Wormerine

I am somewhat puzzled how few reviews were released for WotR. Was Owlcat selective with review key distribution? Did reviewers deem the game too nieche to review? Or too long to bother with? From the usual sources I follow only ACG did a video on it, and the rest only acknowledged its release.

haha, I watched an intro on youtube, as I was curious how much it has improved since beta, and it is still has this very high school stage play feel to it.

With Horizon out of the way, I installed Psychonauts2. First impressions are superbly positive. Had a quite a few good chuckles within the first mission alone. Almost finished with Dark Souls3. Mostly DLCs left to do. Had a space half an hour today break, so I gave Nameless King my second try. Beat him without much trouble. I heard him being mentioned as the best DS boss, so I was somewhat disappointed by how much of a pushover he was. Artorias is still my no. 1, though I wonder now if I will find him as interesting now after 3 DS games.

Finished Horizon: Zero Dawn. After really rocky start I somewhat warmed up to it. It is still Ubosoft time waster at its core, so I suppose it's my fault for expecting something more... interesting considering all the glowing reviews. I still stand, that for how AAA the game seems it's incredibly janky. I don't know how much of it is game it self and how much is PC port and mouse&keyboard controls. Cutscenes are really basic for how well the models looks, and there is this awkard hair physics jiggle with every camera cut. Controls feel unresponsive - as far as I can tell there doesn't seem to be action queing, so if Aloy is stick in animation and I will press sprint or aim button, it won't start doing that once she is available. Still, while the story is predictable, once it starts rolling it is pretty well done, and characters well rounded. Lack of indepth quests design is prohibiting from being truly engaging, but it's still way better then AssCreeds. I think my biggest complaint is lack of game systems - combat is fine, but that's the only thing there to do. Stealth is really, really basic and with little reason to use it, "investigation" is barely a mechanic, and unlike Witcher3 it isn't used to tell interesting stories, climbing is rarely used and again, not really a mechanic, exploration as such doesn't exist either. I mean couple main missions are literally walking simulators - making your way through linear corridors and being told a story. I think there is a reason while Arkham games has been my favourite from the AAAs - and that's because they have enough stuff to fill their maps with. That's why I didn't like the Arkham Origins - I felt they didn't pace skillfully combat vs stealth vs puzzles. You put too many in the row, and players start noticing how uninteresting your game really is. DLC content is far better, with more elaborate mission design, and trying vary things up with other game systems - puzzle, navigation, platforiming is all expaded to an impressive degree considering how basic those systems are. Cutscenes and animations seemed to get an overhaul, making it look like proper AAA production and not overly ambitious AA EuroJank. Overall - it's alright. It's pretty. It would be disposable if not for the superb art direction.

Interesting, I thought Civ6 really streamlined those - especially builders are a selective decision, rather then something you have to control every single turn. I suppose putting builders on auto isn't a thing anymore, and maybe a problem is that I always refused to do so - I found automated builders to be suboptimal. City planning (what improvements to put where, where to put districts, what wonders to go for) is one of the things I enjoye about Civ6 the most - and that includes builders and smart use of their limited charges. I must say, I didn't find disaster system to be particulalry impactful. Games rarely go for long enough to make it shine, unless one increases disaster system to max.

Speaking of bad trailers: this doesn't look... good.

For the first 10 seconds I was like: WHOA! That's an impressive looking game EDIT: "Boss is you - charismatic murder machine" I don't think you know me, mate. EDIT2. Oh well. Am yet to play a single SR game. This won't be the first one. Is it really the studio that did Freespace1&2 back in the day?

Eh, even the turd that is Dark Souls2 turned out well due to solid foundations. From what I understand it doesn't reinvent the wheel so at least combat should be great. With directors adoration for Zelda series, I am curious what kind of open world this game will be.

Agree with everything. I would still play ToB for story completion sake, if I do full BG1&2 playthrough with one character, but I would feel no need to include SoD, as IMO it adds nothing of importance to the substance. On the other hand, I wish I could play White March 1&2 without playing Pillars of Eternity1

I check RPS. Being PC centric they tend to not cover extensively things I don't care about. There a bit more useless trash posts these days, then I remember, but still pretty responsible reports with mixed attempts at humor.

It did finish the overarching story of Bhaalspawn so yes.

Unexpected late DLC to fabaolous Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun coming in December 2021. It seems that no changes has been made to the roster, which is a shame... I expected for at least one new character. I just hope there will be no story retcon, though timeline of the events is unclear.

Unlike Diablo re-release, Diablo2 Re-something is a Blizzard sanctioned pricey remake akin to Starcraft Remastered, Warcraft3 Reforged - I cought the beta completely by accident when I had an urge to play a bit of Starcraft2 out of nowhere. I am pretty sure Diablo2 will be available through battlenet only, just like the other remakes. The asking price is..... £35 . Released planned for September. I mean it's a lovely restoration, but hardly the first one, and I would expect the price to be closer to £15 mark. I also don't trust Blizz to not try something fishy with it.

From what is said, it is unlikely to be XCOM-like when it comes to structure. RPG has been thrown around, so I expect bigger focus on linear progression. Chatting to "party members" in the base and building relations was also mentioned. And there is aformention main character, more similar to traditional RPGs then strategy/tactics hybrids. We will see what it will be in the end.

That would mean XCOM3 wouldn’t be Jake’s baby. Which is not impossible, if Civ can switch directors between installements, why not XCOM. I doubt it though. In interview, Jake mentioned that higher ups contacted him, precisely because they liked XCOM and wanted something like that but with Marvel. I assume XCOM team is working on Midnight Suns. It was observed already that FiraXCOMs were pretty much superhero games. Jumping from Enemy Within and XCOM2 to superheroes isn’t really a change in tone. I doubt they will kill off Ironman though - temporary decommission like in Chimera is more likely.

1) setting. Means nothing to me, but might mean something to marvel fans 2) selection of heroes - from movie A listers like Ironman, Caps, Dr. strange, B listers, like Ghost Rider and some I am not familiar with 3) we create our customisable Avatar - I think the “hero” who is resurrected. From interviews it’s supposed to have a bigger RPG focus with a camp and conversations with heroes we recruit. FIraxis’ Marvel Game sounds good on paper, but I am doubtful it will actually be good. Looking advertising around Chimera Squad it seems that Firaxis deems XCOM2 too complicated to new comers. I shudder to think what they will do with an IP aimed at a mass market. There is of course chance they will make good game first, and then let IP do the selling, but I am doubtful.

We can talk about it more once you beat it. Yes there are “foreshadowings” and “setups” but majority of SoD has nothing to do with either BG1&BG2. It’s not a story that leads into BG2, and there is especially clumsy bit at the end when the game has to transition from its story arc, into you being caught by Irenicus. If there were issues to be solved with how BG1 transitions into 2 I don’t think they succeeded.

https://www.techradar.com/uk/news/diablo-2-resurrected-beta-is-free-to-play-for-all-this-weekend

Things on my menu: Dark Souls3 as posted before - loving it. I got to the point where game started to push back - the first half was rather smooth after DS1&2, but I died quite a bit in recent sessions. Last two bosses (Pontiff Sulyvahn and Boreal Dancer) did take quite a few tries. Horizon: Zero Dawn - it took a while, but I warmed up to this one. I mean it is still an unremarkable, pretty time waster but probably a better one from AssCreed likes. Combat grew enjoyable once more advanced enemies started to appear and I got more interesting tools, but I wish there was more to it - better movement mechanics, more involved quests or story. It's very much like Witcher3, except it's mostly filler content, not even one quests as interesting as a minor W3 adventure. At this point I am ready for it to end. Wasteland3 - it's ok. I enjoy my time with it but I don't particularly long to jump back in. That said, I aparently sunk 17 hours into it, I could awear it was max 5. So it is a good thing I suppose? I will beat it 100%, but I am more the happy to delay my playthrough while waiting for DLC2 to drop in October. EDIT: Oh I also gave a brief go to Diablo2 remaster during the free weekend on GOG. Superb job. I would kill for BG1&2 to be remastered like that. Looks fantastic and plays just as D2. I also tried playing with pad for a while, which worked very well (I always though hack&slash would make more sense with a pad - I never liked the clicking). That said it's Diablo so I had enough after an hour or two. Not gonna be coming back for more.

I beat it on my tablet in the couple months when I was PC-less. I thought it was ok, nothing that offended me as a Baldur's Gate fan, but not something I would add to my full BG1&2 playthrough. Frankly, I think I liked it more then Throne of Bhaal, which I feel about similarly as I do about Return of the Jedi - it's pretty disposable, outside finalazing otherwise great saga. Where I had most issues with SoD, is that IMO it failed it doing what it was supposed to do - bridge BG1 and BG2. It's not something I ever felt the games needed in the first place. Minor things (like Imoen studying magic) are cute, but not something I ever needed, and the actual transition into BG2 I found to be rushed and awkward. The only thing that I liked is seeing Jaheira and Khalid interact. With companions being rather basic in BG1 it's nice to see those two chat, before... you know. I also thought Beamdog was very heavy handed with pushing players through the narrative. BGs were great in delivering tied, directed narrative without constricting player too much. SoD felt like DM sitting me down and saying what's the story, my character motivations and objectives. Not terribly engaging, nor sparking imagination.

Finally some Elden Ring details. Indeed seems like it’s an evolution of Dark Souls rather then a drastically different IP. EDIT: No actual gameplay yet - just report by people who have seen it.

I don’t remember when CGI trailer sparkled my interest the last time. Also I don’t think those two were particularly good. X-Cmen was particularly awful.

That wakes up some early Comodore64 memories from when I was low single digits old.

A pretty decent stelthemup with abrupt ending Styx: Shards of Darkness. Steam Key. PM me preferably, as I don't dive into this thread often.

@BruceVChaha I don’t know about it. What I found is that at least in 90s & 00s consoles weren’t common sights, and personal computers and pirated copies of games were a norm. The result seems to be a generation who grew up on PC classics (often even older ones if you dad bought a dated PC) rather then consoles like PS2 or Nintendo. Genuinely the only Nintendo game I have seen before I moved to US to study was the original Mario on our Comodore64.