What are you Playing Now? Who needs a life anyway?...

[213374U]

102 hours into CP2077 and still not making much headway. I am starting to think I'll never finish this game.

[Wormerine]

4 hours ago, 213374U said:

102 hours into CP2077 and still not making much headway. I am starting to think I'll never finish this game.

huh... May I ask what takes up so much of your time? From what I understood the storyline was to be much shorter then W3, and I thought there wasn't much to do outside the missions.

[Theonlygarby]

1 hour ago, Wormerine said:

huh... May I ask what takes up so much of your time? From what I understood the storyline was to be much shorter then W3, and I thought there wasn't much to do outside the missions.

Not directed towards me but I'm bored.  There are lots of missions actually... I imagine with 100+ hours they are trying to 100% the game.  Some of those missions are pretty basic "go here kill people" "go here steal something".  The main story is rather short  I thought I sidetracked quite a bit, and hit the point of no return quickly.

Edited May 6, 2022 by Theonlygarby

[uuuhhii]

17 hours ago, 213374U said:

102 hours into CP2077 and still not making much headway. I am starting to think I'll never finish this game.

waston can do that to you

other district doesn't have nearly that many side quest

[213374U]

14 hours ago, Wormerine said:

huh... May I ask what takes up so much of your time? From what I understood the storyline was to be much shorter then W3, and I thought there wasn't much to do outside the missions.

My own lack of focus, probably. I finish a side gig and oh look what's that cyberpsycho icon there, hey what's that shootout in the alley there, oh a ripper I haven't visited before... you get the idea.

I'm not actively trying to 100% the game, it's just that it's hard for me to stick to the main missions and ignore all the stuff that the game throws in my face all the time while trying to get from A to B. I don't always use the QT terminals so that's a factor too.

While I would have liked more resources devoted to a bigger, better main plot, I understand how all the side stuff is necessary because the map is huge and would be pretty empty otherwise. It still is to a degree.

[Keyrock]

Hot taek: The Witcher 2 is CDPR's best game.

[the_dog_days]

Hot take: chicken salad > tuna salad

[Keyrock]

I started up Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE Encore. I definitely see the Mega-Ten part of the crossover, though this feels more Persona than mainline Mega-Ten, but I don't see any Fire Emblem in this game, at least not yet. Anyway, this game is SUPER ANIME. This will no doubt be a deal-breaker for some folks, but I kind of like how the characters turn into sexy idealized versions of themselves for combat and how the battles play out like performances on a stage. It's a weird thing where I don't really watch anime (I have in the past), it's not my jam, but I kind of like playing anime. 

[Bokishi]

Elden Ring with VR mod

[Lexx]

9 hours ago, Keyrock said:

Hot taek: The Witcher 2 is CDPR's best game.

How is it a hot take when it's true.

Witcher 2 sure has its problems, like the mediocre combat system, but everything else in the game is pretty much peak-witcher. In Witcher 3, the huge, empty, open world gets in the way all the time.

Edited May 8, 2022 by Lexx

[uuuhhii]

12 minutes ago, Lexx said:

How is it a hot take when it's true.

Witcher 2 sure has its problems, like the mediocre combat system, but everything else in the game is pretty much peak-witcher. In Witcher 3, the huge, empty, open world gets in the way all the time.

pointless big open world with awful level suppression and enemy placement make those early swamp complete disaster

one of the reason dlcs of witcher 3 are remembered as best game ever made was because they start and end with a level range with basically not level suppression

[Keyrock]

Witcher 3 also suffers from content overload. The sheer amount of side content is downright overwhelming and ruins the pacing of the main story. The side content is dressed up really well, so it's not a chore like in a lot of open world games (*cough* Ubisoft *cough*) but it nevertheless ruins the story progression when you spend a couple of in-game weeks galavanting around the countryside, meanwhile EXTRADIMENSIONAL SPECTRAL ELVES are threatening to conquer the world. If you have the willpower to tunnel vision on the main quest then the narrative pacing works, the problem is that the game is designed in such a way as to not just encourage, but also almost require you to do a bunch of side content.

[Humanoid]

As someone with no compulsion to do optional content, the games play out more or less the same to me and they were both the best games of their respective years. There is some advantage in that the open world of W3 did give a visual leg-up though even if you didn't do any of the content, which gave the game a bit more variety in scenery besides narrow ravines. But ultimately the biggest difference was the addition of the dodge button to supplement the roll and it's the primary reason I consider it a better game.

For similar reasons I don't really feel most criticisms towards CP2077 either, the open-world content is a non-factor in my evaluation of the game.

[213374U]

Heh. And that's considering that I'm playing with a mod that basically does away with item leveling. A gun is a gun is a gun, and that snazzy tank top doesn't provide any armor. So I have zero incentive to go fishing for loot.

Can't help it though. Some of the side content is pretty good too. It's a 'problem' with the fundamental design of a story-driven open-world RPG. There's an obvious disconnect if you let the player roam freely on a massive open world and have the urgency of the main plot be conveyed only narratively. There have to be gameplay mechanics to enforce it, but I don't think I've seen many people praise the 150-day countdown until water runs out as genius design.

[Lexx]

I really had to force myself through Witcher 3. Can't really remember the details, but there was a couple months break inbetween as well and then I just rushed the main quest when I came back. The first dlc was really nice, though. Liked it a lot more than the main game. The second dlc.. truth told, I probably only played 30 minutes of it and I haven't touched it since.

Oh right, I just remembered 2 main issues I have with Witcher 3:

1. The minimap design is terrible. I don't remember anything of the landscape, because my eyes were glued to following the dots on the minimap. I was unable to force myself to not look at the minimap all the time. And without minimap I never knew where I was or where I was supposed to go.

2. The visuals are too noisy. There is too much happening on the screen at all times, which for some reason made me unable to focus and actually "see" anything. This is really hard to describe for me, because I never had this experience before in a game. It's like... you see a lot, but at the same time see nothing at all. Really weird. This plays also into 1, where I kept looking at the minimap, because it was simply easier for my eyes.

[BruceVC]

12 hours ago, Keyrock said:

Hot taek: The Witcher 2 is CDPR's best game.

Absolutely, I agree except its not better than W3 ...but apart from that yes

Edited May 8, 2022 by BruceVC

[BruceVC]

37 minutes ago, Lexx said:

I really had to force myself through Witcher 3. Can't really remember the details, but there was a couple months break inbetween as well and then I just rushed the main quest when I came back. The first dlc was really nice, though. Liked it a lot more than the main game. The second dlc.. truth told, I probably only played 30 minutes of it and I haven't touched it since.

Oh right, I just remembered 2 main issues I have with Witcher 3:

1. The minimap design is terrible. I don't remember anything of the landscape, because my eyes were glued to following the dots on the minimap. I was unable to force myself to not look at the minimap all the time. And without minimap I never knew where I was or where I was supposed to go.

2. The visuals are too noisy. There is too much happening on the screen at all times, which for some reason made me unable to focus and actually "see" anything. This is really hard to describe for me, because I never had this experience before in a game. It's like... you see a lot, but at the same time see nothing at all. Really weird. This plays also into 1, where I kept looking at the minimap, because it was simply easier for my eyes.

Are you sure you dont hate W3 because its Polish? You mustnt be like that Lexx ....Poland is part of the EU 

Play W3 again with Mods for a better overall experience, Mods can fix those issues you mentioned  

[Lexx]

I fail to see how my mentioned points relate to poland in any way.

[melkathi]

37 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

Poland is part of the EU 

 

Maybe they should start acting like it.

 

Maybe the EU should start acting as if they had the EU's interest at heart.

[BruceVC]

 

39 minutes ago, Lexx said:

I fail to see how my mentioned points relate to poland in any way.

I was joking, thats why I used the 

Edited May 8, 2022 by BruceVC

[Wormerine]

4 hours ago, Lexx said:

1. The minimap design is terrible. I don't remember anything of the landscape, because my eyes were glued to following the dots on the minimap. I was unable to force myself to not look at the minimap all the time. And without minimap I never knew where I was or where I was supposed to go.

Heavy relience on GPS is an unfortunate design yes. I think we bumped heads regarding Witcher2 aka. ambitious reactivity done badly, so I won't repeat myself. That said all three  Witcher games are so closely together in my personal rating that I don't feel too strongly about the order, though I did enjoy Witcher2 the least.

I did adore Witcher3, but I wonder how much I will like it on 2nd playthrough (which is coming once Next Gen update drops). I wonder if filler content will annoy me more.

Edited May 8, 2022 by Wormerine

[Lexx]

I mean, everyone at the time always talked about reactivity. And for what it's worth, Witcher 2 delivered hard. I'm not aware of other games right now which drastically change so much based on player choices.. mid-game. The whole 3rd act (town?) is basically a different game.

Edited May 8, 2022 by Lexx

[Keyrock]

17 minutes ago, Lexx said:

I mean, everyone at the time always talked about reactivity. And for what it's worth, Witcher 2 delivered hard. I'm not aware of other games right now which drastically change so much based on player choices.. mid-game. The whole 3rd act (town?) is basically a different game.

That was a ballsy move on CDPR's side. It takes a ton of work to design and program all these areas and quests. Naturally, developers want you to see all their hard work, developing content that many gamers will never see has got to sting a bit. I mean, it's one thing when it's an Easter egg or two or some copy/paste collectibles, and another thing when it's an entire act of a game. I played through Witcher 2 four (maybe five, it's been a while) times, so I saw everything, but most people are probably not doing a second playthrough.

Edited May 8, 2022 by Keyrock

[BruceVC]

1 hour ago, Wormerine said:

Heavy relience on GPS is an unfortunate design yes. I think we bumped heads regarding Witcher2 aka. ambitious reactivity done badly, so I won't repeat myself. That said all three  Witcher games are so closely together in my personal rating that I don't feel too strongly about the order, though I did enjoy Witcher2 the least.

I did adore Witcher3, but I wonder how much I will like it on 2nd playthrough (which is coming once Next Gen update drops). I wonder if filler content will annoy me more.

Witcher 3 is my second favorite RPG of all time. I spent 300  hours playing it  and back then I didnt use to use mods, imagine how much time I would have spent if I had mods 

The only thing I didnt like was my battle with Dettlaff in the Blood and Wine expansion, I couldnt defeat him and stopped trying after 5 hours or so 

Wormie dont you  hate it when the AI in a game cheats and you CANNOT win an end boss fight?

I cannot wait for the release of W4 

Edited May 8, 2022 by BruceVC

[Wormerine]

19 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

Wormie dont you  hate it when the AI in a game cheats and you CANNOT win an end boss fight?

I hardly recognise Witchers as RPGs, but W3 is definitely one of the better open-world "action adventures" I played.
It's been a long time. I remember Heart of Stone having some difficulty spikes but can't remember much about BoW gameplaywise.