What are you Playing Now? It's not how you play the game, it's how you place the blame

[BruceVC]

Im 8 hours into Kingdom Come: Deliverance  and so far Im loving the overall Medieval experience the game provides, some highlights
 

• its a beautiful game. I am running it on maximum graphic settings
• I know nothing about this historical time period so I am enjoying the lore around Bohemia
• I like the different survival mechanics like nourishment and rest. Its realistic
• I haven't really touched on serious combat but I finally worked out how lockpicking works which was very rewarding when I got the ring the miller asked for from the executioner
• I like the open world design, I enjoy exploring and interacting with people

I installed some good mods  and everything  I was advised to use, like save anywhere , seems relevant and appropriate for the game.

I will do another update once I am further in the game but Im very impressed 

[Malcador]

Made it to a Morbus mission in Chaos Gate, most tedious crap ever, just getting buried in randomly spawning enemies.   Glad I got this game for free

[majestic]

8-Bit Adventures 2:

Huh, why u no embed? Embed u giev!1! - ah, worked now...

Anyone else probably won't need 40 hours to finish the game, I just grinded a whole lot more than necessary, and spent a whole lot of time backtracking and trying to do quests that were clearly there to do, but simply not accessible yet. It also has some pacing issues here and there but was otherwise a pretty nice game riding on old JRPG nostalgia. As such, it does what is required of a JRGP. It has an airship (alas, no flying fortress) to explore the world with, and a story that becomes increasingly unhinged every step of the way before going completely off the rails.

Much like its predecessor it's story is built upon toying with the fourth wall.

Spoiler

The heroes interact with the Computer, an entity maintaining their world. It calls them programs. The villain of the story is a glitch in the system...

It does a good job of capturing the old-school JRPG feel without recreating the more annoying parts. There are no random encounters, for instance, and enemies do not respawn as long as you stay within a dungeon, unless you exit of tell the save point to revive them. Also, the, uhm, save points in the game are not necessary. You can save whenever you feel like it. They're still there, for nostalgia's sake, and to provide boss clues and some friendly banter.

Can certainly spend one's money on worse stuff.

[Keyrock]

I learned my first unforgivable curse in Hogwarts. I've also specced my talents and gear to liberally apply curses to anyone and everyone I'm fighting and also to deal extra damage to cursed characters. I can't wait to get Avada Kedavra. I'm holding on to a talent point to get the talent that insta-kills all cursed enemies with Avada Kedavra.

Edited February 22, 2023 by Keyrock

[Tale]

Dead Space 2 is done.

I did not like it. I see why I never had the itch to replay it now.

Dead Space 3 gets off a real bad foot by throwing Necromoprhs that are just zombies with pickaxes. They're hard to dismember with their arms at their side, so you just shoot them normal. And it follows this up with... normal guys shooting at you. Bad foot after bad foot.

I've actually got far enough to get into the meat of the game. I love getting to explore a pseudo-open world starship graveyard, at least on paper. But it's all for the purpose of supporting their resource system. That's all you can find, not even new story beats or cool environmental bits. I can carry two guns. I don't need a gazillion gun combinations or the resources to build a gazillion guns. 

Mechanically it becomes a slog. The new line rifle looks cool, but the areas are so small, and all the enemies are so fast you can't use it. Once enemies are on top of you, it can't hit them. By contrast the plasma cutter, which makes boring "pop" noises when fired, is all around useful. And with the Planet Cracker head seems to do more damage than the line rifle anyway...

[Malcador]

Found out Adam Dembski Bowden wrote Chaos Gate Daemonhunters.  That explains the waifu Inquisitor

[Mamoulian War]

I have arrived in Tales of Arise into Niez - capital of Wind region. And the game gave me another unexpected surprise. I hesitate to write here a little bit more about it, so I would not spoil it for the few people, who are still interested in playing this game, and are avoiding spoilers at all costs, but I am enjoying the game more the more I play it. Also, I have found first Artifact in the game, and Kisara gave me first fishing rod, so I have played little bit with it as well

The Hunts for Gigant Zeugles are pretty merciless, and I have burned through most of my consumables, so now, I am trying to save little bit, and avoid them for now. The price of gels in this game is crazy, compared to previous titles, and the money is as hard to earn as in previous Tales of ... games. And I think it was to force some people to buy money DLCs This is my only negative experience with the game. Although, if I would not go against these Hunts, I would not need any extra money for consumables at all, and would be able to sell some of them to earn some extra cash. The sale price of gels is very high as well.

[LadyCrimson]

@Mamoulian War  I liked Tales of Arise a lot, altho I did grow a little impatient with some stuff in the back 1/4 or 1/5 or so. But I had great fun tinkering around and plenty of my typical goofy hijinks.    Glad you're enjoying it. Also, Hootle best owl.

[Bartimaeus]

On 2/22/2023 at 3:33 PM, majestic said:

8-Bit Adventures 2

why are the textboxes/menus blue

i know this is a small detail in the grand scheme of things, but it's kinda triggering me right now

hate to say it, but blue is simply the incorrect color for this purpose

[majestic]

6 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

why are the textboxes/menus blue

Tradition.

 

[Humanoid]

Royal Blue in general is a great choice because it simultaneously leaves both fans of light and dark themes dissatisfied.

[Chilloutman]

It also is reminding me of good ol' days of NC

[bugarup]

They also remind me of classic BSOD, but I think their job is to draw attention away from how ostentatiously ugly the rest of the game is, and they do this job quite well. Hoo boy is this game ugly. 

[Bartimaeus]

7 hours ago, bugarup said:

They also remind me of classic BSOD, but I think their job is to draw attention away from how ostentatiously ugly the rest of the game is, and they do this job quite well. Hoo boy is this game ugly. 

I think the palette is a bit too vibrant, it could use just a little softening up a la the MOTHER/EarthBound games (starting with those blue menus!), but otherwise I think it's perfectly fine. But then again, I think 3D game graphics are largely flaming dog crap and vastly prefer 2D graphics of all kinds, so you know, different strokes for different folks.

 

[LadyCrimson]

Hogwart's Legacy - I have decided they should have named it Hogwart's Revellio
Edit: it's the last 8 seconds of the the 23 second video, mostly.

...I'm pretty sure I've cast it about 2,313,629 times.

Edited February 25, 2023 by LadyCrimson

[Tale]

Dead Space 3 is down and with that my Dead Space trilogy is complete. Final verdict: Meh. I'll never do a full trilogy run again unless 4 comes out and it's as good as Remake.

I almost gave up on 3 at one point. The second to last optional mission. There's a single room, maybe half the size of your average suburban living room, where 4 waves will come at you 3 at a time. All enhanced. It's mostly those lame pickaxe guys who are hard to shoot the arms off of and you have to take out at least three limbs to kill them. I'd end up reloading after the first wave, just to get stunlocked by the next. Line gun, ripper, plasma cutter. Kept dying.

Turns out the line gun is simply garbage. Complete and utter. And the chain lightning gun is the best. Just changing the head on the weapon it goes from killing nothing and walking outside for a smoke break between shots to killing the entire room and being ready for a follow up shot by the time you move your cursor. It carried me the rest of the way through the game and through Awakened.

As for Awakened, it's actually pretty good. Might be the second best Dead Space (if we only count Remake and 1 as a single game). But it's not worth the slog.

[Hawke64]

The Forgotten City. Completed the game. It is an excellent adventure game with immersive sim elements - the investigation makes sense, the writing and dialogues are consistent and fitting, the controls and movement are comfortable, the combat is present yet non-intrusive.

Spoiler

Granted, the ending does provoke the uncomfortable thought of what it means to win. The ability to pursue your passion instead of never-ending soul-numbing grind.

 

[bugarup]

17 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

I think the palette is a bit too vibrant, it could use just a little softening up a la the MOTHER/EarthBound games (starting with those blue menus!), but otherwise I think it's perfectly fine. But then again, I think 3D game graphics are largely flaming dog crap and vastly prefer 2D graphics of all kinds, so you know, different strokes for different folks.

 

Nah, it's not ugly because it's 2D, plenty of fugly 3D games like e.g. Morrowind, this one is ugly because it's just really really ugly. Not as ugly as Undertale, but certainly close.

I really liked Forgotten City for the most part, that sequence with combat was fun too, but I got one of endings which wasn't the "true" one and then suddenly lost all interest so I still don't know what's its deal. Guess the ending I got was satisfying enough.

[Bartimaeus]

1 hour ago, bugarup said:

Nah, it's not ugly because it's 2D, plenty of fugly 3D games like e.g. Morrowind, this one is ugly because it's just really really ugly. Not as ugly as Undertale, but certainly close.

Eye of the beholder and all that: I love Undertale's visuals, . Also, Morrowind looks more visually appealing to me than either Oblivion or Skyrim, so I just don't think we're going to agree on visuals very much at all.

Edited February 25, 2023 by Bartimaeus

[Hurlshort]

I finished Cyberpunk. I was fairly happy with the ending I got. There was still a ton of side missions and gigs left to complete, but my vacation is almost over, and I wanted to be done.

Watching the credits for a bit really makes you realize what a massive undertaking this game was. It scrolled for about 10 minutes. We are talking about thousands of hands in the pot. I played on normal difficulty and was really enjoying the swordplay in the later levels. I wouldn't say it was very challenging, but there was enough style to keep it enjoyable.

Edited February 25, 2023 by Hurlshort

[majestic]

1 hour ago, Hurlshort said:

I finished Cyberpunk. I was fairly happy with the ending I got.

Which was?

[Hurlshort]

14 minutes ago, majestic said:

Which was?

V becomes a legend and goes to space?

[LadyCrimson]

TLDR:  I haven't quite finished the main story but I'd give Hogwart's Legacy something like a 7/10. For me, the first half of the experience, more or less, is the better half. Don't take that too negatively - for me a 7 is still a quite positive rating, the game simply could have used a little more complexity here and there to keep it from becoming too repetitive or "pointless" (outside of following the Story I mean). 
EDIT: one system would be consequences for some actions/dialogues to add a little weight - because there aren't any. Or at least almost none. I'm not huge on needing mega consequences in RPG's but at least a little bit would've been nice. I at first used stealth while lockpicking for example, until I realize there was no need. No one cared, outside of one or two specific quest times. >.>

===========

I think I am nearing the end of Hogwart's main story and am sorta rushing to get that finished now. Haven't explored the lower half of the world very much. It must be said that this is partly because with my thoroughness, I'm already level 36, have the Collections at 90%-100% finished (which does not mean you've done, collected or seen "everything in the game", mind) and my combat abilities seem to be such that most fights last 15-20 seconds. So...there isn't a ton of motivation left for me. One could leave a lot of that for after Story, instead, but that's not my way.

It's still beautiful and exploration is still fun in short doses, but like many open worlds there just isn't quite enough "to do" - or more specifically, there's things to do but it becomes very repetitive, and the loot-hunt aspect is not very engaging or imperative past a certain point. So it's just whether you have personal, small goals of your own or just love scouting the castle/landscape etc.

Some of the longer side quests have been more fun, although I wish the temp-companions during those quests had more heft. Only one of them has any significance in that regard, imo.

the game economy felt pretty nicely balanced at the start, in terms of being a little bit of a struggle to do what you want, but after you've bought what you can buy, there is almost no use for money that I have found, and it just stacks up uselessly. I've stopped picking it up even.

That all said, I definitely got my monies worth, had a pretty good time, and while it's simple, it's a well made game world and a great effort. With the success, I hear WB recently announced more games and maybe a tv series. Hm. Well, we shall see.

Edited February 25, 2023 by LadyCrimson

[uuuhhii]

trying elden ring with collossal weapon

get easily killed by everything

like learning new game again

[Wormerine]

3 hours ago, uuuhhii said:

trying elden ring with collossal weapon

get easily killed by everything

like learning new game again

I didn't try collossal, but did a quick sprint to Morgott for a final achievement using two greatswords (used katanas for my full playthrough). I can't say I felt a difference - jump attack seems to take more or less the same time regardless of weapons I used, and it is simply the best attack to use, almost at all times. I couldn't mix up single weapon swings as easily, but it hardly mattered as my jump attacks did more damage, and staggered enemies more easily.