What are you playing now?

[HoonDing]

That's just the main quest of Tribunal kicking in.

[Drowsy Emperor]

Well so far its not significantly different from Oblivion, just clunkier. And with a lot more mushrooms instead of trees.

[Humanoid]

Made one final attempt to extract some value out of my SR3 sale purchase, unsuccessfully. Steam counting playtime at 13 hours but it drags so much it felt a lot longer - but that's where the clock's going to stop for good.

 

Secondly, while not categorised as 'playing' per se, I've also gone cold turkey on the Project Eternity discussion, since every thread in the first few pages is either about a topic I've already dropped my two bob on, or is utterly irrelevant to my interests (mostly the latter now). Will see if anything changes after the funding drive is over.

 

Another game I've fallen out of love with is King of Dragon Pass. On initial acquisition I was thinking it might have enough gameplay to cover me until X-COM's release, but that turned out to be wildly overoptimistic. Just got too frustrated with the all-too-narrow scope of it all, and ended up only playing one victory.

[Nightshape]

Icewind Dale, lots of fun, it hasn't aged too well... What I wouldn't give for an updated version, its the GUI that holds it back.

 

I'm having a lot of fun with it though, it's a nice way to blow off some steam in the evenings.

[Serrano]

Someone remade the Icewind Dale campaign in the NWN2 toolset complete with the original voice acting and music.

[Nightshape]

Someone remade the Icewind Dale campaign in the NWN2 toolset complete with the original voice acting and music.

 

I may have to check that out, but I have to be honest, I never thought too highly of the Badger engine.

[AW8]

I just finished the College of Winterhold questline in Skyrim. I'm completely dumbfounded.

 

This feels like one of the dumbest things I've ever played. The Mages Guild in Oblivion wasn't amazing, but at least it quickly gave you a purpose to strive for:

 

stopping the rising necromancer threat.

 

 

The College of Winterhold was just laughably bad. The College members came off as idiots, and

the purpose of this questline, to find out what the hell the Eye of Magnus is, is never even fulfilled!!! It doesn't get deeper than "it's highly magical". When these supposedly learned mages isn't any more knowledgeable than

, something is very wrong.

 

 

The more I play Skyrim, the lower my rating of it becomes. I just want to get everything over with at this point.

Skyrim has the potential to be such a great game, and in some areas I think it is, but it fails in so many other ways it's mind-boggling and laughable.

[Lexx]

Heh, yeah. Many quests are like this. They feel huge when you start them, but as you get "deeper" into it... Like this one with the mercs(?). You do one simple job for them and they totally trust you and share all their secrets with you. This is just shait and made me stop playing the game.

[Drowsy Emperor]

Just a look over the gradual changesthe gameplay undertook makes 3 things clear:

 

1. They're simplifying everything as much as possible.

2. They're cutting as much content as possible, mostly in the little things.

3. The trend is likely to continue as long as the games sell well

 

This is why nothing great can be expected of Bethesda (if it ever could)

Edited October 1, 2012 by Drowsy Emperor

[Hurlshort]

Just a look over the gradual changesthe gameplay undertook makes 3 things clear:

 

1. They're simplifying everything as much as possible.

2. They're cutting as much content as possible, mostly in the little things.

3. The trend is likely to continue as long as the games sell well

 

This is why nothing great can be expected of Bethesda (if it ever could)

 

I read through that page, there is a pretty big change from Morrowind to Oblivion, but not much from Oblivion to Skyrim.

 

I'd say the biggest change will be the fact they are going to make an MMO. They will end up changing quite a few systems to deal with having a ton of players in one world. I'm not sure they are up to the challenge.

[HoonDing]

Zenimax Online is a totally different studio.

 

Also the biggest leap was Daggerfall -> Morrowind. That was when all complexity was thrown out of the window to get the game on console (and it paid off, since it was their very first blockbuster).

[WorstUsernameEver]

I'd say the biggest change will be the fact they are going to make an MMO. They will end up changing quite a few systems to deal with having a ton of players in one world. I'm not sure they are up to the challenge.

 

Bethesda isn't working on the MMO that's ZeniMax Online (which is mostly made of MMO developers, and it shows, the game is basically designed like an MMO rather than an Elder Scrolls title).

[WDeranged]

Morrowind is weird. I got off the boat and in 2 hours I already have 2000+ gold and full plate mail gear - and I haven't even reached the first town, just walked around and raided a couple of dungeons. There are high value scrolls everywhere, a ton of gear that can be sold for a lot of cash. Even though all the NPC's in the dungeons are named all of them rush me straight away for no reason. I've freed a dozen or so slaves but none of them have anything to say, and I haven't received any compensation, or quests for that matter. Just two in the first town, none in Pelagia...

 

The first time I played a couple of years ago I had this issue, it's so damn easy to make gold and become godlike in Morrowind, I recommend installing a couple of mods from BTB's list, Hotfusion's Economy Adjuster along with the Morrowind Code Patch mainly, they solve all the glaring imbalances.

Edited October 1, 2012 by WDeranged

[Keyrock]

Splitting time between the insanely fun looting madness of Torchlight 2, dealing with GTA 4's horrific combat mechanics so I can enjoy the other parts of the game (the other parts of the game are really fun which is what keeps me coming back, but the combat mechanics are so frustrating bad... ugh), and doing yet another (heavily modded) playthrough of Fallout: New Vegas (I love that game so much).

[pmp10]

Finished Borderlands 2.

It's pretty much more of the same.

The main quest has been thankfully improved narration-wise but the game still can't keep my interest for more than a single play-thorough.

Especially since my OCD friends insist of completing every single side-quest in existence which kills any challenge the game may have.

Also been trying out Mechwarrior Online beta but it's not looking too good so far.

[Gorth]

Wrecked my game of Icewind Dale.

 

I made it to Lonelywood (HoW expansion) and thought I would "swap out" two of my team members. Deleted two members, created two new ones and wanted to give them approximately the same exp. as the dismissed members. Couldn't get the console commands to work (yes, I know it's case sensitive) and thought hey, that's what Dalekeeper is for. Turned out to be a bad idea as it messed up my party completely. I now have three Gorth's which are 3 three different classes but with Gorth's (a paladin) stats and skills. No wonder my thief couldn't lockpick anything

 

Of course my previous saves are now also overwritten, so I guess it's time to play Icewind Dale 2.

[GhostofAnakin]

Some of these "boss fights" in BL2 are a joke because of how easy it is to exploit the environment versus the boss fights where you're stuck in basically a "room" with the boss.

 

I just took down that massive spacecraft thing called Bunker or whatever with ease, simply because I could shoot at it from a lower level with a ceiling over me, so anytime it shot its weapons, the ceiling and pillars blocked every single shot. So basically it was just a case of me whittling down its HP over time.

[GhostofAnakin]

On a side note: I do enjoy the main quest. Some of the dialogue is pretty funny.

[Blodhemn]

471(!) hours in on this character and I'm still playing Skyrim.

 

It may be that

Skyrim['s] story is [...] so bland and boring that it shouldn't even have been included

, but I still have quests to complete and dungeons to clear in this open-world action/stealth house decoration simulator with RPG elements.

 

Right now I'm playing through the College of Winterhold and I don't really know why I should even care for these idiots or what my goal is, but the appearences of the

Psijic Order and the Synod

have been interesting, if only for lore reasons in the latter's case.

 

I occasionally return to my Solitude house to continue my work on filling two cauldrons with jewels.

https://dl.dropbox.c...09-02-30-88.jpg

 

I've also started up Borderlands 2 but that's currently on hold as I had this current Skyrim relapse.

Haha, nice jewel setup.

[Blodhemn]

Morrowind's lack of main narrative was a much better approach - a few scattered big story moments with a lot of the bulk moreso left to the imagination.

 

How did Morrowind not have a main quest? It would sometimes tell you "hey I guess you should do some sidequests now" and felt a bit less urgent, but it wasn't any less of a main quest.

Morrowind main quest line is more vague - Oblivion's is more immediate with known recycled goals in Oblivion gates...

[Blodhemn]

Made one final attempt to extract some value out of my SR3 sale purchase, unsuccessfully. Steam counting playtime at 13 hours but it drags so much it felt a lot longer - but that's where the clock's going to stop for good.

I have 9 hrs logged into SR3 and I have to yet start another game from the beginning. First game had a bug that totally killed progression in the game so I had to start game #2, well I tried a female character this time and it looked horrible once in the game...now I'm going to try attempt #3 after I finish ME3. I hate how you have to play a mission first before you get to the create character menu, but luckily that mission isn't too long..

[Chr1s]

Torchlight 2 and Borderlands 2, like both games but Torchlight 2 is more fun imo and atleast it have better loot and more ways to customize your characters skils etc unlike D3.

[Katphood]

I've gathered enough money to buy a proper PC. Not top of the line, but still capable of running most games at high settings for the next two years. Not that I care really, the first thing I'm gonna do is hook it up to my 42 inch tv and play the crap out of Fallout 1 and Planescape Torment. They both look amazing on the tv with a few mods installed.

[Gorth]

I've gathered enough money to buy a proper PC. Not top of the line, but still capable of running most games at high settings for the next two years. Not that I care really, the first thing I'm gonna do is hook it up to my 42 inch tv and play the crap out of Fallout 1 and Planescape Torment. They both look amazing on the tv with a few mods installed.

Most recent PC's are probably going to be overkill for the Infinity Engine games. Not so mention the huge pixels on a 42". I mean, I find IWD2 in 800x600 on my 30" monitor to be "large pixels"

 

Good on you though, it's always nice to have something runs games and programs you like rather than being limited to run what your hardware allows you to run

[Majek]

I think he means he'll use Widescreen mods for both of those games.