What are you Playing Now? - Back to the Grind

[melkathi]

Huh, I always simply killed them and when the guards came running, showed them the writ. "Officer, I am licensed to kill."

And the guards would be all "Oh, sorry to bother you. Please be more discreet next time."

[Hawke64]

Finished the two remaining optional bosses in Control - Tammasi (the flying manager) and the evil twin. They were significantly easier with all health and energy upgrades. Also done one expedition. I suppose, it is nice to be able to go through a story-free mission for the sake of physical action, but I am not going to replay these.

Weird West. Started from where the demo ended, with another MC. I forgot some things and set myself on fire by standing next to a torch.

Slay the Princess. The developer's statement was very inspirational, so I got the game on GOG. The content warnings were curious, though, I have not progressed far in the game yet. To think of it, the only unusual one is existential horror, the rest are depicted quite often in games - e.g. in Control, the employees became zombies (various level of bodily degradation) while controlled by an otherworldly entity, while the MC could regularly hijack what remains of them to use as meatshields.

Edited January 25 by Hawke64

[Keyrock]

6 hours ago, melkathi said:

Huh, I always simply killed them and when the guards came running, showed them the writ. "Officer, I am licensed to kill."

And the guards would be all "Oh, sorry to bother you. Please be more discreet next time."

Yeah, you can just murder them in front of everybody and show the writ to get guards off your back, but I think you get more faction reputation and a better reward if you're either stealthy and no one sees you or you make it look like self-defense. You can cast a dominate spell and lead them away, cast frenzy or taunt them to get them to attack you, use a strong enough chameleon or invisibility and snipe them from afar where no one can see you. There's a bunch of different ways to go about it depending on your skills if you want maximum reward for the assassination.

I'm going to set Morrowind aside again because Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth drops today, but when I come back I have a plan. I have quite a bit of moon sugar on me and the Tamriel_Rebuilt mod vastly increases the amount of available vendors and thus the amount of Khajit vendors that will buy moon sugar. Hence, I will larp 19th century Britain and start an addiction epidemic in a foreign country. Hey, if these s'wits can't exercise a bit of self-control, that's their problem. There's coin to be made. Too bad I'm not playing an alchemist; while you can't brew skooma in the vanilla game, there is a mod for that. Skooma is where the real money is at.

Edited January 25 by Keyrock

[Keyrock]

I started Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, the game is awesome so far. Anyway, typically in a story you'd have the main protagonist hit their lowest point much later than this, in a standard 3 act movie it would be at the end of act 2, but I'm at the beginning of the game and my dude

 

got friend-zoned.

That's a fate worse than death.  I'm pretty sure I know where this is going, not the details, I mean, but the main overarching plot that's going to get mostly lost in the shuffle while other stuff, probably murders, betrayals, revenge, that sort of thing, happens, and then comes back at the very end. I guess I'll find out in roughly 100 hours.

Edited January 26 by Keyrock

[Hawke64]

Nova Hearts: Spark. A visual novel with turn-based combat (no positioning) about superheroes. The controls are not rebindable and the character animations gave me a headache. The number of save slot is limited to 3, but I strongly suspect that the story is linear. Haven't noticed any branching, at least. The only positive qualities are the visual design of the fencer companion and the combat system not being FF-like/ATB. I suppose, I appreciate that there was a demo and now my wishlist is slightly shorter.

[BruceVC]

I just completed PoE  White March 2 and like WM1 it was very entertaining, I prefered 2 to 1 overall. It also only took me 20 hours or so

That means I have completed PoE1 in its entirety and I can share my views on the game. Some of this I have already mentioned in a previous post. The most significant positive about this game is Obsidian has been able to create a new fantasy RPG world and different mechanics around ruleset than most of us are use to compared to traditional D&D, I appreciated it but it took some getting use to.  So for example any class can basically use any armour or weapon. The combat is a massive and main part of the game and I enjoyed it once you understand how abilities work, I didnt really like how you limited around healing in the normal sense and the whole health vs endurance mechanic was not preferable for me compared to normal D&D similar mechanics. But its not a big deal

My favorite battles were with the Eyeless, I liked paralyzing them or using my Cipher and Stasis Shell to isolate them in combat and I really had fun with the strategic nature of hard battles

Crafting was rewarding and made sense, there was nothing better than finding a high level ingredient like a Dragons Eye and knowing you can gain a major combat upgrade.I also liked how you can find important items to help in combat and increase stats and they not common so you really appreciate finding them

The main narrative was one of the best parts of the game and I found it very thought provoking. I enjoyed most of the lore but I also found myself forgetting things like who a specific deity was, thank goodness for the encyclopedia ...it became my friend on a regular basis 

I can understand this game is an acquired taste, its not for all fans of fantasy RPG and the combat can sometimes feel draining, I dont like enemies appearing out of nowhere but its not all the time. I used pause and slowed the speed which allowed me to micromanage my party which I enjoyed. My main character was a priest and the game offered some interesting classes like Cipher which is lots of fun

So in closing, great game and its gets a 75/100 on the globally endorsed "BruceVC game rating system "

Now I plan to play PoE2 after a short break from this type of genre, how is PoE2? What is the consensus, better than PoE1?

[Mamoulian War]

Black Dragon Kalameet has been defeated. And his tail cut as well  it took me definitely more than 20 tries combined. I had to relearn the fight as well, and due to big break from playing the game, I became less patient again, which caused more wipes, than I would have liked. It took me around 2 hours or so to find a way, how to defeat him with my playstyle

[marelooke]

Played an completed The Chant, it's sort of an interesting occult horror-ish game. It's ... OK (I mean, I finished the main game), not sure if, or when I'll get to the DLC though.  6/10 I'd say.

Picked up Mass Effect: Andromeda in a sale and it starts out decent enough (I'm pretty early in, I assume anyway, as I just completed my crew), well, story-wise anyway. But graphics, dialogues, characters, and their motivations (including the PCs, tbh) etc. all seem a pretty clear downgrade over the previous games. Feels like a game with potential that a committee got their hands on. At least it hasn't bored me into no longer wanting to boot it up, so far anyway, unlike Bethesda's latest attempt.

[Wormerine]

On 1/26/2024 at 5:32 PM, BruceVC said:

Now I plan to play PoE2 after a short break from this type of genre, how is PoE2? What is the consensus, better than PoE1?

Some things better, some things not. From gameplay experience, I think PoE2 is overall better (even though I did like so, of PoE1 systems). More refined system, more transparency in class progression, about the same length, but “less filler more killer”.

Where I think PoE2 falls short is companions and narrative. Not that there isn’t a lot of good stuff to enjoy there - worldbuilding is probably better, as you won’t have to resort to book reading to understand broader context. Deadfire’s history, culture, and political situation is neatly conveyed through engaging quests, rather than plain text. I also don’t think story is bad per say - I enjoyed every minute spent in three of my Deadfire playthroughs.
The game is very open ended though, and the narrative doesn’t have strong sense of progression. While PoE1 ending give an interesting perspective to everything we have been through, PoE2 ending feels like a set up to be followed up on. I felt there wasn’t sufficient pay off to our adventure in the Deadfire, and the ending made my gasp for PoE3. And with PoE3 not happening in foreseeable future I see it as a bad thing. 

in short, I felt the beginning and end were the weakest part of Deadfire. Everything inbetween is pretty darn good. And of course, all three DLCs strongly recommended. They are more of a smaller side adventures this time around, but we’ll worth your time. 

I would also recommend reaching for some mods. Not necessary, but I refuse to play without them:

1) Enhanced User Interface - adds some icons and colour coding to make game’s mechanics easier to understand. 
2) Community Patch - might be a bit biased, but thanks to hard work of a wonderful folks in the community we got those lovely pack of tweaks and fixes. But being a shallow person that I am, it is a must for me due to unique icons made by @Boeroer to make skill trees a bit more exciting. 
3) Deadly Deadfire (just xp!) - while the whole mode is great, I wouldn’t recommend it for first playthrough. I would, however recommend the file that just reduces XP by 25%. Due to the open nature of Deadfire it is too easy to greatly out-level available content for the vast majority of the game. While PoE1 had reputation of being perhaps to difficult, Deadfire swung the other way. The penalty to XP makes it possible to the enjoy all the content there is, without getting too ahead of the difficulty curve. The base game is still pretty easy for the most part. 

Edited January 28 by Wormerine

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

19 minutes ago, Wormerine said:

And with PoE3 not happening in foreseeable future I see it as a bad thing.

I think that with BG3 doing shockingly well there's a decent chance for a PoE3, perhaps even more if Avowed does well. We'll have to wait and see, but honestly I would not be surprised if we saw PoE3 announced in a year or two.

Anyways I tried some more Fire Emblem Engage and absolutely got my ass handed to me by some spawns with massively boosted stats. I think that you're supposed to run from them but boy howdy it was a shock to get one rounded. Gameplay wise I'm torn on it because while it generally has the best encounter design of any recent Fire Emblem the magic anniversary rings are stupidly broken and aside from a handful of bosses are all player only things. The story is dog**** even by recent Nintendo standards and I'm embarrassed when the dialogue plays.

[Mamoulian War]

And Manus is down! He gave me a lot of trouble, but much less than I’ve expected, and much than both Artorias and Kalameet. The fight is fun though, it either kicked my ass under 20 seconds, or I was able to get him down to 50-25% easily, and then I made a stupid decision. I got him once to 10% and forgot to defend and roll his Dark Beads spell Then I got owned few more times, and I was finally able to defeat him with Dragonslayer Spear and 3 Chaos Fireballs So far, the hardest fights was Artorias and Sif (yes, I have completely ****ed up that one fight )

All I need to do is some kind of clearing and item grinding, and then I can go against Lord Gwyn again. I already see him as a big pain in the ass, as I suck at parrying

[Wormerine]

55 minutes ago, PK htiw klaw eriF said:

I think that with BG3 doing shockingly well there's a decent chance for a PoE3, perhaps even more if Avowed does well. We'll have to wait and see, but honestly I would not be surprised if we saw PoE3 announced in a year or two.

That would be a dream, but I am not getting my hopes down. "Can cRPS be succesful" was never in question. Pathfinders did well, D:OS1&2 did well. BG3 did extraordinarily well, but I doubt Microsoft will suddenly fund 400 team to create their own, in an IP with mixed success. I do sincerely hope they will give PoE another shot in the near future, but am not expecting to see it either.

[Zoraptor]

2 hours ago, PK htiw klaw eriF said:

..there's a decent chance for a PoE3, perhaps even more if Avowed does well.

I think the more realistic take is that if Avowed does well then you get Avowed 2, if it does badly it's proof that the setting is bad and you don't get any more Pillars games at all.

I really don't know how BG3 will effect the possibilities for other RPGs. Larian is in a near unique situation with its own very distinct style and prior success/ fanbase based largely on MP and intrinsic hype due to the D&D/ Baldur's Gate names. Obsidian can replicate some of those, but PoE3 wouldn't have a fraction of the hype that the Baldur's Gate name generated, and a lot lot less than Divinity/ Original Sin. You'd probably need an 'isometric' Fallout to replicate that hype.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

4 hours ago, Wormerine said:

That would be a dream, but I am not getting my hopes down. "Can cRPS be succesful" was never in question. Pathfinders did well, D:OS1&2 did well. BG3 did extraordinarily well, but I doubt Microsoft will suddenly fund 400 team to create their own, in an IP with mixed success. I do sincerely hope they will give PoE another shot in the near future, but am not expecting to see it either.

Deadfire eventually being a success over the long term is a big reason why I'm more optimistic about the prospects of a PoE3 than I was half a year ago. While I myself wasn't the biggest fan of Deadfire it doing well over long terms shows that it has legs....and that maybe Obsidian screwed the pooch with the marketing. With these types of games having several examples of successes at different levels and the seeming willingness of Microsoft to greenlight smaller games like Pentiment, it's definitely within the realm of possibility that PoE3 happens in some form. Whether this is "BG3 but in Eora" or another 'isometric' (relatively) lower budget game is up in the air but we'll see when we see.

3 hours ago, Zoraptor said:

I really don't know how BG3 will effect the possibilities for other RPGs. Larian is in a near unique situation with its own very distinct style and prior success/ fanbase based largely on MP and intrinsic hype due to the D&D/ Baldur's Gate names. Obsidian can replicate some of those, but PoE3 wouldn't have a fraction of the hype that the Baldur's Gate name generated, and a lot lot less than Divinity/ Original Sin. You'd probably need an 'isometric' Fallout to replicate that hype.

While they certainly didn't hurt, I don't think BG or D&D have the kind of pull alone to explain BG3's successes as neither the "BG2 spiritual successors" or other D&D media* really have caught fire like BG3 did, relative to weight class of course. To explain the big success of BG3 I think along with the brand name of D&D we're looking at a combination of a sizeable fanbase for a recent game, viral content about the game driving attention, and it being largely well received by players and critics. The sizeable fanbase and lack of a big brand name is something that a hypothetical PoE3 would struggle with to get attention, but that's something that doesn't seem to be detering Microsoft from greenlighting other games including AAA rpgs like Avowed and that steampunk time travel thing.

And I don't think an 'isometric' Fallout (which I'd like to see) would be a wide driver of hype, the base for that seems much smaller than the DOS fans if we're going by the closest analogue to it: Wasteland 3.

*I'm excluding stuff like the live play podcasts because I think that's more due to the entertainers than D&D itself.

[Bartimaeus]

10 hours ago, Mamoulian War said:

And Manus is down! He gave me a lot of trouble, but much less than I’ve expected, and much than both Artorias and Kalameet. The fight is fun though, it either kicked my ass under 20 seconds, or I was able to get him down to 50-25% easily, and then I made a stupid decision. I got him once to 10% and forgot to defend and roll his Dark Beads spell Then I got owned few more times, and I was finally able to defeat him with Dragonslayer Spear and 3 Chaos Fireballs So far, the hardest fights was Artorias and Sif (yes, I have completely ****ed up that one fight )

All I need to do is some kind of clearing and item grinding, and then I can go against Lord Gwyn again. I already see him as a big pain in the ass, as I suck at parrying

The Silver Pendant that you can find in Oolacile provides complete protection against dark magic, including Manus' spells. Though using it is a little weird, as it's an (unlimited use) activated item - you just spam it whenever somebody's casting dark magic at you and it all just bounces off harmlessly. Makes that part of Manus' moveset pretty trivial.

The four bosses in Artorias of the Abyss are all pretty stupendous in terms of design. When I went through it on NG7 at SL1, I realized how tight, punishing, but fair all of them were...with the single exception of a rarely occurring bug(?) with Kalameet where he would use his leap-forward-turn-around-and-breath-fire attack when you're at point blank range. His entire body instantly turns into a giant hitbox that you can't avoid if you're in melee range, so I'm pretty sure it wasn't intended that he would use it while in melee range and I can't ever say I've seen FromSoftware design something like that anywhere else (and I only discovered it because fighting Kalameet at SL1 on NG7 is quite a lengthy battle where you would naturally be more likely to experience any AI behavioral issues that there might be, especially with repeated attempts), but besides that, a really fantastic group of bosses, probably the best little slice of Souls content FromSoftware has ever put out.

Edited January 29 by Bartimaeus

[BruceVC]

11 hours ago, Wormerine said:

Some things better, some things not. From gameplay experience, I think PoE2 is overall better (even though I did like so, of PoE1 systems). More refined system, more transparency in class progression, about the same length, but “less filler more killer”.

Where I think PoE2 falls short is companions and narrative. Not that there isn’t a lot of good stuff to enjoy there - worldbuilding is probably better, as you won’t have to resort to book reading to understand broader context. Deadfire’s history, culture, and political situation is neatly conveyed through engaging quests, rather than plain text. I also don’t think story is bad per say - I enjoyed every minute spent in three of my Deadfire playthroughs.
The game is very open ended though, and the narrative doesn’t have strong sense of progression. While PoE1 ending give an interesting perspective to everything we have been through, PoE2 ending feels like a set up to be followed up on. I felt there wasn’t sufficient pay off to our adventure in the Deadfire, and the ending made my gasp for PoE3. And with PoE3 not happening in foreseeable future I see it as a bad thing. 

in short, I felt the beginning and end were the weakest part of Deadfire. Everything inbetween is pretty darn good. And of course, all three DLCs strongly recommended. They are more of a smaller side adventures this time around, but we’ll worth your time. 

I would also recommend reaching for some mods. Not necessary, but I refuse to play without them:

1) Enhanced User Interface - adds some icons and colour coding to make game’s mechanics easier to understand. 
2) Community Patch - might be a bit biased, but thanks to hard work of a wonderful folks in the community we got those lovely pack of tweaks and fixes. But being a shallow person that I am, it is a must for me due to unique icons made by @Boeroer to make skill trees a bit more exciting. 
3) Deadly Deadfire (just xp!) - while the whole mode is great, I wouldn’t recommend it for first playthrough. I would, however recommend the file that just reduces XP by 25%. Due to the open nature of Deadfire it is too easy to greatly out-level available content for the vast majority of the game. While PoE1 had reputation of being perhaps to difficult, Deadfire swung the other way. The penalty to XP makes it possible to the enjoy all the content there is, without getting too ahead of the difficulty curve. The base game is still pretty easy for the most part. 

I cant   explain  enough how much Im loving PoE2, its  almost like  Obsidian listened to  my criticisms  with PoE1 and addressed  them. Im only 9 hours in but already I can  appreciate the differences

There  lots of small  things I love which I consider  an improvement for my gaming preferences and they include

 

• you can select a  different class if you want for companions when they join which is  a  small  but significant   change. I decided  to be a Cipher for my main class  so I  made Serafen a Barbarian and he is one of  my tanks 
• I prefer how the Heath mechanics  work
• It  looks  like you have Romance, finally !!!  
• I love Xoti and her cute Southern accent 
• I like the whole idea  of  a ship  and island exploration design,  I have always liked Pirate RPG  

 

And then I did load  the first 2  mods  and Enhanced User Interface is a huge feature  because now  I can easily access  lore   and mechanics  and  I have much better  understanding of these  things

I really enjoyed PoE1 but I completed  it without  a good understanding or remembering all the lore  and how ruleset  mechanics work together,  now that uncertainty is easy to  reference

One of the best things about PoE2 is its  apparently longer than PoE1 and Im  planning on doing as  many side quests as  possible  so  I get a full experience with this game 

 

 

[xzar_monty]

On 1/26/2024 at 7:32 PM, BruceVC said:

Now I plan to play PoE2 after a short break from this type of genre, how is PoE2? What is the consensus, better than PoE1?

I would say it's a lot better, even if it does have some problems in the story department.

The big, big improvement is that you need to do a lot less fighting. My main gripe with PoE was with the fighting. I appreciated the fact that you essentially got no XP for grind fights, and it was fine that there was no major loot to be found, either. But considering that, I thought it was sheer madness to leave so much fighting in the game. I mean, if you get no XP and no loot, then much of the fighting is just a waste of time. Some of the outdoor maps were really, really bad in this respect. This problem doesn't exist in Deadfire.

The story problem in Deadfire is that with all the drama going on, you're supposed to be in a hurry to put things right. But of course you're not, really: you can spend as much time as you want exploring the world, and nothing will happen. This feels a bit strange and even slightly silly, although the game doesn't suffer all that much from it, in the end. But I can't get away from the fact that storywise, it is a problem. You can't very well tell someone to hurry and then give them all the time in the world, it doesn't make you look good.

By the way, for me the best part in all of these games was the beginning of PoE, up until the moment when you learned that you were this "Watcher" thing[*]. I loved the darkness and the sense of foreboding, it was extremely well done. Also, the Beast of Winter DLC for Deadfire is superb.

 

[*] I really don't like the fact that random strangers in Deadfire seem to know that you're the Watcher. It's a bit annoying, although that is all that it is. How could they know?

[xzar_monty]

9 hours ago, Zoraptor said:

I really don't know how BG3 will effect the possibilities for other RPGs.

I don't think there's any way to predict this.

Let's assume that the next RPG in this vein a) tanks or b) does extremely well. It would be easy to assume that a) the previous title milked the market for all it could, or b) that the previous title created a huge appetite for more. These explanations would be easy to regard as true, but of course we couldn't really know, at least without extensive consumer research, and we're never going to get that. There could be many other explanations, too, from both within and outside the gaming world, to tell us why a title did or did not succeed.

So I would say we're back to Samuel Goldwyn and his movie business adage that "No one knows anything".

(I have no interest in BG3, as it looks like complete trash to me, but I am almost certainly going to buy the next isometric rtwp fantasy RPG, if one ever comes out.)

[Mamoulian War]

2 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

The Silver Pendant that you can find in Oolacile provides complete protection against dark magic, including Manus' spells. Though using it is a little weird, as it's an (unlimited use) activated item - you just spam it whenever somebody's casting dark magic at you and it all just bounces off harmlessly. Makes that part of Manus' moveset pretty trivial.

Oh yeah, I know that about the pendant, I just find rolling out of his dark magic a little bit more convenient. Unfortunately I was at point-blank range when he cast his version of Dark Beads. I just got like 90% of the beads right into my face with my reflexes failing to do anything in time. So I just looked at the screen with blank stare for a few seconds and let out a very deep sigh

[BruceVC]

4 hours ago, xzar_monty said:

 

(I have no interest in BG3, as it looks like complete trash to me, but I am almost certainly going to buy the next isometric rtwp fantasy RPG, if one ever comes out.)

Monty Im surprised  you of all  people is commenting on something you havent experienced?  You know how  this works,  objective criticism is fine but need  to play a   game before you can  criticize  it 

Its  like a restaurant,  would you take seriously a review of it from  someone who has  never been there before?

 

[Hurlshort]

9 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

Monty Im surprised  you of all  people is commenting on something you havent experienced?  You know how  this works,  objective criticism is fine but need  to play a   game before you can  criticize  it 

Its  like a restaurant,  would you take seriously a review of it from  someone who has  never been there before?

 

I mean, if it's a chain restaurant, and he didn't enjoy one chain, it's safe to say he isn't going to enjoy another. If you didn't enjoy the Divinity games, it's safe to say BG3 isn't going to change your mind.

[xzar_monty]

18 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

Monty Im surprised  you of all  people is commenting on something you havent experienced?  You know how  this works,  objective criticism is fine but need  to play a   game before you can  criticize  it 

Its  like a restaurant,  would you take seriously a review of it from  someone who has  never been there before?

I am surprised that your automatic assumption seems to be that my view is based on someone's review. (For the record, I haven't read any reviews of BG3.)

But anyway: first, I have no interest in turn-based RPGs. I have tried one, D:OS2, and it was rubbish. I have no interest in combat mechanics of that sort -- in fact, just like @kanisatha, I was really annoyed that there is one battle in WotR that you have to play in turn-based mode. The mode is so unfun that for a moment, I felt like ditching the game just because of that, but didn't (of course). Second, the "movie-like" cutscenes where you can watch people talk look just really, really bad to me, and I have no interest in a game that takes that route. Also, just like @Hurlshort says above, the entire Larian approach is contrary to my preferences in so many ways that I'm not going to give it a try anymore. I did try D:OS2, and that was a complete waste of money, so that's enough.

 

(I don't think there is such thing as "objective criticism", by the way, or at least I'd like to know what you mean by it. Criticism is subjective almost by definition, although it has to be said that this is a somewhat tricky subject. If you say that Whitney Houston was technically a much better singer than Madonna ever was, that's an indisputable objective fact that anyone with ears can verify, but that's not really criticism as there isn't even any attempt to comment on any aesthetic or emotional aspects of her singing. If you say that Whitney Houston grates on your ears because she had all the emotional expressivity of freeze-drying machinery, then that's definitely criticism, but there's no way it's objective.)

[Hurlshort]

So Larian is Madonna and Black Isle was Whitney Houston?

That analogy works for me! 

edit: Bioware is clearly Bobby Brown.

Edited January 29 by Hurlshort

[kanisatha]

18 minutes ago, Hurlshort said:

So Larian is Madonna and Black Isle was Whitney Houston?

That analogy works for me! 

edit: Bioware is clearly Bobby Brown.

LOL

On the Larian forum I've put it as: BG3 is to video games what Taylor Swift is to music, or 'Barbie' is to film. For some this will obviously be a huge compliment. For me, equally obviously, it is sooooo *not* a compliment.

[HoonDing]

In a better world, Obsidian made Black Hound.