn't that great. So now, I'm hoping to find some replacement parts - namely, a replacement board with the chassis and motors included.

One of the main reasons why I'm trying to refit this old controller, rather than replace it outright ... is because my wife bought the controller (and the PS4 it came with) as an anniversary present years ago. I'm the sentimental type and I'm trying to keep as much of this old controller going as I can, Ship-of-Theseus style. In addition, these controllers don't come cheap - $70 seems to be the basement these days for a new, in-box controller.

I've taken a swing at purchasing replacement parts off eBay - however, while the controller models matched, the board models did not. iFixit has the exact parts I need, but they are out of stock and their stock is inconsistent. I found another site - Fasttech.ca - that purports to have the same parts, but looking around online I've found a fair bit of discussion surrounding this site and the fact that it may be less-than-reputable.

Any advice on where else I might be able to look for parts?

Can you even call it microtransactions anymore?

Here's the link to the store page.

I have never bought a cosmetic in any game, ever, but this is absolutely insane to me, especially for World of Warcraft which usually had somewhat measured pricing on their real-money cosmetics (everything has always been below €25 to my knowledge) - that it's fully cosmetic is debatable though, seeing as you now have an auction house and mailbox wherever you are. Not all that game changing to be sure, but it's definitely a small advantage over those that are not rich in money or in-game currency.

There is an argument to be made that it's a way to influence the economy in the game - another gold-sink to reduce the huge wealth gap between players (it will cost nearly two million gold to reach the Battle.net balance required). However, two million gold is not that much.

I'm not quite dusting off my pitchfork over it, mind you, but still. And I just wanted to share to maybe foster some quality discussion on tildes about microtransactions maybe?

Thanks for the tags @mycketforvirrad, didn't really know what to put.

Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom was one of the best metroidvanias with a retro flavour and an excellent hand-drawn art style and fantastic music of the current console generation, an entry in the Wonder Boy series of games. While completing the game gives you a sequel teaser, it had since been reported a long time ago that the development team at French studio Game Atelier had decided not to go forward with plans for a sequel, citing the overcrowdedness of the market for (2d?) metroidvanias.

I remembered this recently and decided to look up what the studio is working on now. To my surprise, a new game by them has already been announced, and a demo is live on Steam. The game is called Otherskin and is... a Metroid Prime-like? My jaw dropped to the floor when I heard that - these game devs sure know their ambition!

Otherskin is a 3D action platformer metroidvania. You play as a woman who is stranded on an alien world filled with ruins of a bygone alien civilization and are tasked on eliminating the Corruption™ (yes, that's really what it's called). You progress through the game world by absorbing and copying abilities of enemies you defeat - I'm thinking Kirby or Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia. Or, well, any other kind of metroidvania game. The major difference between this game and Metroid Prime is the 3rd person perspective.

Grappling hook, wave beam, bombs, your favourites return. It's not all copy-cat though. The very first ability you acquire is a super-jump that makes you fly very high into the air. The movement in the game is great and the environments range from dark, corrupted and gloomy to bright and wonderful. The combat feels dynamic - while you're using your super-jump ability, you can briefly slow down time to shoot at enemies while falling. You can also insta-switch between different weapons with the mouse wheel.

I'm curious to see how the final game will turn out. The demo has you lose your copy abilities after returning to the hub, for you to have to collect them again from the same enemy in the next level - although this likely doesn't apply to weapon upgrades, only copy abilities like the super-jump and grappling beam. I'm also perplexed that it is a metroidvania game without a map system. Maybe we will see one in the full game? It certainly has me intrigued and looking forward to more.

A while back I asked for some advice about running a haunted Beaver Dam game, and a few people popped up to ask why I wasn't trying out a narrative RPG system instead of using classic DnD.

Well, you got me. After some discussion (particularly about the painful amount of time to conduct a high level fight in 5e), we're going to try out the Dungeon World system instead. I've never run a TTRPG like this, and I'm rapidly working through the rulebook to figure it out. But rules only take you so far, there's a lot of learning that only comes with experience.

So for those of you with experience, I ask you: What do you wish you would have known before running a narrative TTRPG?

In some games like Terraria or Horizon Forbidden West, you can have a "fake" set of armor on top of your "real" set of armor. The "fake" set defines how your character looks, while the "real" set determines your stats. This isn't a common thing in a lot of games, but in basically any game with different outfits with stats, I hear this being a requested feature. Whenever someone mentions this feature in a comment, people will chime in that it's cool and they wish [insert game here] would add it. The Horizon devs being one example of a studio who heard about this from the community of their first game, Zero Dawn, and added it to the sequel.

I really don't like this, even having it available as an option for single player games. Let me explain...

I think it really ruins the whole point of stat changing equipment in games. A big part of video games with customizable equipment and builds is designing a build and a character appearance that you like. Do you want to be slow with powerful attacks? Do you want to be fast with weak attacks? Do you want balance?

I'd argue that making a set that looks good while balancing the stats is another one of these things that adds to meaningful character creation decisions. Do you take the insane armor, or the really decent armor with worse stats that looks cool? Find a cool hat the character you're roleplaying as totally would wear? Oh, it has worse stats than the helmet you were using... But it weighs less! Maybe you can use a heavier chest plate to compensate for the stats you lost?

This also makes armor that both looks cool and has great stats into very valuable items that players want to get.

Of course for PvP games, having the type of armor that a player has on instantly give away their power level is important. On a Minecraft server, if you see two hostile players, one has leather armor, and the other has full netherite, you know the netherite guy is going to have better gear.

You might think this only matters for PvP games, but not allowing this mechanic in mostly single player games also adds a lot to the game, since you'll likely either see friends play the game or watch videos of other people playing the game. Each armor being intrinsically linked to certain stats creates a link between what you know that armor does and what kind of player would use that armor. In Elden Ring (which also has PvP, but bear with me), if you see someone wearing Bull Goat (the heaviest armor with the best stats), or wearing nothing but a jar on their head (to get worse defense but faster dodge rolls and some buffs to consumable throwing items), that tells you a lot about their play style just looking at their character's appearance. If both of these people could wear whatever armor they wanted and make the functional armor invisible, I would have no idea what build they had.

Using armor that looks good but has bad stats can be a fun flex to show you're good at the game, and choosing to have terrible fashion in exchange for stats is hilarious, as per this ProZD skit. That concept is a fun part of gaming culture I wouldn't want to see destroyed.

I'm currently building a basic MUD as a (very productive so far) learning exercise.

Obviously MUDs have the same mix of appeals as other RPGs do: exploration, progression, combat, PvP, online community etc.. But what in your experience is the key mechanic the game needs to nail to keep you coming back? When a MUD clicks with you, what itch is it scratching?

All examples welcome, even those that are not MUDs but may be applicable to MUDs.

Based on the previous topic, it looks like there are a few of us currently playing through this. I felt like we could use a dedicated topic on Tildes given that FIFTY different games yields quite the discussion surface area.

Use this topic to talk about any and all things UFO 50!

So I have very little free time and have been on a gaming hiatus for the past four-ish years, but I've been wanting to bust my Switch out again and fit some time in when I can. I'm looking for recommendations for a game that can be played for less than 20 minutes daily with an easy learning curve. Any recommendations?

When I was in elementary school, I found some Advanced Dungeons & Dragons books at a yardsale. I read through them, brought them to school, and played through a basic campaign with some friends. Since then, I haven't met anyone interested in pen-and-paper RPGs. I still hope that I can one day convince someone to play with me, but I don't even know which system I should try to learn. There are now so many different editions of D&D, in addition to countless alternatives and endless arguments over the merits of each.

Whatever system I decide to learn, I will need to invest time and energy into learning and teaching the game to others, and I'll most likely be the DM, so I'd like to choose one that won't be too difficult for beginners to get into. While I enjoy exploring interesting game mechanics, I think the idea of creating an interactive adventure story or a world to explore with friends is what attracts me the most. The Fate system sounded interesting, but I had a hard time understanding the core rulebook. I've recently read short summaries of several other systems that seem like they could be fun and not too hard to get into, such as Index Card RPG, Shadowdark, Tiny Dungeon, Five Torches Deep, Fantasy AGE, and Creative Card Chaos; but I can't afford to read through each of them and seven editions of D&D to determine which one is most suitable for me.

Does anyone have any advice on how to evaluate my options or a suggestion for a good one to start out with?

Gonna put up a collection of links to the trailers that came out today. Monster Hunter and Ghost of... can carry their own threads, but hopefully this will people a place to discuss the less popular things.

Astro Bot - Speedrun and Special Bots Add-On Trailer
The Midnight Walk - Reveal Trailer
Hell is Us - Gameplay Reveal Trailer
Metro Awakening - Release Date Trailer
ArcheAge Chronicles - First Announce Trailer
Palworld - Launch Trailer
Lunar Remastered Collection - Announce Trailer
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge - Radical Reptiles DLC Announce/Launch This was leaked yesterday on official channels
Fantasian Neo Dimension - Release Date Announcement Trailer
Dragon Age: The Veilguard - Blighted Dragon Gameplay Trailer
Alan Wake 2 - Lake House Expansion
Hitman World of Assassination - Announcement Trailer
Legacy of Kain Soul Reaver 1-2 Remastered - First Reveal
Fear the Spotlight - Release Date Reveal
Towers of Aghasba - Gameplay Trailer
Dynasty Warriors Origins - Overview Trailer
Monster Hunter Wilds - Release Date Reveal Trailer
LEGO Horizon Adventures - Pre-Order Trailer
Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered - Announce Trailer This is funny to me
Stellar Blade - NieR: Automata DLC & Updates This is funny for a very different reason.
Chroma Collection
PlayStation 5 Pro Console - Game Lineup Sizzle
Ghost of Yōtei - Announce Trailer

Overall, my stance is that this sure was a collection of games. Porting old stuff that may have been locked to old hardware is cool. Remaking stuff that was already playable on existing hardware is a little weird. Showing more news on upcoming games is expected. The only real fireworks in this show is Ghost of Yotei, but those are some pretty good fireworks.

Gonna try and get a handle on everything shown off at TGS this year. It will probably be less structured compared to the Sony State of Play thread I posted, as language barriers, time zones, and finding official trailer sources I gonna be a lot more time consuming than just going to the Playstation youtube channel.

DAY 1

Gamirror Games Now TGS 2024 Speical

XBOX Broadcast
METAL GEAR SOLID Δ: SNAKE EATER - Official Trailer #2
Overwatch 2 x My Hero Academia | Collaboration Trailer
Age of Mythology: Retold - Immortal Pillars Teaser
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle - Trailer | TGS 2024
TANUKI: Pon's Summer Announcement Trailer
Threads of Time - First Look Game Announcement
We Love Katamari REROLL+ Royal Reverie - Xbox Game Pass Trailer
Fragpunk - Trailer | TGS 2024
Metaphor: ReFantazio | Xbox Tokyo Game Show 2024 Broadcast Trailer
A Deep Dive into the Magical World of Atelier Yumia
ASURAJANG Xbox Announcement Trailer
BLEACH Rebirth of Souls – Announcement Trailer
SYNDUALITY Echo of Ada – Release Date Trailer
All You Need is Help Launch Trailer
Slitterhead: Learn More from Gaming Legend Keiichiro Toyama
Starbites - Xbox & Windows Announcement Trailer
DRAGON QUEST III HD-2D Remake: TGS Demo Playthrough
Trials of Mana | Xbox Announce
Legend of Mana | Xbox Announce
Final Fantasy I-VI Pixel Remaster | TGS Xbox Announcement

SNK Special Program
FATAL FURY: CotW × STREET FIGHTER｜Teaser Trailer

Koei Tecmo Broadcast
“DYNASTY WARRIORS: ORIGINS” TGS Official Program

Level 5
HOLY HORROR MANSION – Teaser Trailer Saw some discourse online about this game using AI art
INAZUMA ELEVEN RE – Teaser Trailer
INAZUMA ELEVEN: Victory Road – PV7
DECAPOLICE - Theme Song Trailer
Professor Layton and the New World of Steam – Trailer
FANTASY LIFE i: The Girl Who Steals Time - 2nd Trailer
MEGATON MUSASHI W: WIRED – New Content Announcement Trailer

Capcom
A Beginner's Guide to Monster Hunter Wilds
Monster Hunter Wilds: 4th Trailer | Release Date Reveal (Extended Kut)

Day 2

Most of these devs don't seem to have anything up on YouTube (or in some cases don't have an easily identifiable channel). So It's mostly just the live stream broadcast here.

Aniplex
The Hundred Line -Last Defense Academy- SPECIAL PROGRAM

Sega
SEGA/ATLUS Special Program in TGS2024

Square Enix
"EIKO KANO'S CRITIKANO HIT" TGS2024 SP

Infold Games
Infinity Nikki Special Program at TGS 2024

Dungeon Stalkers TGS2024 Special Program

I like to listen to mostly horror let’s plays throughout the day and at bedtime because they are good background noise for me.

I just want to find more chill options that don’t do any over the top screaming. Preferably some that need a boost and are lesser known.

I’ll contribute my own to get started. Her name is Hula Noob and she’s very chill, lots of dialogue and commentary which I like.

I do know about Gab too. Though she’s a little more diversified. Which is fine.

I thought I should ask this question here, as I value the input of users here more than strictly WoW-focused places. A brief summary of my relevant likes and dislike.

• Love solo-friendly MMOs, e.g. ESO and GW2
• Haven't played WoW much but love Warcraft's lore, and been a fan of it for over 2 decades
• Dislike competitive group content and mandatory structured raiding

Basically, I am mainly interested in solo content, and story and lore.

The price of the expac is a bit pricey in my country, so it's a significant monetary expenditure if I choose to buy it. However, nowadays I have exhausted my enthusiasm for the other MMOs mentioned (and a lot more others I haven't mentioned). I've also heard a lot of good things about the solo-friendly nature of this expac. But I still have my reservations, as WoW players tend to hop on a bandwagon rather easily, especially at the start of an expac.

So, the question stands: do you think it's worth it?

Hey ho, so I'm taking over running one of my existing D&D groups. I have a campaign in my pocket that I have run part of before, A dystopian Narnia. If somehow my players meet just the right overlaps of nerd and techness to have ended up here. Leave now .

But it's really a set up for a longer campaign that I hope bridges into more worlds. I have the Narnian World really fleshed out, but if somebody feels particularly passionate and has ideas, please let me know. I can provide any detail folks would like into being asked a tricky question just helps me World build so please go for it.

The general gist is that our adventurers are pulled by a much weakened aslan from faerun or whatever default world we start from into Narnia. There they find it has been a thousand years of winter and rule by The White Witch. I'm familiar enough with the lore that if they decide to leave the country of Narnia or seek out another witch as an ally I have some options. Hopefully they save the day and free Narnia from Christmas-less winter. (I'm leaning hard into all the broad references to mythology in Narnia, Dionysus and the Maenads, the River God

If they do, they will receive a set of the magic rings used in The magician's nephew to allow people to pop between Narnia and the wood between the worlds. Allowing them to hop into other stories that have been similarly messed up.

I am looking for One Big Idea But also some other suggestions

1. The suggestions I'm looking for are other stories from about the same realm of stories that could be similarly messed up, ideas I had included Dinotopia, Wrinkle in Time, The Rats of NIMH, maybe one of the Discworld stories (I feel like half of those characters would be self aware) particularly thinking middle grade books with a dip towards children's or younger YA stuff, particularly fantasy stories, particularly those with some nostalgia for my fellow millennial PCs. I don't want to touch Harry Potter.

2. My idea for the reason why the story went wrong is that someone is rewriting it, possibly due to hating children or hating happy endings or something. I wanted a BBEG but I can't think of one. Umbridge is out for the Harry Potter reasons, but who else would go to the trouble? I am planning on the villain having acquired "magical book mcguffin" (that I also need to figure out) that's letting them do this. I like the idea of a villain who gets a lot of power but uses it in such a petty way, to rewrite children's stories

It'll take a long time to get out of Narnia, we don't play very often, and we may not continue depending on how players feel but as someone who's worked this idea over and over in their head for a while, I would love to get past these things.

Hi DnD friends,

I'm tackling a new DM challenge and could use some guidance. I'm designing a dungeon where humanoid beavers are attempting to awaken a sleeping god. Their efforts get derailed when they offer the god a magical plant that overgrows their entire base, warping the rooms and fusing many surviving beavers into half-plant, half-beaver creatures.

Since our group is relatively new, I've found that combat can be a bit slow. To speed things up and make combat more dynamic, I want to include environmental elements and traps—things like shelves that can be pushed over or a chandelier that can be dropped on enemies. I hope this will make the players feel more impactful when they pull off creative moves.

I plan to design a large building that encourages investigation, puzzle solving, and backtracking. My goal is for the players to get familiar with the map before combat, allowing them to discover useful items or environmental features they can take advantage of when enemies appear.

Since I've never done anything like this, I'm seeking advice on how to approach the design. Are there common pitfalls I should avoid to keep the building fun? How large should the maps be if I want to run this over 3 sessions, each about 3 hours long? And what types of puzzles would fit well in this environment?

Thanks a ton for your ideas! I’m already feeling like I may be reaching too high, but I’m excited to give it a shot!

I miss playing D&D with a group, but hanging out for 5+ hours at a time every week just doesn't fit into my schedule. However, I was thinking about how some mobile games have handled this - Words with Friends has (had?) a mode where you would get notified when it was your turn, and you could play whenever you had free time. I think there's at least one chess game that operated this way as well.

I can't imagine many human players would appreciate long waits between moves, when D&D is designed to be very immersive. So I'm being realistic and wondering what options there are as a single player.

Baulder's Gate 3 is fun, but I don't expect anything with that level of graphical fidelity. And something I could play on my phone would be ideal (but not a dealbreaker if I can't).

Are there options like this out there, or do I just have to accept that D&D doesn't have a place in my life?

I was impressed with our community’s response to this same question for the PlayStation.

I’m thinking of focusing my gaming habits on the Dreamcast for the month of September by emulating some old classics and hidden gems. I’d love to hear this community’s recommendations for the greatest underdog console of all time.

Let me know what games for Dreamcast you think are still worth playing today, especially less well-known ones, and why!

Homebrew and fan translations are also eagerly welcome!

Hey guys,

I've had a Switch for a couple of years but I haven't really played it lately because I've kinda been disappointed with the last two titles I've played. I've played God of War recently and I was just blown away by how much fun I had and I kinda of want to replicate that? Sadly, my friend wants his PS5 back so I'm looking for some game recommendations for the Switch.

I've played BOTW and I just found it so boring. I played maybe two hours and I was at no point entertained. I also played the Link Awakening remake but I didn't really like the graphics and so I just stopped playing after two hours or so. 2D Zeldas are among my favorite games of all time (OOS/OOA; Minish Cap/LADX), I'm kinda scared to say this, but I also didn't really like OOT (although I played it a good 10 years after its initial release). I don't really like open worlds and much prefer having "guided" gameplay, but I do enjoy a mix of both (like God of War).

I've played Hades and absolutely loved it, just like Rayman Origins, but since I've been disappointed with BOTW and Link's Awakening, I'm kinda scared to buy another critically acclaimed game just to not like it... Looking at the list of games and picking one seems so daunting, I don't really know what to do.

You guys have any suggestions?

DMs, how do you decide if an NPC dies at 0HP (like a monster) or drops unconscious and starts making death saves (like a PC)? I'm a newish DM (been playing off and on for 10 years but never run a campaign that had legs until now), and our last session ended with the death of a recently-introduced barbarian NPC at the hands of another barbarian NPC. I made some other missteps but the big one seems to be this death - some of the players were shocked that barb #2 had done enough damage to kill barb #1 outright. I just had #1 die because she hit 0HP, and it hadn't really occurred to me that she should have gotten death saves.

Any rules of thumb for how you handle NPC death/dying? Or, if you're a player, how you would expect/like to see it handled? Happy to provide more context if desired.

Thanks!

Edit to add: coop multiplayer is not available on the mobile version, which is the only realistic choice for our current life pattern / technology setup. I do agree it sounds interesting and fun!

My family has recently been on a big Stardew Valley kick. My spouse and I and our daughter are all first time players playing on android, which has no multiplayer mode.

From what I understand about multiplayer, I don't really think it would be good for us. We all play the game in very different ways. However, I think it would be amazing to be able to trade items. No one but me likes going into the mines/caves, and sometimes you just need one of something out of season.

My idea is that there would be a special chest I could put something into and it would be moved out of my game and into one of theirs or vice versa. Obviously, you could mod the game so you can just get any item, but this way somebody still has to get it, so it (hopefully) doesn't undermine the game economy.

I have been looking at the mod community, and it seems like the android version supports mods. I haven't found a mod that does as described. My general path forward is:

• set up a mod that implements the chest and talks to a server via API
• set up a server that can receive and hold incoming "put" and then send those items with the "get" from the client at the other end
• build the API so that it can represent important assets in the game
• come up with a lightweight way to secure the protocol to the intended users (this may depend on how identifiable individual clients are, but could be as simple as putting in a shared secret when creating the chest)

Obviously there are a lot of details to work out, but I wanted to get some wider feedback from people who had been playing the game longer.

• does this already exist and I'm just not aware? I did spend some time searching, but it seems like most mods are either cosmetic or change the in game mechanics in some way.
• would you be interested in something like this?
• what kind of mechanics would you want to see? Maybe a way to propose and accept specific trades rather than just sending items? Would you limit it to your circle of friends or be interested in a wider community?
• have you written or used Stardew Valley mods (especially on android), and if so, what was your experience?

I'm looking for games that I can play and enjoy with my 8 years old son. It doesn't need to be a 2-players game, or even a game that he can play (though if he can take the controller and get actively involved, that's better), but just something that he can enjoy as a "backseat player". We have a Switch, a PC, and a PS4.

tl;dr: "backseatable" adventure-ish games with exploration and a clear direction (different sights to see, and a sense of progression), puzzles (so he feels involved when exchanging ideas), ok with light horror. Low stakes, low stress.

Here are some games that we played together and both liked:

• Outer Wilds: loved it so much we did 2 playthroughs in 2 years. He liked the sights, the exploration/treasure hunt aspect, the puzzles, and he asked me questions about our universe and solar system. He was mostly passive as a player both times we played, but we were sharing ideas and he was making suggestions on what to do/where to go next.
• Link's Awakening remake: we played this one when he was 6 years old, with me taking the lead for the bosses or more complicated puzzles. We finished it together.
• Stanley Parable: I intended to play it alone, but unexpectedly he really liked watching me play.
• Strange Horticulture, Grim Fandango, Day of the Tentacle: he liked solving the puzzles with me, and me explaining/narrating what was happening and why.
• Portal 1 & 2: he was able to play on his own with some help, and the coop levels in Portal 2 were great.
• Deep Rock Galactic: he's making his own story and narrating along while I (and sometimes random players) play normally.
• Human Fall Flat: he loves the slapstick humor and finds better (and more creative) solutions than I do
• Mario Odyssey: probably his GOAT game, the accessibility features helped him a lot to play and enjoy it alone.

He's also taking an interest in light horror (specifically mascot horror) games:

• Garten of Banban series: objectively bad games but he really enjoyed the progression, light puzzles, and the liminal level design.
• Indigo Park: much better production value, mostly a walking sim, but very short.
• The Complex: a free "Backrooms" game. He didn't play it since he wasn't yet comfortable with mouse and keyboard controls, but liked watching me explore around
• Crow Country (demo): he backseated and enjoyed it. There's an "exploration mode" that removes enemies. Will probably buy the full game later.

And some "failed" tentatives:

• Tunic: since he liked Link's Awakening, I thought he might like Tunic, but no. Probably because of a lack of NPCs or clear indications, and the game is too difficult for him. Not fun to backseat.
• Zelda BOTW: he tried to play it when he was a bit too young, and had a hard time with it. I'll probably try again soon.
• Minecraft Dungeons: we played 2-3 games but he got bored of it very quickly.
• Diablo 3: he saw me playing and wanted to try it. He liked it much more than Minecraft Dungeons but hated seeing villagers getting turned into zombies, so we stopped here.
• Sandboxes: not his thing (Minecraft, Terraria, No Man's Sky, Animal Crossing)

So in summary, I highlighted the best experiences we had (with Outer Wilds being the best), and I'm looking for something equivalent.

EDIT - I'll try to keep this post up-to-date with the suggestions we liked:

• Superliminal: Excellent, I wasn't expecting such a good game. He's managing most of it alone, and there's even a (harmless) "scary" section
• Untitled Goose Game: Great suggestion. We actually already played it (not to completion), and he loves honking and absolutely not helping me complete the objectives 😅
• Layton series: I think he tried the first one on my DS for an hour or two. I'll suggest it again and be the backseat player myself.
• Luigi's Mansion 3: GOTY

A bit of background before I get to the main body of the post.

I've been following Warcraft's story since Warcraft III came out. It was a wonderful experience of my childhood, and I was interested in the story's progression since then. Even though I haven't played WoW personally until last few years, I read the comics and books, and I read about the lore. Chatted with friends who played the game.

Near the very end of Legion I started the game (2018), and Battle for Azeroth was my first real experience of the game. I played a demon hunter night elf, and I didn't have a problem with the story at the time. I thought the burning of Teldrassil set up the conflict well, and I found the world fascinating. Of course, it was heavily colored by me finally being able to play the game after almost 2 decades. I was also a night elf fan since my childhood, so I looked at things mainly from the perspective of Alliance. Story-wise, my major problems were that N'zoth and Azshara were defeated too quickly, and Tyrande's ritual transformation should've had resulted in much more of an impact.

I now know that the experience for Horde players was much different. But roleplaying as a demon hunter night elf suited the BfA story very well. I had just come out of a long battle against demons to find my people burned to death, their land destroyed. Vengeance, once again, fueled me.

Come Shadowlands, and like most people, I found that the story to took a steep dive in quality. I don't think I need to elaborate, but I will touch upon the main points. The afterlife was extremely unimaginative and made death lose its impact, the conclusion of Sylvanas's story was extremely unsatisfactory, Jailer was all kinds of bad writing, and Tyrande's arc was a major letdown.

Coming to the main issue. With the release of Dragonflight two years ago, and seeing how much people praised it, after a month or two passed I bought the expac and joined the adventure. However, despite all the letdowns of Shadowlands, I found the Dragonflight story to be the most unengaging one I've experienced. I just didn't care about the dragons and their personal arcs. Every word that came out of the major characters was such a cheesy and cliche line. In the cinematics, every one of them, especially Alexstrasza, talked so slowly and artifically that it threw me off every time. I just couldn't take it seriously.

There is only one memorable moment I remember from Dragonflight, and it's that one dragon in dwarven form that tells you his story while you sit down and listen for a few minutes. It was a really touching and tragic story, but it was just a very minor interaction.

I have no problems with personal stories or more touching subjects being told in video games. In fact, I think they can be wonderful. So, that wasn't the part that bothered me. What bothered me was that dragon aspects felt extremely one-dimensional and same-y, and their story was like a poorly written Disney story about the importance of family. Because it was handled badly, it especially felt jarring and out of place in the world of Warcraft, where violence and war crimes are rampant.

Yet, many players seem to have enjoyed the story because it was more "down to earth". I have trouble with this, because I have trouble understanding how people found this story to be engaging at all. For example, when Amirdrassil arc concluded, I didn't feel anything. In fact, it just made the burning of Teldrassil feel hollow for me, because I felt like that dramatic turn of events didn't matter at all. Night elves had a world tree and a home again, as if nothing happened. This retroactively made the story worse for me. At that moment, I realized I had stopped caring about WoW's story and was forcing myself to care. I decided to stop playing, at least for a while, because story and lore were the main reasons I played.

This, however, led me to a question. I've been following r/wow for some years, and the general opinion there is that Dragonflight's story was well done. My experience is the opposite, as it was the most unengaging story experience for me.

I have considered several possible explanations for why people reacted so positively to the story of Dragonflight.

• The one-upping of threat levels and villains in Shadowlands left a really sour taste, especially because it was handled so badly and retroactively undermined a lot of stories. So a relatively tame threat and villains were welcomed.
• Since the "gameplay" part of the expac was received well, this put people in a positive mood and led them to interpret the story charitably. This might go the opposite way too. For example, both BfA and SL were also criticized heavily for gameplay reasons.
• The expectations for WoW's story are really low, and that's why longtime players that are still playing don't mid the stuff that bothered me. In other words, they adjust their expectations. People who didn't adjust left.
• People don't actually pay much attention to story, they are mainly interested in raids and other combat-centric parts of the game, or even cosmetics. So, when discussing the story, they mostly go with the prevailing vibes and opinions of the community.

I think all of these play some part in the explanation, but I came up with these explanations based on my own experience. I also can't assess their relative importance. For the reasons, I thought I could benefit from a wider array of opinions, especially from people that have or had been involved in the game and community for longer than me.

So, my questions are;

• Why do you think Dragonflight's story was received so positively?
• Why don't people seem to care about the aspects I mentioned?

There are games that people can generally agree are masterpieces due to their eminent quality and cultural impact.

I'm interested in ones that fall outside those lines: a game that you consider a legitimate masterpiece but, for whatever reason, isn't necessarily widely seen as such. Maybe it's because it's very niche; maybe it's because its amazing systems and story are sold by underwhelming graphics; maybe it's because the game did something so different or unique that people don't appreciate it as much relative to other games. Maybe it's something else entirely!

Let us know what game you think is an unconventional masterpiece and, most importantly: why.

I absolutely LOVE hearing other's stories from their games. Crazy things happen in game land, and these kinds of tales inspire others to play and experiment as well.