What are you playing now?

[GhostofAnakin]

Managed to finish off all three weapons challenges in Shadow of Mordor.  The bow and sword ones were easy.  The knife ones were a bit more challenging because you had to avoid detection in a few of them.

 

I don't know if I'll be able to finish the outcast challenges because of that one timed mission I'm stuck on.

[Keyrock]

Playing more Infinity Wars.  I'm having a ton of fun with the game.  I really like the simultaneous turns aspect of it, since it brings an elements of trying to predict your opponent's actions and bluffing into play (MtG has that too, to a lesser degree, with instants).  I've done all the available matches and challenges against the AI and am now playing against human opponents, though in unranked starter matches, since I can't play ranked matches yet.  So far I'm 6-1 in PvP matches, though, again, these are matches against other starter opponents.  Once I get to level 10 I can start playing ranked matches (I'm almost lev 9 now).  My most used deck is most comprised of commons and uncommons, as is expected for someone starting out, but I'm having success with it and gaining cards.  I'm currently playing a deck called "Sugar Glider", because flying and animals.  It's 2 purity Warpath and 1 purity Order.

 

There are 8 factions in Infinity Wars:

 

Flame Dawn - Basically a Warhammer 40k Space Marine ripoff.

Cult of Verore - Death Cult, Necromancers and such.

Warpath - Beasts, Druids, nature, etc.

Genesis - High tech corporation with lots of robots and gadgets.

Sleepers of Avarrach - Undead.

Descendants of the Dragon - Martial Artists.

Exiles - Demons.

Overseers of Solace - Angels.

 

My main deck is predominantly Warpath with a dash of Overseers.  It revolves greatly around Leader of the Pack, a beast card that gives all other beasts +3/+3 when in the battle area.  Warpath also has cards that can increase your resource pool, plus I use neutral cards that do the same.  The idea is to stall for a few rounds, taking damage if necessary, while I get beasts into the support zone (deployed but not in direct combat) and wait until I can get Leader of the Pack along with several beasts into battle at the same time, deploying a ridiculously powerful force all at once.  Overseers are there mostly to shore up Warpath's weaknesses.  It was hard for me before to deal with artifacts and locations.  There are neutral cards for that, but they're expensive.  Overseers have Consecrate, which destroys either a location or an artifact, making it versatile, and for a very reasonable cost.  I also have a few angels in there for flying purposes since Warpath doesn't really have flying creatures (that I've seen so far) and only some (and expensive) creatures with Reach (lets them block flying creatures).  There's also Leader of the Charge, an angel that can get super nasty if allowed to hit the opponent's fortress (the opponent rather than any of their creatures), since it gains flying if it does that and then buffs every attacking creature (itself included) every turn going forward if it attacks.  I usually play very aggressive once I have the resources to put a bunch of beasts on the battle field, but sometimes if my opponent is attacking a lot I need to defend with the majority of my forces.  If Leader of the Charge has gained flying I will often just leave her alone to attack (there are separate attack and defend zones), while my other creatures defend.  Every round she gets stronger as long as she has gained flying and attacks.  If the opponent has no way to deal with a flying creature, they have an escalating problem on their hands.  Also, Overseer has some relatively low cost angels (without flying or reach, unfortunately) that have vigilance, allowing them to immediately defend.  These are there for desperation defense purposes.  The deck still has plenty of weaknesses and inefficiencies, but it's a start.

 

Anyway, I'm still fairly new to the game and figuring out synergies and strategies.  I'm sure there are some really cool wacky combos for me to figure out.  Figuring out unorthodox combinations is one of the most satisfying things about card games.

Edited January 3, 2015 by Keyrock

[GhostofAnakin]

So I ended up finishing the outcast challenges after all.  The only one that gave me a problem was that timed one where you had to race across a map and rescue three slaves within 2 minutes (the timer actually reset once a slave was rescued).  I was able to tame a caragor and use it to distract the guards while I sneaked in and cut the slaves loose.

 

I've got one main story mission to go, and then I've got two hunter challenges.  I'm not sure how to complete the hunter challenge because I can't find a ghul matron anywhere on the map to slaughter.  The only time I've faced one of those was way back for a specific mission and I haven't seen it reappear since.

[Gizmo]

Finished Eye of the Beholder 2, am feeling like something a little more action oriented now, I was thinking of running through the Streets of Rage trilogy but to be honest i'm a little put off by the third installment, it was brutally hard even for my younger, more dextrous hands, to the point where I never completed it. I've heard that the Japanese original Bare Knuckle 3 is far more enjoyable, is this true? And does anybody have any experience of the remake of the series?

I finished EOB2 early this week, and finished Menzobarrenzan just tonight. I'm was going to play Stone Prophet, but it's effectively Menzo 2... So for me it's either DA:O or WL2 next.

 

EOB2 spoiler [i found out last week ~after I'd completed the game.]

 

Wall of Force will stop a scripted door from closing.

 

That means that both death traps can be looted for thier above average gear. 

 

Edited January 3, 2015 by Gizmo

[NOK222]

 

I know there's a few Shantae fans here, Anybody play Pirate's Curse? It's probably one of the funnest, and challenging, games I've seen in a while. 

 

I plan to scoop it up for the Wii U very soon.  I'm a huge fan of the series. 

 

Edit:  We also get Half-Genie Hero supposedly sometime this year with playable Rottytops!

 

Rotty, Bolo, Risky and Skye. 

[WildWild-Horses]

Wonderful 101. One of the best action games to come out of Platinum. The more you play, the more you learn the more of what you just learn changes everything. Funny, charming, and has an extremely well put together combat system. Has a bit of a learning curve though.

[Keyrock]

Wonderful 101. One of the best action games to come out of Platinum. The more you play, the more you learn the more of what you just learn changes everything. Funny, charming, and has an extremely well put together combat system. Has a bit of a learning curve though.

I'm going to scoop that game up sometime this year.  I love Platinum Games so much.

[mkreku]

I finally started Wasteland 2 and logged something like 20+ hours in it. Then I found an area that just refuses to let me past. I tried for probably five hours, using all skills, every item, every route, every combination of everything I could think of. Nothing worked. Out of frustration I finally googled it: an area I previously visited was supposed to drop an item which it didn't. Time to restart.. frustrating.

 

Other than that it's a fun game.

[Keyrock]

More Infinity Wars.  I built 2 new decks, one I called Dragon Fire, because it's Flame Dawn and Descendants of the Dragon, and the other called Wings of Glory, because it's Genesis and Order of Solace, the two most flying-heavy factions.  The Dragon Fire deck is awful, I don't know what I was thinking.  Those two factions are pretty much polar opposites in their approach, Flame Dawn being a very fast, attack heavy faction, while Descendants of Dragons being a very defensive, slow faction.  The idea was that Flame Dawn would get me some damage in the early game while I play the slow game with Dragons.  It did not work, at all.  I'm sure it's possible to build a good deck with those 2 factions, but not the deck I built, that's for sure, and likely not with the cards I own right now.  The Wings of Glory deck, on the other hand, has been quite succesful.  Flying creatures are just a real pain to deal with, and that deck has them in spades.  Plus Angels and Genesis synergize quite well.  I don't think it;s quite as good as my Sugar Gliders deck (my Warpath/Order of Solace deck from before), but it's been fairly successful.  As I acquire more cards I am slowly tweaking all my decks and getting ideas for new ones.  Hopefully I get an Untapped Wilderness card soon.  It;s a rare card, so not likely, but it would help speed up the Sugar Gliders deck immensely (It's a 3 cost location card that makes the cost of all Warpath cards 1 less).  I am almost to lev 10, at which point I'll be able to play ranked matches and start playing more experienced players with more robust decks.  

 

Also more Grim Dawn.  I'm almost done with Act 1.  I'm in the warden's cellar and have reached the underground railroad portal.  I'm very close to the lab and the warden himself.  The BATTLEmage is working really well.  I've gotten more mage abilities to make me a tad more balanced, but they're still mostly to enhance my melee combat skills.  One is an energy burst around me that does damage and can knock enemies back and down.  I got the modifier for it that makes it much more powerful but more expensive and with a 5 second cooldown (whereas the regular form had an almost instant cooldown) so I can't spam it.  Still, the damage is great and can kill lesser enemies outright.  It's an AWESOME ability when I get swarmed by a bunch of smaller enemies.  Plus, the skill has a very quick, but still noticeable animation that interrupts and slightly slows down my melee attacks, so I felt it was better to do one big powerful busts every 5 seconds than spamming weaker bursts, constantly slowing down my melee attacks.  Another ability is a shield that absorbs 100% damage and reflects a small portion of it back to attackers.  It only lasts 3 seconds and has a rather long cooldown (almost 30 seconds, which I can reduce with more skill), but it's extremely useful in certain situations.  Just straight up taking an axe to an enemy's face is still the meat and potatoes of my character's combat tactics, though.

Edited January 4, 2015 by Keyrock

[GhostofAnakin]

Last attempt in Shadow of Mordor to complete the hunting challenges.  I give up on the Ghul Matron challenge.  She just never appears.  I'll hunt down pack after pack of ghuls, but the matron never comes out to play.

[Malcador]

Plodding along in Gray Matter, right now am helping Styles be emo over his dead wife.

[Tale]

Last attempt in Shadow of Mordor to complete the hunting challenges.  I give up on the Ghul Matron challenge.  She just never appears.  I'll hunt down pack after pack of ghuls, but the matron never comes out to play.

The trick is to find one of their spawns and let them retreat when the icon over their head turns into an alarm. That triggers a reinforcement wave. After a few of those, the Matron will spawn. 

 

I've been playing GTA V for PS4 and feeling like I'm wasting my time. It's not bad, but it's not exciting. I bought Alien: Isolation for a second time recently (previously owned on 360, but since I disconnected that to make room for PS4, I rebought on PS4) and should be playing that instead while I wait for Wolfenstein: The New Order to arrive.

 

Edit: Did I mention I beat The Wolf Among Us a few days ago? It's officially my favorite Telltale game, unseating Tales of Monkey Island.

 

Tales of Borderlands Episode 1 is good and has the promise to be even better, we'll see.

[GhostofAnakin]

 

Last attempt in Shadow of Mordor to complete the hunting challenges.  I give up on the Ghul Matron challenge.  She just never appears.  I'll hunt down pack after pack of ghuls, but the matron never comes out to play.

The trick is to find one of their spawns and let them retreat when the icon over their head turns into an alarm. That triggers a reinforcement wave. After a few of those, the Matron will spawn. 

 

 

 

Good to know.  I've just been slaughtering them wholesale whenever I see them.

[Gorth]

Last game I played (over the Christmas holidays) was actually not a computer game, but a "card game". Munchkin (with the need for steed expansion) by Steve Jackson games. It was hilarious

[mkreku]

I finally started Wasteland 2 and logged something like 20+ hours in it. Then I found an area that just refuses to let me past. I tried for probably five hours, using all skills, every item, every route, every combination of everything I could think of. Nothing worked. Out of frustration I finally googled it: an area I previously visited was supposed to drop an item which it didn't. Time to restart.. frustrating.

 

Other than that it's a fun game.

 

Ok, I need to retract this previous post. Turns out the item I was referring to was NOT supposed to be in the area I fine-combed. The help I had read was for the beta and a lot has changed since then.

 

THE GAME IS BUG-FREE IN THIS CASE!

 

(I hate when games get undeserved buggy reputations)

[teknoman2]

and im done with ME3. i have to look at youtube for the original "nonsensical" ending everyone was talking about, because the ending i ve seen was pretty standard

[Starwars]

Actually started up Final Fantasy 9 on a PS emulator. This was always my favorite FF (well, didn't play the ones after 12). Just loved the atmosphere in it.

 

Haven't played it in many, many years now. Kinda fun to go back to it. I haven't really played much jRPGs since, well, around FF12 either. Not sure if I'll finish it but I'm enjoying the nostalgia trip for now, it's a very charming game.

[teknoman2]

i see now why all the flame and hate for the ending of ME3 on release. it was a quarter of what the patched version that i just saw is, however i do understand the frustration of it all coming down to "pick a color" after the myriad of different choices done throughout the entire series

by the way, i chose the green ending.

[Tale]

I can't stand the revised ending, either. I just think the ending misses the point of what the audience is after. The squadmates aren't there at all.

 

Try and think of another piece of media about a group where they all get shoved away before the climax. Dark Tower comes to mind, but King didn't exactly nail that one himself. His own writing of it showed he wasn't too sure, going so far as to advise readers to skip parts of it.

 

I mean, it would be kind of like if The Walking Dead ended without Clementine present.

 

The most important thing in the franchise is not the Reaper's goals, but the ending cared about nothing but.

[Malcador]

Good thing Harbinger didn't see the Normandy there, that'd have been embarassing. The refusal ending was a nice touch, though, perhaps a bit trolly.

[Serrano]

You know if they'd just cut to credits on the original ending at the point where Shepard and Anderson are looking out at earth, people would have still said the ending sucked and their choices didn't matter ect. but I bet there wouldn't have been nearly as much ruckus.

Edited January 5, 2015 by Serrano

[Tale]

If they'd kept the ending exactly the same, but had your two squadmates there to say "Red's what we were fighting for all along" and "I'll never let you choose green!" then I doubt the furor would have been more substantial than it is for every overhyped game.

[HoonDing]

Dark Tower ending was perfect.

 

What was obnoxious about the final books was the self-insertion.

[GhostofAnakin]

You know if they'd just cut to credits on the original ending at the point where Shepard and Anderson are looking out at earth, people would have still said the ending sucked and their choices didn't matter ect. but I bet there wouldn't have been nearly as much ruckus.

 

That ending, plus slideshows/cutscenes showing the results of the various choices you made through the series, would have been satisfactory for me.

 

What killed it for me was not only the idiot ending we got, but we didn't even see much in terms of how our actions affected anything.  At least with regards to the original ending that shipped with the game.

 

Basically, screw the starchild.

[Tale]

Dark Tower ending was perfect.

 

What was obnoxious about the final books was the self-insertion.

I can't agree. It wasn't abominable, but it needed some work. I love what happened to Roland and the cycle. But the rest of the team is just kind of meh.