Hurlshort

You were exercising restraint earlier?

I agree, but I'm not sure what the solution is. Just adding more fights would just make it grindy. Minigames around the Abbey seems terrible too. Better puzzles, maybe.

I never figured out the point of them. I mean, you can shelve a couple companions there and get some more resources, but it seems pretty useless. I assume it will be some developed feature in 10 years or something. To be fair, owning a house in Skyrim was pretty lackluster until some of the DLC expanded it, so it is possible it will become cool. Everything about Starfield kind of seems like it needs more time in the oven, really. Which is pretty typical of Bethesda.

I finally got into Midnight Suns, and it's no surprise that I love it. The combat is a blast. Firaxis continues to nail the turn based combat stuff. I'm enjoying the storyline of The Hunter and his mommy issues. I'm also glad to see that the Marvel heroes are pretty different than their MCU counterparts. Plenty of parallels, but the Avengers are a lot more down to earth in the game. That being said, Blade and the non-Avengers are still the standouts for me. The base exploration and friendship building stuff is decent. It feels a lot more pulp comic bookish than movie based, so that is good. I still think they could have done almost the same game without Marvel and it would have been as good. I'd argue that Xcom Chimera Squad was just as good at creating memorable teammates and unique combat, but I'm sure they felt they could reach a wider audience with the Marvel IP. I don't really agree and it seems like the sales numbers were underwhelming, so hopefully they realize they can stick with their own IP's going forward.

Ugh, just looked at the polls and it's crazy how Trump pulls in numbers: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-primary-r/2024/national/ So yeah, I guess it is him.

Are we sure Trump is going to be the candidate, though? I mean, he's not even going to be on the ballot at this point in a number of states. He's not been part of the primary process. The primaries stretch out until July and who knows what will happen before then.

As was already stated, Steam awards are voted on by the public, so they aren't quite the reviewer circle jerk. Also as much as Keyrock doesn't care what gets an award, publishers do tend to look at that stuff, and that directly affects what games get funding going forward. So I'm bummed when a game like JA3 doesn't get the recognition, despite knowing that it was better than everything else that got awards this year. Hopefully the sales numbers were big enough for awards to not matter. It's always good to remember that Fallout: New Vegas got shafted by Metacritic ratings and Obsidian nearly was shuttered because of that. https://www.gamespot.com/articles/obsidian-denied-bonus-over-new-vegas-metacritic-score-studio-head/1100-6366337/

I also bought Midnight Suns during the sale, but haven't bothered playing it yet because I'm not really in the Marvel mood. I have no idea when that mood will strike. I mean, I loved all the Xcom games, so I'm all about the combat, but it's hard to get excited about more super hero stuff.

I'm not sure who recommended it that way. It's a pretty depressing holiday film. This is like the saddest thing ever:

I thought there were some good exploration moments, but they were mostly in the designed areas. The random caves, planets, and bases were pretty boring. It was pretty silly that they didn't do vehicles.

I watched an episode of The George Lopez Show called Blue Beetle, and it was pretty well done. I've missed most of the DC movies that have come out lately, but this one was a decent standalone flick. The family was definitely the star of the show.

I watched Rebel Moon and agree with most of what people are saying here. The beginning was good. I liked the little Space Amish Viking community. It was a nice looking film and the actors were good. But yeah, it felt half baked. I'm sure we'll get a 4-hour Snyder Cut that will be fully cooked but filled with overly long gazes.

No there was definitely something wrong with that trailer. Story-rich does not preclude plot-holes and contradictions. It just means it has a lot of story. Just like calorie-rich food doesn't mean it tastes good or is healthy. Anyways, BG3 is an absolute mess of story, for sure. They tried to give every throwaway NPC a backstory and it's a bit crazy. It's one thing to have a town with named NPC's and quests revolving around them, but then they named every NPC in the enemy bases. Even the forest critters seem to have backstories. I didn't stop many to ask, but I'm sure each of the squirrels running around the forests have some lengthy diatribe on their family history. Is it good story? I've said it before, if you don't like Larian's writing, then you aren't going to like that they put 1000% more in this game.

I thought you were trying to seem less snobbish. Rings of Power is definitely my bag. It was right up my alley and I can't wait for more. Which is why I'm concerned that it was badly recieved. Barbie is pretty much the opposite. It was a huge hit and well recieved. It also wasn't really geared towards me. Sure, I enjoyed it, but for my wife, her mom, and my daughter it was a powerful film that evoked their childhood and mirthfully touched on their struggles as women in this society. So yeah, I'm puzzled when people can't see outside of themselves enough to recognize that a film isn't really geared towards them.

Side note: Did you grow up with Barbies in the 80's and 90's? The movie is pretty much tailored to that audience, so it would make sense that it fell flat if you weren't exposed to that in your youth.

None of the stuff I nominated made the final list except for BG3, so I'm bummed. JA3 definitely deserved to be on the Best Game You Suck At category, and Conan Exiles is definitely a labor of love. That being said, I'm happy to put BG3 up as Game of the Year and Story Rich game. I definitely want more games in that vein. The other options have little appeal. Hogwarts Legacy was pretty good though. My kids played the heck out of that one. Starfield was a good game and I'll play it a lot more over the years, but I'm not sure how it is innovative. It is still Skyrim in Space. I haven't played the others, but looking at the list, they are all pretty unique.

The Creator - It was nice to look at. Allison Janney was pretty fun as a gung-ho American patriot. Other than that it was kind of lacking. There was a lot of chaos and violence and it was just so-so.

I've restarted about a dozen times over the years, and I've ditched most of the mods I used to use. I always have a tough time going back to old high level characters, so I've found I prefer to just start everything fresh. Granted hat means I grind through the early stuff a lot, but funcom has tightened up the early game, so it's not bad.

I thought my attacks were wonky! I'm not close to actually assaulting the fortresses. I just hit level 39 and have a pretty haphazard base setup. I think I'll need to tighten it up. I've never actually triggered a purge, but the new treasure horde dynamic makes it interesting, so I figure I'll work towards that as well.

My daughter was pretty obsessed with this movie as a kid and wanted to be a drummer because of it. We've been watching the new animated version, but it doesn't have the same magic.

I just watched Gran Turismo with the family, and it is far and away the best video game movie ever made. It's also a pretty sweet racing movie. It was extremely well done and you all need to watch it, especially @Mamoulian War. It's on Netflix.

The stronghold (maybe it isn't Stygian?) is a new thing that you can attack. It is a fully destructible fortress. As is the ability to open a bar and hire people at your bar.

Leave the World Behind - This movie had a good cast, but it was pretty boring, and everyone did stupid stuff. It kind of had that horror movie thing going where people make dumb choices. Everyone except for Kevin Bacon, apparently. Also everyone is unlikable. I don't think this is how real people act, but maybe rich people are just ****.

I'm bludgeoning my way through Conan Exiles trying to get to the place I can open a bar. I'm up to level 36. I've skirted around the Stygian stronghold a few times and I'm contemplating relocating my base nearby. Currently I'm still set up new the newbie river, so it's time, but I hate packing up all my stuff and moving. It's amazing how much I've played this game, and yet I still stumble on stuff I've never seen while exploring.

It sound like you dreamed of Empyrion.