1 hour ago, Gorth said:

Edit: What I am trying to say is, I just don't "get" BG3

Yeah, for the last couple months I have been trying do my 2nd playthrough (honour ruleset, without perma death). I created a drow character and this time around I decided not to roleplay at all - be a passive passager and pick options that seem amusing rather then aim for any character consistency. I definitely enjoyed the game far more this way, got to discover couple reactivities I didn't know about. I also find myself less annoyed by the story - I know it doesn't go anywhere, and for some reason it makes it easier to endure - I also seeing it before, I don't feel obliged to sit through all of it.

I installed some light mods - including fixed to hotbar and WASDa controls. WASDa actually transformed my experience - one I think it fixes some issues that mouse control has, and because it doesn't play like cRPG I am not annoying how inefficient and clunky party controls are.

Still, got to ACT2 and the game went on pause. You know how some games are clearly flawed but still capture your heart and imagination? That is, to me, a complete opposite. On paper I like a lot of it, and it should be my type of a game, but I just find it a bit boring. It's a Bethesda effect to me.

4 hours ago, Wormerine said:

Yeah, for the last couple months I have been trying do my 2nd playthrough (honour ruleset, without perma death). I created a drow character and this time around I decided not to roleplay at all - be a passive passager and pick options that seem amusing rather then aim for any character consistency. I definitely enjoyed the game far more this way, got to discover couple reactivities I didn't know about. I also find myself less annoyed by the story - I know it doesn't go anywhere, and for some reason it makes it easier to endure - I also seeing it before, I don't feel obliged to sit through all of it.

I installed some light mods - including fixed to hotbar and WASDa controls. WASDa actually transformed my experience - one I think it fixes some issues that mouse control has, and because it doesn't play like cRPG I am not annoying how inefficient and clunky party controls are.

Still, got to ACT2 and the game went on pause. You know how some games are clearly flawed but still capture your heart and imagination? That is, to me, a complete opposite. On paper I like a lot of it, and it should be my type of a game, but I just find it a bit boring. It's a Bethesda effect to me.

I managed to complete it my first time only because of my completionist/'must-finish-what-I-started' nature. And I feel the same way as you: it's a game that in theory I should passionately love, and yet it is meh at best. Worse, because of how huge it is, that makes it even more likely I will not play it again because I can't bring myself to commit hundreds more hours to a game I don't care for that much. If it had been a smaller game, I could justify trying playing it a second or third time.

I never started Act 3. I'm right outside Baldur's Gate and I just can't seem to push forward. But that is typical of Larian games. I don't know what it is. I like the combat, but maybe it just wears me out after a couple acts.

Larian's D&D game. I did 4-5 runs (a halfling rogue, a half-elf sorc, a gith warrior, the same half-elf but from mid-game, Wyll, started a dragon bard, but have not finished). It's not long (15-40h) and I enjoyed being able to choose what I wanted to do and to be able to control the combat (or the absense of it up to the end of Act 2). The thing is that you must not see the game as a CRPG, but an imm-sim - find interesting ways to do things, do not allow the corpses-to-become to monologue at you, sneak past ambushes.

Would have replayed again if not for the size - 130GB+ are infuriating and the lack of will to fix the worst (or the second worst after the lore-unfriendliness) flaw of the software is disappointing. Here's to hope that the hardware shortages will align Larian's and my priorities.

---

Nighthawks. Finished Act 1. Can't tell how much the story branches (got a game over when refused to become the owner of the titular nightclub), but the presense of the map is welcome. The UI not showing equipment stats before it is equipped is less so. There are some small interesting features, such as the lack of clothes being a functional choice of attire and the sewers having maps, and it is playable overall. Erotic content is present (mentioning as it was an issue with releasing the game), but it is not particularly descriptive.

The developers are also actively engaging and moderating the Steam forums, which is commendable.

19 hours ago, Hurlshort said:

I never started Act 3. I'm right outside Baldur's Gate and I just can't seem to push forward. But that is typical of Larian games. I don't know what it is. I like the combat, but maybe it just wears me out after a couple acts.

I made it into the city, but the game kinda seems to fall apart there, just when you finally get the tools for things to start feeling good.

Bringing certain characters back just as fan service was, imho, a mistake, they didn´t exactly do most of them justice and it has, honestly, detracted from the story for me.

Anyway, I've been saying I just need to power through to the end, but I've been at this point for close to a year now, so...yeah...

In other news, I've been playing Cronos: The New Dawn and I've been enjoying it. Kind of feels like SOMA with Dead Space 1's combat (heavy suit, so limited mobility, which apparently was a bug in the PC version of DS1, but it worked and is done very much intentionally here). Fights have been frustrating at times, so I've been taking it slow and playing the game in short-ish chunks and as I said, overall I've been enjoying it.

21 hours ago, Hurlshort said:

I never started Act 3. I'm right outside Baldur's Gate and I just can't seem to push forward. But that is typical of Larian games. I don't know what it is. I like the combat, but maybe it just wears me out after a couple acts.

I'm playing BG3 as well, no crashes so far which on my card is a huge improvement. It does suffer when the difficulty curve breaks, which if I recall is around Baldur's gate.

6 hours ago, marelooke said:

Bringing certain characters back just as fan service was, imho, a mistake, they didn´t exactly do most of them justice and it has, honestly, detracted from the story for me.

Yes! I completely agree. And it was especially aggravating for me because those two are my most beloved companions from the first two games. So I was even more angry at what they'd done to those characters.

One of the most important aspects of playing an RPG for me is playing with a party, and having those companions there with me as I go on my adventures. But with the exception of Karlach, and surprisingly Minthara, I just couldn't stand any of the others. And that contributed hugely to suppressing my enjoyment playing the game, especially because I was mandatorily using the party size increase mod, and I always ended up with at least half my 6-person party being companions who utterly irritated me.

On 10/2/2026 at 7:37 PM, Hawke64 said:

The thing is that you must not see the game as a CRPG, but an imm-sim - find interesting ways to do things, do not allow the corpses-to-become to monologue at you, sneak past ambushes.

Granted, most of my experience with BG3 is from early access and early 1.0 which might not represent what the game fully became, but at a time I found game's reactivity to greatly fall short of systemic freedom game seems to permit. A lot of events seemed to be scripted or assumed certain actions being game, so in general attempts of truing to engage with BG3 systems left me disappointed - that said, no issues noticed in my current playthrough - outside the dialogue options not being able to make up their mind if my Dark Urge has amnesia or not.

I couldn't get out of act 1...well no...I couldn't get in to act 1. I think I left the game in front of the goblin fort. As others have said, there is something about Larian games that just doesn't jibe with me.

Speaking of a game I jibe with, Control Resonant. I ended up 99% it and may even go the extra mile and try to play some after story content.

The game reminds me a lot of Prototype. I can't put a finger on why it does that, it's been a long while since I played Prototype, but I think the exploration, movement and to a degree the combat are kind of similar.

I liked the story although the ending is very Supernatural (tv show) like.

The gameplay is simple like it was in the original control, there are no combos...well there are but it's the same combo for all weapon types and you can only pick one. It triggers after a third attack. There is nothing to learn in combat, it's just spamming left and right click. There is no blocking, only dodging and even that is optional most of the time. I used only one weapon type throughout the whole game, even though you need to unlock and upgrade the other types to get stronger.

The bosses are great as set pieces and story tools, but gameplay wise you just breeze through them and to be honest I think they made the right choice. Considering how combat works if they made them harder they would have not been fun.

The graphics are ok, on par with the previous game. The music, as always is phenomenal.

The only gripe I have with the game is:

Minor spoiler

There is no Ahti in the game.

Edited Saturday at 08:46 PM1 day by Sarex

Whirlight - No Time to Trip

Not too bad an adventure game, the design seems to think you'll use the walkthrough because it presents you with a bevy of tasks, and little to no clue what order they should flow in or much of the way of giving you leads, or at least I found. Having to go give mushrooms to a squirrel on the edge of the map to get a TV to give to a hobo is pretty damn random - I don't see how they'd expect us to come to that conclusion

Other than that, the story is interesting, and the characters and jokes are decent.

16 hours ago, Wormerine said:

Granted, most of my experience with BG3 is from early access and early 1.0 which might not represent what the game fully became, but at a time I found game's reactivity to greatly fall short of systemic freedom game seems to permit. A lot of events seemed to be scripted or assumed certain actions being game, so in general attempts of truing to engage with BG3 systems left me disappointed - that said, no issues noticed in my current playthrough - outside the dialogue options not being able to make up their mind if my Dark Urge has amnesia or not.

This too. The game does give the player a lot of freedom to do things their way, but there is very little reactivity or meaningful consequences to your choices and actions. For me, this was playing my own created character (which is the only way I will ever play). Perhaps this is a little better if you play one of their characters or the DU, but IMO the game should not have been made that way.

Making progress in my current game of Pathfinder WOTR. Playing a sorcerer (undead bloodline) and Lich mythic class. I haven't met any of the "notable" enemies yet, but the game feels somewhat more manageable this time. I fell in love with a limited use ability (whose name I can't remember from top of my head), that for a short time lets me ignore opponents magic resistance. It almost feels like cheating 🤭

I am not as far as my first Lich attempt, as I haven't finished building my Ziggurath yet. Also not optimizing my companions according to any min/max guides, just using them for the heck of it. Cool factor being a thing. My succubus archer has a second job singing for the team (bard)

RetroSpace (aka Double-Indie Prey or Discoshock).

One the one hand, it seems a bit soft (even in 1999 mode) as resource management is barely a thing and it is too simple to disengage from combat in tough situations by fleeing and hiding. One the other, levels offer lots of paths to explore, are wonderfully interconnected to form a station, there's even a fully realized central transport system. Plus, I've just received this audiolog from someplace arguing why you may like this if you're into Shock-Likes. Let's hit the play button, shall we?

I am Andrew Ryan, and I'm here to ask you a question: Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow?

"No!" says the quest marker, it belongs to the impatient.
"No!" says the in-game GPS, it belongs to the blind.
"No!" says the witcher sense, it belongs to the dumb.

I rejected those answers. Instead, I chose something different. I chose the impossible. I chose... RetroSpace. A game where the curious would not fear the quick-time event, where the creative would not be bound by petty cinematics, where the ideas would not be constrained by the playtesters. And with the sweat of your brow, RetroSpace can become your game as well.

Edited 5 hours ago5 hr by Sven_