What are you playing right now?

[Tale]

Jumping around a bunch of games, looking for something to catch me. A little Battlefront 2, Read Only Memories 2064, Skyrim, Fallout: New Vegas.

 

I'm trying to find something with a good story, but also easy to jump into. Most of these games are just holding pattern while I figure it out.

[Katphood]

Jumping around a bunch of games, looking for something to catch me. A little Battlefront 2, Read Only Memories 2064, Skyrim, Fallout: New Vegas.

 

I wanted to play that but I only saw bad reviews on the interwebz. It looks like Snatcher though...

[Lexx]

So I've played Red Dead Online for two days now. Here's my current thought on it:

 

RDO has so many items to unlock, but none of that matters to the player, as everything costs a fortune and thus can't be bought and used. PvP in free roam is dull, boring and has no point. It costs you money and morale and in return offers a tiny fraction of experience for another rank increase which unlocks items you can't buy. Due to the instant respawn right around the corner, it pretty much adds no value to the game. Participating in it just wastes anyone's time that - at this point - is probably better spend at grinding stupid pelts to get your $1.50 from the butcher... the only trader of value.

 

The coop missions could be fun, but again, they offer no reward. In the last mission I've completed, they granted me a wooping $10... and I've used a couple healing items and about 100 bullets, which probably costs about $10 if you'd buy them at any trader.

 

"Stranger missions" are some sort of open world PvP scenarios. Escorting a caravan, kidnapping people, etc. etc. Kinda fun, but again, reward is something between 2 to 5 dollars... so not worth the time. Deathmatch, team deathmatch, battle royale, etc.. are all dull and pointless, because of auto-aim and instant respawn. Also you have to bring your own weapons and ammo, thus it often costs you more to participate than you get as a reward out of them.

 

I'm guessing all of this is why free roam is utter chaos at this point. Players are bored and start shooting each other, even though there is no point in any of this. You can't play any of the minigames from the singleplayer either, which disappointed plenty people. Me not so much, because I never play them anyway.

 

 

HOWEVER. If you've finished the singleplayer and want to play more in the environment, but don't want to restart the campaign for whatever reason... RDO is not all that bad. Landscape is still beautiful and at least on PS4, most players in the wilderness don't seem to mind each other. Usually you can ride around, hunt some animals and stuff like that without anyone bothering you. If that's all you want to do, then yeah, it's not that bad. Feels like the endgame of the singleplayer mode, but you have the option to do some coop stuff or play with friends, if you feel the mood. The only thing you have to overcome first... is all the grind to get your basic gear back. Bow, binoculars, horse brush,... that stuff costs time, money and much dedication as of now.

 

In the end, it pains me, because this thing could be great fun... with more attractive activities and a real reward system. Who knows, maybe Rockstar is going to deliver exactly that... but right now, I'm rather pessimistic here.

 

 

Oh, there was some "money exploit". If you killed pigs in certain places to get their hides, you could make fancy $20 every 15 or so minutes. Of course Rockstar fixed this within a day. lol. Just shows once more that the whole RDO experience is made to extort money out of you to decrease the grind. If it stays like that, the game will probably lose most of its playerbase within the next weeks.

 

 

/edit: Just had a story mission that was quite funny. The NPC said "take a bow with you", but all of us were around rank 6 or 7 and the bow is not unlocked before rank 12. We just killed everyone with normal guns and nobody cared.

Edited December 1, 2018 by Lexx

[SonicMage117]

Good to know. So, I'm not missing out on much then atm but I'm the type that once finishes the campaign (or campaign plus story dlc), never looks back and moves on to the next game. Single player was well worth the full $60 so I'm pretty happy.

 

What am I playing right now? Spider-Man dlc/expansions. Finished both. You can finish one per sitting I'd say... so they're not very big but they are same quality of the base game so "that's good, Oliver, that's good." The third and final dlc/expansion releases in December.

 

Next it's Sniper Elite 4 on Steam (courtesy of Oner) and Horizon Zero Dawn - finally!

Edited December 2, 2018 by SonicMage117

[Lexx]

Yes, you're not missing out, at least right now.

I would love to just throw that stuff away, but in a weird way I'm still addicted to the game and can't stop playing. I fear that once more interesting content will hit the game, I'll be burned out from it forever.

[Malcador]

Kotor 2. Still don't know what I am doing.

[marelooke]

Played and completed Transmissions: Element 120, neat little (free) game set in the Half Life universe.

 

Took me a little under 2 hours to 100% and that's with having to restart a few sections due to bugs, or to get achievements.

[GhostofAnakin]

Kotor 2. Still don't know what I am doing.

 

Even after all these years, I never learned the proper use of most of those Force powers.  It's why even when I played as a super good Lightside character, I still spammed Force lightning.

[Malcador]

 

Kotor 2. Still don't know what I am doing.

 

Even after all these years, I never learned the proper use of most of those Force powers.  It's why even when I played as a super good Lightside character, I still spammed Force lightning.

 

In my defense I have never read the manual, maybe that'll help explain things. Game is way more buggy than the last time I played, have had at least 10 instances that force me to kill the .exe

Edited December 2, 2018 by Malcador

[ShadySands]

Star Trek Online. I need to get better gear for my Tactical Romulan Captain but I'm not sure what items or sets to go for. I think my weapons and most of my consoles are good but I need to work on a better impulse engine, deflector, and shield

[Gfted1]

Currently dabbling with Star Trek Fleet Command.

[Tale]

Decided to stop wasting time with Skyrim and play a "new" RPG. Divinity OS 2!

 

I think this is the first act final boss.

[Katphood]

More RDR 2.

 

I still haven't finished it, taking my sweet time. Gotta say, I really admire Rockstar Games for having the balls to create a true AAA experience. Sure, some of the gameplay mechanics feel a decade old but the attention to detail, story and the individual characters more than make up for that. It also helps that it is one of the best looking games out there.

[Keyrock]

Slowly getting better slightly less crappy at Artifact playing draft mode.  It's really unlike any card game I've played previous.  The 3 lane mechanic changes everything.  Deployment is extremely important in this game, sometimes more important than the decisions you make when playing cards. 

 

At the beginning of the game you deploy 3 heroes (the flop), one in each lane.  You get to decide which heroes will be in the flop but they get placed in a random lane.  On turn 2 you deploy another hero (the turn) and on turn 3 another (the river).  You do get to decide which lane the heroes deployed on turn 2 and later go in. The strategy starts with deciding what 3 heroes should be in the flop and which hero is the turn and which is the river. A lot of factors go into this, including (but not limited to) the survivability of the hero, the nature of their special ability (is it passive or active, if active how long is the cooldown?), assuming they have one (not all heroes do), the hero's color, what their signature card is. Squishier heroes tend to be better deployed on the turn or the river, when you can control which lane they will deploy into, giving you a better chance of putting them somewhere they will not get instantly killed in, but that's not always the case.  A hero dying, particularly in the early turns, isn't the end of the world.  In fact, it can sometimes be advantageous since heroes respawn after being dead for one full turn (in a sense 2 turns if they are killed during upkeep, making upkeep kills super powerful) and then you can deploy them in whatever lane you want.  Heroes represent more than just meat shields and damage. While you share a single hand of cards across all 3 lanes, each lane has its own mana and is played as its own separate turn within a turn (although there are a few, very few, abilities and spells that can affect other lanes or even all lanes) and you can only cast a spell in that lane if you have an active hero of that color in said lane.  So, for example, if you are playing a red/green deck (dual color decks are the most common in the game, as they are in MTG) but you only have a red hero in the left lane, you can only cast red spells in that lane, you cannot cast any green spells.  So you need that in mind when you plan ahead.  If you are planning to cast a green spell in the right lane, make sure you get a green hero into that lane.

 

One of the big mistakes I've picked up on that I tended to make when I started out, and still do, to a lesser degree, now is giving up on a lane too soon.  For the most part, you are looking to win 2 lanes, so eventually you will tend to abandon 1 lane and concentrate your resources on the other 2.  However, it can be deceptive early on sometimes as to which lanes will have a better chance of going your way later on and a lane you abandoned may turn out to be a lane you should have fought for.  Knowing when to abandon a lane is a very key decision and it is a difficult one.

 

Another thing I'm slowly learning is utilizing initiative.  Generally, the first person to pass in a lane gains initiative in the next lane.  However, there are also cards that can steal initiative.  I often overlooked these cards, but I'm realizing how powerful these cards can be.  Initiative isn't as important early on (in some cases you'd even rather not have it so that you can react to your opponent's plays) but it can be critical in the late stages of the game and the difference between victory an defeat.

 

There's a lot to consider at all times in this game, so many layers.  I can confidently say it's the most complex card game I've ever played.

Edited December 4, 2018 by Keyrock

[SonicMage117]

More RDR 2.

 

I still haven't finished it, taking my sweet time. Gotta say, I really admire Rockstar Games for having the balls to create a true AAA experience. Sure, some of the gameplay mechanics feel a decade old but the attention to detail, story and the individual characters more than make up for that. It also helps that it is one of the best looking games out there.

The combat is clunky, the character movement is slow, the controls are unintuitive.

 

It feels dated and it's an action open world game but yet has more depth than something like Baldurs Gate.

 

People who havent played it think the game is all graphics and no gameplay value bit there are times when the game looked gorgeous and other times where The Last Of Us Remastered looked better.

 

The biggest thing is the world building, there isn't an rpg out there that has matched or can match Red Dead Redemption 2, sure someone will read this comment and laugh and say "but this game (insert title)" but they haven't played it and this is just one of those games where if you don't play it, you just won't know - regardless of how much you read on it or how much youtube walkthroughs you watch.

 

 

I'll be waiting for an rpg to catch up but I know that's going to be a long, long time because while Cyberpunk might come close, I doubt it will surpass Red Dead Redemption 2 in that area and the reason for my saying so is because Cyberpunk 2077 has alot of focus elsewhere.

[Katphood]

^That sounds a bit weird to be honest. For me that title obviously goes to Fallout: New Vegas. The world building in that game was awesome and I have no idea why Pillars of Eternity didn't manage to beat that game.

 

Also, I wouldn't put RDR 2 in the rpg category.

 

example:

 

In the mission where you have to gather animals for Margareth, you only have one choice: kill the lion.

 

 

That's why to me, it is basically a very good open-world action-adventure game with a few rpg elements sprinkled on top.

Edited December 4, 2018 by Katphood

[Lexx]

#JustSonicThings again. RDR2 is not an rpg and lots of its features have been done in other games before as well. Yes, I played RDR2.  

It's also a very linear game that expects you to play in the way the developers wanted. There is no choice&consequences in any kind of way, even though the game likes to make you believe so.

 

/Edit: The most cringe example was a bounty mission where the character asks you to spare him. If you do so and go away, they say something like "he lets us go, quick, before he changes his mind!" ... then they run away... and you get the mission failed screen. No matter the dialog, you *have* to lasso that guy, because this is how the developers want you to play.

Edited December 4, 2018 by Lexx

[melkathi]

I never got a hashtag named after me. Even with hundreds of Mordheim Screenshots to my name.

Edited December 4, 2018 by melkathi

[Katphood]

Hmmm, how does #melkheim sound like?

[Fenixp]

I never got a hashtag named after me. Even with hundreds of Mordheim Screenshots to my name.

Well, melkathi, that's because you are a gentleman and a scholar. Tag would be below you. Edited December 4, 2018 by Fenixp

[Chilloutman]

#JustSonicThings again. RDR2 is not an rpg and lots of its features have been done in other games before as well. Yes, I played RDR2.  

It's also a very linear game that expects you to play in the way the developers wanted. There is no choice&consequences in any kind of way, even though the game likes to make you believe so.

 

/Edit: The most cringe example was a bounty mission where the character asks you to spare him. If you do so and go away, they say something like "he lets us go, quick, before he changes his mind!" ... then they run away... and you get the mission failed screen. No matter the dialog, you *have* to lasso that guy, because this is how the developers want you to play.

 

Well lets be real here, if you decide to let bounty go you probably should not expect to get 'mission accpomplished'? Or am I missing something?

[Chilloutman]

 

I never got a hashtag named after me. Even with hundreds of Mordheim Screenshots to my name.

Well, melkathi, that's because you are a gentleman and a scholar. Tag would be below you.

 

 

Heh, this makes me chuckle, colleague at work told me exactly same thing today just because I shaved my head bald :D

[melkathi]

Then let us unite in the brotherhood of obsidianite gentlemen scholars. Tagless, and selectively hairless.

[SonicMage117]

Also, I wouldn't put RDR2 in the rpg category.

 

Originally I didn't, I put it in the ubisoft open world genre, then someone asked why not Rockstar open world, then after that someone on this forum said why not rpg? But even then, it still has more depth than our most beloved rpg's, that's not to mean more choice and chuckle - although it has those things as well.

I never got a hashtag named after me. Even with hundreds of Mordheim Screenshots to my name.

I'mlike Trump. Even when I say something right, people will find a way to disagree and the hashtag often is a go-to in a way to validate their criticism. I can't blame them though, it does sound appealing

 

 

I never got a hashtag named after me. Even with hundreds of Mordheim Screenshots to my name.

Well, melkathi, that's because you are a gentleman and a scholar. Tag would be below you.

Says the person that made a "how-to" for blocking people (namely me) on the forum. Nevermind the fact that even months after you block me, you still talk about me and attempt to insult me in various threads Edited December 4, 2018 by SonicMage117

[Fenixp]

Well lets be real here, if you decide to let bounty go you probably should not expect to get 'mission accpomplished'? Or am I missing something?

Considering what I've seen in previous Rockstar games, "Mission failed" may quite easily be a "Game over" screen which'll make you load a checkpoint, so unless your choice is to be stuck in an endless groundhog day scenario, you don't get any. I might be wrong, Rockstar may have shifted their mission formula somewhat.

 

I mean, their Australian branch absolutely did that with LA Noir - at the end of a mission (or case, as it were), the game would tell you whether you actually caught the suspect or not and then the story would just sort of continue, your failure persisting. That was nice.

Edited December 4, 2018 by Fenixp