marelooke

I'm level 11 in Grim Dawn (thanks for letting me know it was fully released btw). Can't put my finger on exact changes but the game "feels" a lot better than when I last tried it. Also seems a bit easier, somehow. Have to pick a second class now, wondering if Arcanist is a good pairing with Occultist: let the pet(s) do the tanking and nuke nuke nuke with the Arcanist abilities? Also still playing Warframe, new quest was released recently, kinda positively surprised they didn't take this opportunity to introduce more grind. On that note, a lot of the high level (well, Void) content has become a lot less unbearable since I figured out that I'm actually powerful enough to not have to bother too much with PUGs since I can, if I want to, solo pretty much every Void mission. I hope they'll rework the tutorials though, as this game has surprising depth (and complexity) once you get past the initial hump, which I'm sure, most people don't. I mean, the tutorial isn't particularly easy (at least not last time I tried it with a new account) and once you're through you're just dumped into your ship without any explanation, once you figure some basic stuff out the difficulty falls off rather quickly (unless you go looking for hard challenges). Also it's kind of bad if you need the forums/wiki to figure out that certain things even *exist* in the game.

Got stuck on some battle in D:OS for now (the two headed fire dude with the icon that keeps reviving his cronies). The main issue being that I'm basically three manning him since my pyro/geo-mancer only has offensive Pyromancy spells, and tossing fire at fire elementals seems to be kinda counter productive (who could have guessed ). Finding some offensive Geomancy spell would probably solve all my issues with that fight. But the entire random finding of spells and stuff is kinda...meh. Also kinda annoying that enemies keep going for my wizards, I could take the stench skill but I had the bright idea to make my wizard the high charisma character... oh well... So playing more Warframe. Saryn Prime has been out for a bit now and Saryn has been my favourite frame for quite a while (apparently with 18% of my time spent with her, though I think those stats are only accurate since they revisited the Star Chart a bit over a year ago). Kind of a shame that there's so much whining about her skill rework (which I quite liked, barring for the fact that they decreased the survivability of the non-Prime Warframe which sucks since she has a lot of melee abilities...). (for the uninitiated "Primes" are "improved" versions of the "normal" versions that are, theoretically, harder to get, in the beginning they just had a different focus, now they are just plain upgrades to the normal version) Trying to get my reputation up with a few other Syndicates now (which should bring me in the positive with 4 (out of 6) of them, will be a fun balancing game then to keep them all happy-ish afterwards... Also trying to get my hands on the Ivara Warframe (got 2 out of 4 parts now), I'm slowly getting better at those Spy missions, just need a bit of luck with the drops now... Kind of curious about the new patch that should drop soon (today? Wednesday is usually patch-day...), especially the Sabotage mission rework.

Picked up my D:OS playthrough. I intend to finish the "classic" version as savegames don't carry over to the EE.

Finished up Rise of the Tomb Raider. The final part had some epic eye-roll moments... And the naïve girl Lara-shtick is not for me, thankfully the gameplay and overall setting were pretty good. I tried to get 100% completion too, but it seems I'm foiled by a bug (or horribad design): a ledge I need to get to one of the final documents I need is no longer there in free roam (it's one in Path of the Deathless in case anyone wants to avoid running into the same snag), making the document inaccessible for that playthrough. Bummer.

Got to "the point of no return" in Rise of the Tomb Raider, so going back and finishing up the one side quest I still had hanging and now working my way through the challenges and other things to get 100% completion on all areas. I know I could come back after I'm done, but the likelihood of me firing up a finished campaign seems a tad low. I'm a completionist but I'm not that OCD quite yet

You're forced into PvP? Ugh, I don't think I've enjoyed MMO PvP since the Burning Crusade... (and consequently, avoided it like the plague)

Lol. Wow. That's gonna ruffle a few feathers when it arrives. The guy's narration gives me the creeps...

Warframe event is over, grabbed the stuff I needed from the Void before Saryn Prime release (yay, Saryn!), so back to Tomb Raiding it was! Last session I ran into quite a number of bugs, an achievement didn' t trigger (find all documents in Baba Yaga) even though I have 100% area completion. The completionist in me finds this painful, especially since one of those documents was the one I was complaining about being a real pain to grab. Ugh. I've also had my camera "stuck" at some point (only way to look around was aiming down the sights), very annoying, especially since I had no idea how far I was from the next savepoint (it was in a story part with quite a bit of combat and I didn' t just want to bail out for fear of having to start over quite a ways back). Made stealth...interesting to say the least Had to quit out of the game entirely to fix that one (once I reached the next campfire, that is). Pretty sure I'm off to the last area now.

Lara getting beaten on more, managed to get the annoying document in Baba Yaga, only to find out that for the last one there is I need some tool I don't have access to yet, well, bummer, so onwards with the main plot I went! I have the feeling I'm nearing the end but knowing that there's still 2 tools I don't have access to I might still be further off than I expect (which I'd consider a good thing ).

Maybe that was a change to the EE though, not sure I played before its release. Nope, that's exactly how I killed it as well. With or without specter oil? Also:

Dunno if they tuned down the first boss encounter for the EE but if they didn't: that boss is, as far as I remember, the hardest fight in the game. So should you get frustrated there, remember that once you're past that one it will only get better. In that fight be sure to use all the tools available to you (especially an appropriate weapon oil, specter oil, iirc. It makes a *huge* difference since you won't have a silver sword yet). The Swamp, while annoying, doesn't come anywhere near that boss, difficulty-wise.

Mordheim: City of the Damned released 2 new recruitable units as DLC (one for the not-so-human warbands, and one for the human warbands). Oddly enough this info is not featured anywhere on the official website's frontpage. Thankfully Steam put it right in my face: Globadier (for Skaven/Cult of the Damned): http://store.steampowered.com/app/434040/ Smuggler (for Mercenaries/Sisters of Sigmar): http://store.steampowered.com/app/434041/

Hate to ask if you have noted it already but are you playing it on the pic or Xbox one? If so what would your specs be and how does it run if you don't mind me asking. Playing it on the PC on a first gen i7 (model 930) with 16GB of ram with a GeForce GTX 970 on spinning disks (no SSDs). I'm using the settings recommended by the NVidia GeForce Experience tool and the game appears to be running great (haven't actually checked my framerates though, haven't noticed any slowdowns or stuttering though). I think AA isn't turned all the way up and textures are on "high" rather than "very high" (or whatever the maximum is called), I can have a look when I get home if you're looking for specifics.

OK, trying to get all the documents in the Baba Yaga DLC of Rise of the Tomb Raider. This one "puzzle" (solution is simple, execution is horrible) just nearly made me break my keyboard: a series of extremely tricky jumps with an extremely short timer. Annoying as all hell and absolutely not fun in my book. I need a break of this thing before I *actually* break my keyboard.

Oh, so you bought it. Good, don't have to shill for it then :-P Seriously tho, I've read that the challenge tombs were entirely created by the same team which worked on multiplayer for the last game and it shows (that they had a dedicated team behind them I mean). They're huge, they often have mechanics not seen anywhere else in the game, the puzzles in them are a lot of fun - they're no longer just a small room with a simple puzzle. And then there are actual tombs to raid strewn around the landscape, there are the big, open locations like the soviet base which offers a lot of opportunities for exploration which is incredibly satisfying, stuff like that. Weirdest thing is that I'm enjoying doing the challenge tombs and side missions a lot more than progressing trough the main story, but that's not a bad thing per se - it's just a shame that when someone's not a completionist he's risking not really seeing the most fun parts of the game. I also love that stealth is a lot more viable this time around, and generally, if you explore a lot, you'll be doing a lot less shooting and a lot more tomb raiding, which is awesome. Generally speaking I'd say the game has improved in just about every aspect upon the 2013, except for the main storyline buut I'm a sucker for mysterious islands. Oh and then there are challenges. God, it's that kind of thing which gets decided during a board meeting by a bunch of managers who then walk up to the development team and say "Guys, add some challenges. Like cut 7 soviet flags. People like challenges, right?" "But... It doesn't work with the theme at all." "CHALLENGES, MAN! THINK POSITIVE! ONLY LOSERS THINK NEGATIVE! CHALLENGES!" "I... *sigh* Whatever." Yeah, the challenges seem kinda...meh (Shoot red laptops. Really?) Tombs are definitely better (and equally importantly: bigger) and some of the more enjoyable parts of the game, now if they can take over the rest of the map for the third instalment we'll have a party Though, so far, none of the "Challenge Tombs" has been that much of a challenge (did 4 or 5 or so now I think. Also Lara starts to give you hints if you take too long, noticed this when I managed to miss a climbable surface in the Baba Yaga challenge tomb). Then again, I've been stuck for *hours* in TR 1996 and that wasn't much fun either, kinda hard to find the balance I guess ... That said, making them harder might mean they'd increase the difficulty of the parcours instead of the difficulty of figuring out the solution, which would not be much to my liking... (Cistern was really cool) But I wish they'd leave the James Bond stuff out already, it just doesn't fit. I mean the part with the chopper... if I hadn't been so busy repeating "seriously?" in disbelief I probably would've facepalmed hard enough to end up with a headache. Anyway, really enjoying the game so far, few niggles I have so far would be: - the annoying QTE based opening sequence (getting killed over and over because it's not obvious where you gotta go is annoying, especially in a tutorial) - the James Bond/ Mad Max-style chopper sequence - challenges - environments often designed to be cool but make zero sense (eg. start of Baba Yaga is a "well worn path" in Lara's words, that then ends up with a bunch of jumping around cliffs to get to the destination. Suuuuuure...) The good (so far) - the overarching story - challenge tombs tend to be bigger - more exploring (outside of the tombs, eg. caves and various historical sites) - less fighting (bit of an overdose in the last game, feels more balanced so far in this instalment) - first part of Baba Yaga was pretty cool, though the "plot twist" seems obvious (but won't be able to tell for sure until I've finished it, of course ) - the annoying "deathrides" from the previous game have been gone, so far - side missions (while the objectives don't always make the most sense the added NPCs and their reactions make the world seem more alive) - the environmental stories told by the recorders/texts/objects you find (also there in the previous game, still worth mentioning imho) All in all a solid game and not regretting my purchase one bit so far.

Did you like the original? I mean, the original reboot. Gah. Kinda, it was a good action adventure, bit light on the puzzling compared to the originals. Then again, the puzzles in Tomb Raider 1996 (as opposed to Tomb Raider 2003 ) were often extremely finicky, though I kind of miss the grand scala of the puzzles (spanning entire levels, like Palace Midas). That said, Tomb Raider 1996 is the only of the old ones that I spent much time with even though I never actually finished it (gave 2 a shot, but never got very far). As for the story, I liked the story of the Island, and I'm kind of liking the overarching story in the new one so far as well. However "new Lara" doesn't quite do it for me (although she has her moments), I preferred when she was a grown seemingly confident woman compared to the insecure teen we have now. But maybe she'll undergo some character development that puts her back to where she was at in Tomb Raider 1996 in that respect... Currently I'm in the abandoned Soviet Base, kinda itching to get back into some tomb raiding, those are still the best parts of the games (imho). You know, I'd kill (figuratively speaking, of course ) for a remake of Tomb Raider 1996 in the new engine. Though given how different the gameplay in both games is that seems rather unlikely (or unlikely to be satisfactory, if it should happen), but some of those locations in the new engine...

There's an event going on in Warframe so I'm playing mostly that right now. Seems they finally found a way to keep people playing during these events without making the final reward depend on insane grind, which is good. I've been tempted by Rise of the Tomb Raider, would those of you who've played it say it's worth getting at full price? (well, minus the 10% it's currently off on Steam I guess)

In fairness, that quote was made at a time when most video game stories consisted of "Robot Ninjas Kidnapped the President" and not much more. Gaming has evolved since then. I agree not all games need a deep, well written story. Games come in all shapes, sizes, and varieties. There are story-driven games and there are gameplay-driven games. Story-driven games obviously need a good story with well thought out characters or they will fall flat on their face (/glances disapprovingly in David Cage's direction) since story is the core pillar of the game. Gameplay-driven games don't necessarily need much story at all, though they can still benefit from one. As far as I remember Carmack was the technical genius behind the graphical engines that were always pushing the limits of what was possible at the time (would explain why he now works at Oculus) but that doesn't necessarily make him an authority on videogame storytelling since really, which of the games ID Software made had any real storytelling going on? I guess Rage would be the closest to "story driven" they ever got... Now if that quote would have been from MCA...

I've kind of been waiting for more patches before I carry on much further with Mordheim. Shame about the insane loading times or it'd be a great game to fire up for a quick match now and again... Wonder if lowering the resolution would help with the loading times, though I'd assume not since it's apparently due to how they randomly generate the maps. Meh. Which brings me to the game I tend to fire up for a quick match: Warframe Attained Mastery Rank 19, running out of new gear to level (not surprising given how long I've been playing the game) which means I'll have to go into the Void more often if I want to obtain new toys to play with. The reason I dislike the Void is because I can't just let the matchmaker create a group and go. On top of that it requires keys, so I'd feel bad about sucking in some high level missions (which is stupid, since I play at similar levels on the Star Chart, but hey, a little insanity has never hurt anyone, or something...). When I have slightly more time to play I fire up SWToR, made it into the Shadow of Revant content now, finally starting to get gear that's an actual improvement over the stuff I had.

So figured I'd check the status of my ticket before heading to bed. Now I'm forced to wait for the launcher to be done "Reorganizing data..." or I will "Have to download the entire game again". Giving a heads up before starting such an obnoxiously long process is too 1900s I guess. EDIT: apparently got luck and after 20min the update finished (someone in the forums claimed his took over 2 hours!) As for the ticket I made about the missing Cargo Bays, it has been closed and made into a bug report. Should interpret this as: "We don't care, we tossed it on the pile and nothing is ever going to happen with it, go away" or can I expect the issue to actually get resolved at some point before the heath death of the universe (made that ticket like 20 days ago now...)?

Finally started seriously playing Witcher 3. Gotta say combat is a *big* improvement over Witcher 2 (especially the release version). Kinda really enjoying the game though running into a lvl33 quest 5minutes into Velen was a pretty big "WTF?" moment. Also bit of a bummer that Velen is just more of White Orchard, visually. Anyway, going have to be careful with this game as I was just gonna kill that Royal Wyvern and then head to bed but before I knew it I was trudging through elven ruins with a certain "witch" and the clock struck 4(am)... Ouch. Also playing a bit of Mordheim here and there, closing in on Warband Rank 10, should really return to the story missions and get some more of those over with.

I quit after my initial month at release because I got fed up with the amount of generic MMO quests I was forced to do to level. Granted, I had a max level character within the first week and was leveling a bunch of alts. I tried to come back when it went F2P, but then I saw they were trying to sell basic UI elements (I can't recall if it was the 3rd or 4th hotbar) that I'd needed when I played previously, so that was pretty much an instant nope. I initially quit because my guild fell apart due to the endgame (heroics/raids) being a buggy mess until a *very* long time after launch. Nowadays I don't have the time to raid anymore and I don't care for PvP. Got a good deal on the expansion in the end of year sales so now I'm "subbed" meaning the horrible F2P (or "preferred status", lol) restrictions don't currently bother me. Going to make the most out of the two months or so of subscription I have and try to ignore the wasted potential as much as possible. More on topic: finally acquired HK-51 after they reset the quest progress (without refunding anything, of course) somewhere in the past few years. Thankfully all those operations can be soloed nowadays.

Been playing quite a bit of SWToR lately. Game's pretty depressing to be honest. Lots of potential but all thrown away by choice of a seemingly horrible engine (judging by the amount of bugs and time/effort it seems to take to release anything) and the "streamlining" and nickel and diming that appears to have been going on since the game went F2P. Customer support also seem to be pretty horrible (ticket's been open for 8 days now, missing storage space is kind of a big deal...) The good news is that it probably won't be very hard to put the game down once I've seen all the class stories. Just, you know, the things that could have been... *sigh* I really should make a list of games I want to play and then stick to it, instead of starting a bunch and then moving on and restarting and never getting much of anywhere Witcher 3 seems like a good candidate to start with.

Apparently the HK quest got reset at some point so I get to start over...which is pretty darn annoying since I think I only needed one of the operations before I was done (I also get to re-buy some expensive component, not to mention all the fun scanning I get to do once more). I've also still not received any response to the support ticket I made nearly a weak ago, so making a support request for this seems largely pointless. Still haven' t received any better gear from quets so far either (level 59 now and I was running Colunmi level gear) though I seem to have lost an artifact (seems to be the one from the Datacrons, is that gone?)