Hawke64
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Posts posted by Hawke64
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Blasphemous. An incredibly well-made Metroidvania. Not sure if the gore and the religious aesthetics are supposed to make it more humorous, but they do. The visual design is outstanding and the controls are reasonably comfortable, though the insta-kill spike traps are rather unfun. Discovered that I can get more Estus Flasks by filling the empty ones at the blood fountains after the third (?) boss.
Celeste. A very beautiful platformer. Despite the checkpoints being quite frequent, I activated almost all Assist Options by the end of the second area and didn't feel like I was missing anything. I guess, my reaction limit is closer to PoPTSoT than Celeste. The soundtrack might get slightly annoying, though.
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Thank you for the suggestion. I will look into it, though installing BIOS images correctly might require slightly more experience than I have.
Edit. It seems Asus actually locked the voltage settings in one of the updates (I doubt that the files for a different model would work for mine): https://www.reddit.com/r/ASUS/comments/qdvyui/asus_undervolt_unlocked_for_model_gl704gw_via/ -
I am looking for a safe way (software suggestions and step-by-step guides) to decrease the CPU temperature while being able to use the notebook for gaming (Elden Ring, Baldur's Gate 3) and ML (e.g. XGBoost).
Asus ROG GL704G, Intel® Core™ i7-8750H. The CPU reaches 90+C under stress. The goal is <80C without blue screen, ~45C when idle.
The notebook has not been used much and changing the thermal paste at the moment is not an option. I have not found the CPU-related settings in UEFI/BIOS. I have tried to decrease the performance via Control Panel/Power Options, but it did not change anything, and to undervolt the CPU with ThrottleStop by -125mV (cores and caches)*, but it led to hard crash and 3 blue screens. The monitoring software is HWMonitor. Could try with smaller steps (-50mV), though would prefer to know more about the process first.*the guide used: https://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/how-to-undervolt-cpu-guide/
Edit. Found an official Intel software (https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/download/17881/intel-extreme-tuning-utility-intel-xtu.html), which lists CoffeeLake as supported, but not the exact CPU model. If anyone has experience working with, the information would be most welcome.
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6 hours ago, Wormerine said:
Eh, push and broken stealth are bigger concerns for me. Abusing barrels takes active effort.
Chests, not barrels. Barrels are single-use, chests last for the whole game.
SpoilerMy PC and my stalwart companion, Chester.
From what I've heard, there should be less surface effects than in D:OS, though, as you've said, meta is still recommended (getting everyone into stealth and on the higher ground before starting combat). I guess, there should be less obvious exploits in a year of active updates. Then again, they might be features, not exploits.
Edit. The Dungeon of Naheulbeuk is free on EGS.
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Finished The Last Hero of Nostalgaia (pronounced as Nostal-GA-ia). It is an action-adventure/Souls-like. The world is dying and only the main character can save it. The controls are rebindable, the progress is saved on exit. Can't exactly recommend or not recommend, thus not posting it on Steam - the combat is clunky and the backtracking is uncomfortable, but the location design is memorable and the weapon upgrade system is unique. Though, I had to edit the save file to enable fast travel (after trying to backtrack through the woods) and to fix a failed side quest (the time limit and the need to backtrack were not clear).
Review:SpoilerThe story is narratively coherent, being both a satire and a love letter to gaming. Though, showing degradation via older visual styles is expressive, it also implies that more polygons are equal to quality. While the game refers to some of the industry developments, such as the rise of MMO RPG, it does not seem to address the crunch and outsourcing it to poorer countries, the loot boxes and gambling, and the intrusive DRM.
The combat reminds of the game’s primarily technical inspiration, but feels clunky in all aspects, as well as the movement. The hitboxes for some foes and weapons are odd, while the targeting/tracking is inconsistent - sometimes a boss goes straight past, sometimes in the same combo they do a 180-degree turn. Enemy AI and pathfinding are impressive - they can surround, attack from different directions, and hide (one specific type), but they also can hit through walls. The diversity of the opponents is adequate - most are specific to one region, some can be encountered throughout the world. The difficulty is mostly reasonable, with few points where the damage output, the attack speed, and the density of the encounters seem too high (the werewolves). Jumping is not possible.
The bosses have a wide range of attack patterns and abilities, with one of them including 3 stages, but overall almost all are too sturdy and heavy-hitting. Also, there are too few (5 mandatory, 1 repeated, 1 arena battle, 1 optional) of them and almost all are humanoids. It is possible to have an NPC assist with the battles, trivialising them, providing the respective NPC quest line has been progressed.
The location design is distinct and varied, from visuals to gameplay interactions - there are forests shrouded in deadly fog and dungeons filled with traps, mines and castles. While there are unlockable shortcuts, the lack of a built-in fast travel system and the general difficulty of navigation make backtracking extremely uncomfortable, but it is mostly unnecessary (3 times unavoidably during the main quest), except for restoring relics and side quests, including the optional bosses. New traversal abilities are added as the story progresses and, while their utilisation is minimal, add more depth to the exploration.
The Remembering aspect of the weapon upgrade system is unique and consists of finding a specific location the relic references and selecting “Remember" from the inventory screen, but if a favoured weapon has its memory location far or it is hard to determine, it makes it less powerful than the Remembered alternative. Alternatively, the weapon can be Unburdened - the same increase of the base stats, but the lore and special abilities are stripped. Another way to upgrade is more typical - linear damage increase and branching for different attribute scaling. This requires to unlock smithing firstly, then to find anvils scattered around the world to unlock higher upgrade tiers. Additionally, Remembering unlocks character-specific, Insight, bonuses, such as increased health or stamina regeneration.
There are several optional NPC quest lines progressing alongside the main story, which can also break if not done in the correct order before moving on with the main quest. Additionally, one of them requires backtracking quite far back, which is not clear from the NPC dialogues, and unlocks 2 optional boss battles.
As for the accessibility options, the controls are rebindable, 5-button mice supported, sprinting can be a toggle, the subtitles are available and readable, though not adjustable. The game saves the exact position on exit.
There have been very few bugs encountered an area didn't load once, an NPC didn't spawn once (the Old Man), foes regularly hit through walls.
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On 6/24/2023 at 5:08 PM, Bartimaeus said:
planet of lana
cheat engine's speedhack doesn't work on this game for reason, so it got uninstalled pretty promptly after I had to slowly crouch walk under something for the umpteenth time in the intro
billiam shakesman once said that brevity is the soul of wit, which is just a fancy way of saying QUIT WASTING MY TIME
also, why can't 2d platformers that are trying to be pretty have gameplay just a little closer to Donkey Kong Country and a little farther away from clunky walkathon Limbo, it'd do them a whole lot of good to have some kind of gameplay that isn't only "hold right" and "stop holding right until you can hold right again"
I think that the puzzle or stealth elements don't work well with more active action platforming. E.g. Guacamelee is an excellent platformer/metroidvania, but has no puzzles or stealth. Same for Celeste (the game is very impressive, but I don't think I would be able to play it without the Assist Mode).
The Last Hero of Nostalgaia. It is a purposefully junky Souls-like. Some systems are simpler, some are more intricate. The location design feels a bit linear (the path forward, a dead end, a shortcut), but nice otherwise - there are reasons to return to the previously visited areas, but I have not unlocked the fast travel system yet (if it is present in the game). The second boss battle was ridiculous (might have something to do with me trying to use a new sword and repeatedly misjudging the attack range) - several very different stages, including a group, and the save point was far.
Edit. Reached the Wilds (woods). The place is a labyrinth and it is connected to the previously-visited areas.-
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Finished Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones. It is as good as can be expected, though the technical quality of the Sands of Time was higher. I think the boss battle against the twins was bugged (the Eye of the Storm ability turned off after one hit), I fell ~12 times on the jumping plate in the Middle Tower (it did not throw me far enough to reach the dagger-holding point), and there are quite a few differences between the pre-rendered cut-scenes and in-game graphics. Mixed feelings about the idea of accepting fixable mistakes*. The total playtime is around 5 hours, including 20-30 minutes away from keyboard.
*SpoilerI guess, Kaileena's low opinion of dead civilians, as long as it got her free, was understandable, the Prince's regret of trying to avoid dying in Warrior's Within or calling correcting own errors "childish" was odd. But overall, it was an adequate conclusion and finishing it with the exact same words spoken to the same person as in The Sands of Time was rather poetic.
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Somewhere in the middle of Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones. A few things I've noticed only because I'm playing through the series sequentially - the sound design is better (VA, music, and random noises are separated mostly correctly), the targeting is much less forceful, and the boss battles are somehow more diverse (might be because of the QTEs, though - no giant griffons* this time). On the other hand, the graphics and animations are poorer and the gallery unlocks are not exactly immersive (the "Sand Credits").
*it was odd that the only boss faced during the infinite Sand period did not have any Sand-related gimmicks (like slowing down Mahasti in T2T).Purchased The Last Hero of Nostalgia after playing the demo. It is a Souls-like with a very unfriendly narrator, similar to The Stanley Parable. The controls are comfortable and mostly rebindable and the progress is saved on exit. Will continue after finishing the trilogy.
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1 hour ago, Wormerine said:
Ah, reminds me of the golden age of Zero Punctuation. Still somehow the most on point take on the trilogy I have encountered. Parable about pudding is a very valuable life lesson.
Mostly agree, though the only issues I had with Farah in T2T (vs TSoT) were the lack fire support during gameplay and the kidnapping part. Liked the new VA a lot, though. The Prince's character development seemed to make sense in the context (especially that not all switches and arena-shaped spaces are traps, but one should think before pulling/entering them). For combat, stealth became a viable approach (which was incredibly ironic with one the Prince's lines in WW - "Where I came from, we face our opponents"). Going to replay T2T next.
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Finished Prince of Persia: Warrior Within. The "realism" (as in "How would it work/be used by human beings normally?") of the environment and the combat barks/visual design of the enemies are somehow worse, but the platforming and the ability to traverse the island more freely (to backtrack to collect the health upgrades) feel good. There are more optional collectibles, such as weapons and artworks, but now I am much less interested in hunting them down. I also realised that I had forgotten what some of the switches did and was pulling/pressing them to find out, which was very in-character.
Defeated the final boss on the first attempt, the thing did not glitch (it used to instantly pull itself from the ledge in one of the previous playthroughs). In terms of combat, Warrior Within is more comfortable than the Sands of Time, but the targeting and auto-activating the combat mode are somehow inconvenient and some of the actions are bound to the same inputs (e.g. rolling back and doing a backflip with S+Space, which was unpleasant during the final battle). The total playtime, according to Steam, is around 6 hours.Finished Fable III - Traitor's Keep and Understone DLCs. I had forgotten some of the design issues (rather poor combat, untracked fetch quests, and good-looking but inconvenient GUI, including maps), but overall it was a very nice experience. Also Fable III has one of the most impressive character customisation systems and environments - the stats affect the PC's appearance and the story choices change the locations.
I suppose, if the reboot is anywhere close to that (and preferably returns visible HP/MP, local maps, and the magic system from the original Fable), it will be great. Also, the game definitely needs a chicken companion animal.-
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Finished Lucifer Within Us. A short (3-4 hours? If I didn't check the store page, I'd think that it the whole game was an introduction) investigation game. Somehow, it captures the idea better than Pentiment did, but the objective is also different and there is a specific murderer for each case.
Fixed the save files for Fable III and was able to load them. Somehow relieved that I can access and use my digital media (technically, we purchase licenses, while the files are the means to fulfill the agreements), although with third-party tools (DRM remover and save editor). I still might start a new game after finishing the DLC, as the saves are from the post-game.
Finished Solasta: The Lost Valley. The update slightly messed up the pregen characters' backgrounds. The paladin's I noticed (from Lawkeeper to Lowlife), but missed the wizard's (from Aristocrat to Acolyte) and added her to the party (a rogue, a barbarian, a wizard, and a druid). At some point, the party got another wizard as a follower for a side quest. Because the quest was for a higher-level party and the follower wizard was very effective, he stayed with the party for the rest of the campaign.
SpoilerI somehow either got stuck or actively antagonised most of the factions and the only ones I could continue with were the Mask and the Rebellion. So I continued with the Rebellion quest line and discovered that their leader was undead (not a lich, as I understood) and he sent the party to discover Orenetis' "weakness" and to destroy his research facility. The rogue under Invisibility was able to explore and loot the whole dungeon, including the bullette's arena (the creature could see through the invisibility, but it was possible to sneak past) and located the NPC the party was sent to kill. The NPC explained why the party might want to kill him and the barbarian auto-declared the intention (I assume, it was bound to the quest), initiating the battle. The uncomfortable part was that the rogue got there alone and the rest of the party teleported via the dialogue, so there was no option for tactical positioning. I was unable to activate the major gate, so the party left the same way as entered. Back at the Rebellion HQ, after receiving the bug-repelling sceptre recipe from the undead, it seemed safer to set him on fire, which was accomplished successfully. But the other Rebels did not like it, so the part had the opportunity to murder the undead's descendants as well. Ironically, the follower wizard, Tuznan Anfarel, was completely fine with everything, despite seemingly being related to them. Then the party just walked out of the valley. Marin Ving (?) was never found and the ending showed the throne being empty with the future described as uncertain.
Overall, I chose a wrong party composition and the parts that I liked were not the ones intended by the developers, such as being able to explore an area without fighting our way through it or using an NPC in the manner described above. I am curious if it is possible to kill and loot Orenetis on the first meeting (thus skipping most of the game), but not going to test it.
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13 hours ago, Wormerine said:
I replay that game every couple years. Love it to bits. the door puzzle comes down to following the water sound, no? I remember it taking me time to figure it out the first time, but it’s straightforward after that.
You are correct - the water sound does lead to the right door, and I have never noticed it between the characters' comments and the music.
Spoiler
This is the most reasonable order of the doors, which is clearly visible when written down.
11 hours ago, Wormerine said:I need to give it another go. I liked the vibe, but remember not caring for the game much. I also need to replay the 4th late entry to the trilogy. I remember it being pleasant overall.
The reboot is fine (the controls are a bit unresponsive due to the animations), though the semi-open-world format hurts it - you know that nothing horrible will happen mid-area and that you have to clear all the areas and possibly backtrack to gather the light blobs. But it looks gorgeous and the companion is likable. The Forgotten Sands would be better if it was a stand-alone game (the trilogy has 1 theme and it has concluded; it also does not have HP pickups falling out of vases) without any online components. I think, at different points I've encountered 2 progress-stopping bugs (a handhold not appearing mid-game and a door not opening somewhere late-game). Also, the Steam version might not work at all due to the DRM issues.
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Installed Fable III. After downloading external patches, it agreed to run, but I could not access my saves, because the DRM player's ID was different.-
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Finished Bad End Theater, a visual novel with the ability to replay the story from each MC's perspective and set the behaviours of the other MCs. The number of unique images is very impressive, though the playtime is rather short - 2 hours in total.
Replayed Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. It still holds well, though the combat, the targeting, in particular, is rather uncomfortable. At least once I was defeated in combat (was getting hit while trying to get up and the rewind was reset due to finishing off a foe) and the NPC companion died once as well (was surrounded during the final elevator ride). It is also interesting that the save points are locked behind combat encounters, some of which are skippable. Overall, PoP:TSoT proves the quality over quantity approach - it is concise, on point, and takes less than 5 hours (including the doors puzzle that requires a sheet of paper and a pencil to solve).
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8 hours ago, Wormerine said:
I thought it was a great narrative adventure, but it is just a narrative adventure. Not something a dedicated gamer will find particularly exciting to interact with.
It was somehow low on interactions, and the ones present were rather uncomfortable, from the slow exploration to the mini-games to the very low interactivity of the story. Speaking of, the first MC becomes severely unrelatable, as a major story event happens off-screen, and (end-game spoilers):
SpoilerThen he goes to die in fire, fails, and lives 20-something years under the ruins, all of which without any input from the player, even something simple as "Press F to breath in smoke/Press A to try to escape". While the second MC at least had all character-shaping events during the game, she still could not bludgeon the antagonist with a rock instead of listening to the corpse-to-become's monologue*. Which was awfully similar to Thaos', but he was possible just to attack without talking to, and, in general, one of themes of the story was presented much better in PoE. The other one, how history reflects the events, seemed fine in Pentiment, though it did not mix well with the player's motivations (to find the attacker).
On another note, I find somehow unpleasant that it was impossible to discover the main antagonist on your own, before the story pointed at it. I was not familiar enough with the setting to do so, but other players figured it out and were understandably upset.
*MC: "Did you attack that important NPC?"; The antagonist: "Yes, but.."; MC takes a large rock and proceeds hitting the antagonist until it stops moving. Shouldn't have been that difficult to implement.
Edit. Also, the walking into the burning library episode (and the preceding depression) did not work for all backgrounds. For the Bookworm, definitely, but not for the Hedonist.
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Finished Tacoma. Nice, but linear. End-game spoilers:
SpoilerI guess, it was good to see a happy ending and that both pro and against corporate characters were AIs as well as humans. On the other hand, the 2 NPCs wanting to pursue careers in arts did not age well at all and at no point in the story there was any choice. Also, it was somehow interesting to see a gay character who at the same time was unreasonably cruel with the background (the citizenship) explaining it reasonably well, while there were enough NPCs (2) who were gay and decent.
I guess, the question of AI and automation application remains relevant. As is, in order to train a good (reliable and usable) AI model, you would need a skilled specialist for each area (from data management to communicating the insights to the stakeholders), a lot of clean training data, and processing power, while low-skill contractors are cheaper short-term and provide a comparable output. On the other hand, higher-skilled employees might provide results of higher quality but slower and they also require adequate compensation. And people in general might like to have income sources and react negatively when those are threatened.
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5 hours ago, InsaneCommander said:
I lost almost all interest in Starfield after seeing its price on Steam. Almost twice the price of The Outer Worlds and 50% more than BG3. I guess it will go to my wishlist and wait for a nearly impossible 67% or more discount.
While regional pricing is an issue, especially with the last year Steam guidelines adjustments, waiting for a more bug-free and less expensive versions of the AAA games* seems to be the most reasonable course nowadays (the last 15 or so years). Starfield is also a Bethesda game, which are well-known for their issues on release.
*Not applicable to independent developers, they do need support and less likely to attach invasive DRM or exploitative monetisation to their games.---
On another note, I am curious if the Prince of Persia reboot requires the Ubisoft DRM. As is, the game does look interesting, but not outstanding. I guess, I would prefer it to be a separate IP. Also, I think, it would look better with cell-shading, considering the visual style.
https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/prince-of-persia-the-lost-crown-is-so-much-better-than-it-looks-in-the-reveal-trailer-
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21 minutes ago, the_dog_days said:
The problem as I see it is that Obsidian's best stories are those told by the player. There's a lot of impinging on role-playing opportunities in that you have to play human or elf, there are no classes, your employment status is set, apparently you took an oath, and you have to have two party members with you at all times.
Agreed. I hope, there will be different ways to approach the oath and the employment, even if their presence is pre-determined.
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Finished Dreams of an Exile. It is a functional and minimalistic action-adventure with platforming. Due to a bug, I was able to achieve only the bad ending and not quite inclined to replay the second half of the game.
Review:SpoilerDream of an Exile is an action-adventure/platformer. The protagonist’s village was covered by mysterious red fog and her father’s notes imply that the salvation is outside the barrier (unsuccessfully) protecting the village.
The locations available are divided into regions with collectibles and power-ups to find. The latter consist of various tools that allow to explore and collect more. The issues are that only one tool can be equipped simultaneously and it is necessary to switch between them one-by-one, as opposed to auto-applying them in relevant circumstances (e.g. the hammer can be used only on the small rocks, the axe only on trees, etc.) or having individual hot-keys. The other problem is the lack of a map. While there are only four areas and four dungeons, seeing all of the map helps with planning the route to the objective. Speaking of, most of the objectives are spherical coloured keys to open the corresponding doors. There are also chests, containing the above-mentioned tools. Both are clearly understandable and visible, and there is an on-screen counter of the orbs to collect in each area and dungeon. Also, this aspect of the gameplay provides a reasonable challenge - some of the orb keys must be carried without taking damage, while others return to the initial position if their timer runs out. Though, some of it comes from the controls - the protagonist moves strictly by squares. Additionally, taking actions (such as jumping) or using the tools (such as cutting down trees) consumes the only stat, Energy, which recharges by itself over time, meaning that it is possible to deplete in an inopportune moment (e.g. standing on a disappearing platform) and might be necessary to wait to perform an action even in a safe environment (e.g. breaking boulders).
On the other hand, the controls are rebindable, saving is almost unrestricted (can't save during dialogues or combat), the penalty for dying is low - the MC respawns at the area's entrance.
The single combat encounter takes place in real time, without a pause.
The graphics and music are adequate - most of the visuals are pixel art, with the short cut-scenes and dialogues featuring drawn images. The writing is present - nothing exceptionally good, but neither is it horrible, just enough to explain the story.
In terms of bugs, the most significant ones experienced during the playthrough were a quest-critical NPC not appearing and getting repeatedly "hit" and pushed back when jumping. The latter was fixed by several reloadings, the former required replaying.
Overall, it is a decent concept realised via a very restrictive engine.
Started Tacoma. It seems to be a walking simulator. Unironically, the character models are very impressive - the NPCs have different heights and weights, which is rather rare. Usually, there are at most 2-3 models of the same height in sci-fi games (thinking of Mass Effect in particular).
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8 hours ago, the_dog_days said:
https://www.pcgamer.com/avowed-rpg-obsidian-preview-magic-interview/
https://www.pcgamer.com/avowed-open-world-skyrim-rpg-size/
https://news.xbox.com/en-us/2023/06/11/obsidians-avowed-is-coming-in-2024/
- You have an established role as the imperial envoy, but your "personality, appearance, and philosophy and vibe you bring to that role is up to you as a player to decide"
- You can play as a human or an elf, but not other races
- It's purely singleplayer—no co-op
- The world is lightly systemic: think water and lightning interactions, but not the ol' bucket-on-the-head trick
- You'll have two companions with you at a time, with their own combat specialties and, of course, personalities
- There are several ability trees to progress through, and you won't be locked to a particular class or playstyle
- You will level up, but the focus is on unlocking abilities rather than putting points into stats to grow stronger
Avowed went from a 'very interested' to 'nah'.
Sounds reasonably good, though I would have preferred more races and specific classes. Curious if it is possible to do a complete diplomatic pacifist/stealth/murder playthroughs.
Also, I am very happy to see a purely single-player game. An adequate integration of co-op tends to mess up SP and drains resources. Speaking of, I doubt that Obsidian would go for text-only dialogues in a first-person game, so less interactive dialogues, I suppose.-
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18 hours ago, Wormerine said:
I mean, it’s day 1 on GamePass. Will be checking out demo later - buzz seems to be very positive. I don’t think it matters if the studio is independent or not, as long as they release a game worthwhile of the price. CDPR and Larian are also independent and operate in the premium price range.
I know nothing of the devs so don’t know what to expect. It always looked too good to be true, but it seems it might be solid afterall.A fair point. The developer and publisher is Neowiz. I haven't played any of their titles, but have 2 of them on the wishlist. I suppose, Lies of P looks somehow similar to Steelrising (a fancy-looking robot* fighting other robots in a European city), but, according to Steam forums, is better optimised. I didn't get further than the main menu, but unlike Steelrising, Lies of P (demo) does not support the 4th and the 5th mouse buttons, which might be fixed in the full version.
*I also can't quite unsee that P looks somehow similar to Evie Frye (Assassin's Creed: Syndicate). I don't think that it is intentional, though.Spoiler
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Lies of P PC demo is available on Steam. The price seems rather high for an independent game.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1627720/Lies_of_P/ -
Finished Self-Checkout Unlimited. It was a quite surreal 2-hour-long walking simulator, despite the first scene implying horror.
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On 6/5/2023 at 9:45 AM, Gorth said:
Finished my game of Mass Effect 2. I deliberately went with a less than perfect ending (I don't think I've ever killed any team/crew members before) to satisfy my curiosity. No maxing out of Jack or Zaeed resulted in a dead engineer Daniels (I did like the innuendo and fun dialogue between Daniels and Donnelly throughout the game) and as well as Presley and the biggest loss of all... Chambers. By extension, all my fish died soon after
I guess nobody really cared about Zaeed, as he survived despite not getting his way (I saved the refinery workers, no loyalty there), whereas Jack did bite the bullet before the end. I suspect the former is because he was a DLC addon IIRC, so no consequences either way?
It will probably be a while before I play ME2 again. I chose Miranda as the romance option btw, that's how Jack ended up failing the loyalty test, as I didn't have enough light/dark side power to persuade her (having already done Miranda's mission, I could have sided with Jack to maximize both team members loyalty, but that would ruin the experiment). I managed to squeeze both Legion and Tali into the team without them killing each other. Not that they didn't try to at first. Lots of characters I never really bothered with though. It's possible I did in the first half dozen runs back when the game is new. Generally stuck with Miranda, Mordin, Grunt and Kazumi for most missions that didn't require specific team members.
Now off to play ME3.
There is some sort of complex survivability rating for each character, depending on their role, loyalty, and team composition. So, it is entirely possible to have a fully loyal team and lose some of them and vice versa. The non-combat crew survivability depends solely on the reaction time - the sooner you start the final mission, the more survives. It also introduces a problem with the ME3 world state generator - it is either the loyalty missions or alive non-combatants, but not both.
11 hours ago, uuuhhii said:that was the worst part of me3
As mentioned above, the OOC PTSD was worse. Kai Leng is poorly introduced and written in-game (he first appeared in one of the ME books and seemed less annoyingly dumb), and covered in plot armour, but fine otherwise.
The ending is fine, though I would have preferred it to be more open.
---Finished Record of Lodoss War ~Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth~. Enjoyed it overall, though cannot see another playthrough.
Review:SpoilerRecord of Lodoss War ~Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth~ is a Metroidvania.
The story follows the titular protagonist Deedlit as she navigates the Labyrinth and has only one ending. The exploration is reasonably interesting and the bosses are diverse and engaging. The graphics and sound are gorgeous. The controls are comfortable and rebindable, but mice are not supported. The game uses checkpoints, overwriting into the same slot.
The two elemental spirits, Sylph (wind) and Salamander (fire), used for both combat and exploration, and utilised heavily during boss battles. Additionally, there are several elemental spells, melee weapon types, and bows to equip.
The only negative aspects are that the protagonist is knocked back upon taking damage, including out of an area, the foes revive upon exiting a "room", and the story is hard to understand at the beginning without being familiar with the original work (novels or anime series).
One bug was encountered during the playthrough - the uncompressed screenshots are saved in the game's save folder (C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Deedlit_in_Wonder_Labyrinth) and removed upon restarting the game.
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Record of Lodoss War-Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth-. I have realised that I should have watched the anime (or at least read the summary) first - the MC recognises NPCs and bosses, but does not elaborate on their background nor there is an in-game wiki (that I could find). The elemental system (Fire and Air spirits charge one another when the MC attacks foes, and when the charge at level 3, the MC regenerates HP and MP) is rather convenient, but it feels slightly OP. Then again, it also seems to be incorporated into the boss battles - when you get hit by a Fire/Wind attack and the corresponding spirit is active, you take no damage and regenerate MP.
17 hours ago, melkathi said:Character progression has you spending points to unlock bonuses and abilities, but at max level everything will be unlocked - you choose the order in which you unlock, not what.
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You also unlock sponsors based on your fame and personality. The choice of sponsors is the only thing that really changes between playthroughs.
Thank you for the information. Could you elaborate if there is any branching in the story, alongside the sponsors (what do they affect)?
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What are you Playing Now? - Games don't make you violent, lag does
in Computer and Console
Posted
I generally prefer RTwP to TB and TB to the weird thing in Final Fantasy VII/7 (probably 7, the one with "select the menu option while on timer because hotkeys are hard").
My issue with D:OS was that the animations were unskippable (in WotR it was possible to triple the speed and, as painful as that one battle was, at least it was faster) and that only the combat area was entering the TB mode, so everyone else could randomly wander into it. In terms of encounter design, often something was appearing out of nowhere (e.g. the second wave of slimes in the oil pits) and there was no way to prepare except for the meta knowledge. Then all surfaces were lava (sometimes literally) and just finding a safe spot to stand was a problem.
Though, I think, Larian has lowered the number of environmental hazards in their D&D game. Going to play it at some point, but likely in co-op. On a related note, Wasteland 3 had this amazing feature of switching between the players in dialogues (providing that the other player was in range) with 1 button. I strongly doubt that Larian will add it, so triggering dialogues with the rogue/fighter then reloading and putting the bard in front is going to be a thing.
Elden Ring. Defeated a dog/cat statue boss, then went to another dungeon and died to 2 dog/cat statue bosses, then went to the main story castle and died to some guy with magic hammer. Then defeated a skeleton boss with a boat and ran away from a dragon boss. The two positive things I can say so far are there is a horned horse called Torrent and Torrent can double jump. Considering just modding the game and running the critical path. Overall, the open-world in Dragon's Dogma and Shattered: The Forgotten Subtitle was more enjoyable and engaging. They also were smaller and the PCs were less flinch-y.