What are you playing right now?

[Labadal]

Reached episode 4 of Tales from the Borderlands. I have to say it's a lot fun. I treat current TT games as interactive movies and that makes them easier to enjoy. TWD S1 and TWAU was also good. TWD S" was decent. I heard that I should pass on GoT and that TftB was good.

[Fenixp]

Would love to see some impressions of the game

I hate 4x and I have played Endless Legend for more than 15 hours, so that's something :-P But yes, this statement could be quite damning, so why do I love it:

- Extremely slick UI

- Oozes personality with each faction having a set of unique mechanics working well with their theme

- Quests, quests, quests. It has fairly rich lore and nice storyline which ties it to Endless Space and Dungeon of the Endless. I'm a bit of a lore freak so I adore this and the quests add a lot of nice gameplay elements.

- Expansions which actually add nice and fun content

- Absolutely amazing presentation - design is gorgeous, soundtrack is stellar, it's a joy to look at

 

While you're at it, also get Dungeon of the Endless if you like stories and enjoy some rogue-lite ... Things ... With ... Stuff. It's extremely difficult to even begin describing what Dungeon of the Endless actually is. It's a game with dungeon and rooms and towers which defend things that's not actually rogue-like and it's not really a tower defense either. Blah.

[Mamoulian War]

After pretty long time, caused by my vacation, I have finally finished my Europa Universalis 2 game this Sunday.

 

Nation fo Xhosa conquered 52 provinces in Africa, and successfully ended up as 5th most powerful country in the world Unfortunately, due to some clumsy game mechanics, it is very hard to get with some nations to high enough Land and Naval technologies events, to stay competitive with Euro and Muslim countries, so I was unable to conquer whole Africa, and get better results in accumulating Victory Points.

 

Still playing such an outsider was crazy fun for me, and the outcome of the game is on much higher level, than I would ever thought. TBH I was thinking, that some time after in 17th century, I'll be obliterated by Portugal. But In the end, I was even able to win few wars against them, despite very big Tech handicap.

 

Anyway the last day of my campaign, was in the vein of defending myself against countries, which guaranteed Ethiopia's independence, which almost ended fatal for me But in the end, I was able to Annex Ethiopia, and take out every Persian and Ottoman provinces in between my kingdom and Nubia. Though Nubia have saved me from getting kicked my ass by Ottomans, because they had crazy number of troops, but were unable to get them, due to lack of Military Access to their lands

 

Anyway, if you would like to know little bit more in detail about the game, you can read more in detail about it >>here<< in my Let's Play/AAR

[Bartimaeus]

I always wanted to try out a tiny random country in EU4, but I'm such a Roman/Byzantine homer that I never got around to it, and now EU4's completely broken...very sad.

[melkathi]

Sailed to Erengrad. Just before we got there we spotted the Wrath of Sigmar in terrible shape sitting in the water. We pulled up to her starboard and the captain informed us that he had barely made it this far, having run into an orc raiding fleet heading for the city. With the majority of the Kislev fleet engaged with Chaos ships further north, mine was the only ship in fighting shape close enough to defend Erengrad.

I took my trusty spyglass and scanned the darkness. Soon shapes were looming ahead. Four orc ships were coming in from the north west. We placed our corsair with the 20 cannons of the starboard battery ready to welcome the orcs. Luckily the fleet contained only Bigchukkas* and Drillakillas**. The drillakillas bore down on us, trying to ram us. I let them come close, and in the last moment had the crew unfurl the sails. The timing worked perfectly. The closer of the two drillakillas narrowly missed us, and as it passed, a full broadside hit its treadwheel, leaving it dead in the water. With the crew cheering, we bore down on the bigchukkas, trying to keep out of the reach of their catapults. The second drillakilla gave chase. We turned, one broadside firing at the chukka, the other at the pursuing drillakilla, sinking it. Bigchukkas are not very maneuverable, so with the pursuer taken out, it was easy to circle round and take them out. Sailing back to Erengrad we scuttled the first drillakilla; who knows, perhaps the orcs know how to repair those treadwheels.

 

Reaching the port we were greeted by grateful kislevites, but also by rocks hurtling towards us. A second orc fleet had occupied the opposite side of the bay! And this one was lead by a Hulk***. We barely avoided the two drillakillas, again taking out the treadwheels on one. But with rocks raining down on us, our sails were soon in tatters. The Hulk smashed into our port side and started hitting us with that nasty Smash-Hammer. The hammer was crushing into the deck again and again, while the gun crew tried to keep the gun battery firing. We were lucky. The damage dealt by our cannons was far lower than the havoc wreaked by the hammer. The orc ship started to take on water faster and faster, then sank beneath the waves. This turn of event surprised the drillakilla's crew even more than mine, so we managed to sink it before it could turn around and ram us. That left two damaged orc ships afloat in the bay. With nothing but a towel for a sail, we pulled up next to the bigchukka. Most of its crew must have died fighting the Wrath of Sigmar, so we simple shot them with our rifles. Then we sank the drillakilla and floated into port, were the crew patched up the ship as good as thy could, to allow us to get back to Norden, where we'd pull the Millennium Sea Otter into dry dock.

 

* Bigchukkas are one of the smaller orc ships. They take their name from their single, front-facing bigchukka catapult. They use a large treadwheel for travel, but the ships "mechaniks" are such that the treadwheel and catapult prevent the other from being operated.

** Drillakillas are the other smaller vessel. They have no ranged weapons, only one giant drill at the front of the ship.

*** Hulks are the orcs' floating fortresses. They have a bigchukka catapult facing each direction. Scarrier though are the iron clawz with which they try to catch ships and pull them towards them, either to be boarded or to be smashed with the giant smash-hammer. Unlike the other orc ships they have sails in addition to the treadwheels.

Edited April 19, 2016 by melkathi

[Keyrock]

I'm ****ing around in Saints Row 2, but not really playing anything seriously.  I still have the itch to play more point & clicks, despite having played several lately, but I don't have one started currently.  Anyone have any suggestions?  I'm looking for something fun and lighthearted, rather than super cereal.

[GhostofAnakin]

I hate having a random good game out of the blue.  It gets my hopes up that I finally found a gun that works for me, only to then get my ass handed to me the next few games.

 

Maybe it was fluke, maybe my opponents just happened to suck, or maybe everyone else in the lobby had bad lag and my connection was perfect, but my last game of PvP in Destiny saw me finish first in the lobby and by quite a large margin.  I was killing enemies in like 2 shots (something I rarely can do) throughout the entire match, head shot after head shot, even when there were two of them on the map and both were trying to shoot at me before I finished them off.

 

Hopefully I've found my hand cannon of choice.  Good impact, great stability and range, and has a perk that explodes enemies I kill with a head shot, so anyone around them gets a bit of explosion damage and makes them easier to kill.

[Vaeliorin]

I just got around to finishing Shadow of Mordor (which is good, but overstays it's welcome.  It becomes a bit same oid, same old towards the latter part of the game.)  The final battle was a freaking quicktime event.  And not even a drawn out, challenging quicktime event, but like 6 button presses, to kill the guy you'd been after the entire game.  How does any designer think that that's okay?

[Fenixp]

Mr. Franklin "Speedtest" Weareoutoftime makes the best design decisions every single time.

[Mamoulian War]

I always wanted to try out a tiny random country in EU4, but I'm such a Roman/Byzantine homer that I never got around to it, and now EU4's completely broken...very sad.

Well I have seen Twitch stream of Pedro Almeida playing Kongo, after release of Mare Nostrum expansion. It looked really interesting and challenging from my point of view, but because of Steam, I have never played EU4 before, so I really do not know how the gameplay chnaged from the vanilla version of the game. I have started to watch some streams just after release of previous expansion, and mostly from Rabid Bunny, but he is to fast for me to see why he is doing what he is doing :-P

 

Still If this game would ever hit GOG, I know I would enjoy it, from what I have seen so far, because I already know, that it fixed some of the issues which I had in EU2, but I am kind of sad, that that Paradox does not have "Real History" mode available in their game anymore. Pure sandboxy feeling after EU3 is not as challenging, as trying to change the course of history, when the real historic events hit the player (

 

Barti, do you know, are can you give me some advice, wher I can find some material about Victoria 1 with expansion? I am really bad at that game, and all the guides, which I have found are just for Vic2 game, which is much easier to get into, from what I have seen so far.

[Bartimaeus]

No, sadly, I cannot: I've never played the Victoria series. I hate the industrial age (or anything later) as a time period for these sorts of games, so I haven't touched it.

Edited April 19, 2016 by Bartimaeus

[Gorth]

I haven't played EU4 as much as I wanted to, something always seems to get in the way. Memorable countries that I played in EU3 were Denmark (being from there Originally), Muscowy (recreating most of the later Czar's empire) and besides being a big challenge, also very rewarding, having played the Timurids and transitioning to more stable goverment forms and founding the Mughal empire was very different from always playing powerful European countries. Having luck on my side didn't hurt either, as you are initially very vulnerable every time your leader dies (internal power struggles and rebellions), so neighbours already locked in war with each other at the right time definitely helped.

[teknoman2]

Started This War of Mine. Man, that game is truly bleak. Just when you think you are starting to get more supplies and are doing ok you ran out of food or something else... Oh well at least my moonshine business is running well.

i've been playing this for a few days now... last time i was on day 39, one of my group left the base because he could not stand another and they always fought, all 3 left are depressed, 1 is moderately wounded, the other is badly wounded and i use the 3rd to try and find bandages to keep the other 2 alive while almost every night i get bandit raids (fortunately i have plenty of guns, ammo and armor and they don't get any more hurt)

[Mamoulian War]

I haven't played EU4 as much as I wanted to, something always seems to get in the way. Memorable countries that I played in EU3 were Denmark (being from there Originally), Muscowy (recreating most of the later Czar's empire) and besides being a big challenge, also very rewarding, having played the Timurids and transitioning to more stable goverment forms and founding the Mughal empire was very different from always playing powerful European countries. Having luck on my side didn't hurt either, as you are initially very vulnerable every time your leader dies (internal power struggles and rebellions), so neighbours already locked in war with each other at the right time definitely helped.

 

That was the reason, why I have picked Xhosa in EU2. It played completely different to what I was used with Austria in EU1. I have also tried to play Swahili in EU3 for few hours. I can say, that country is crazy hard. Much harder than Xhosa at start. Most of the time, you lose your first War with Mutapa. (I was able to defeat them only once in 5 starts), you have very low manpower and start with 10 provinces (9 provinces are max for tribal governments, else you get rebels.) When I have finally won against them and vassalized them, my ruler died and I got rebels, right away, even though I have sold 1 province to Mutapa. Right after I was able to sort out the rebels, my Muslim neighbours (i think it was Nadj) already had Land Tech advantage and declared war on me and at the same time, Mutapa break out from their vassalage. After three hours, I got completely annihilated and ass-kicked

 

I would love to try out the game with them again, but I will need more training with EU3, because it feels harder for me than two previous games.

 

@Bartimaeus: To bad, industrial era is not my favourite time period for gaming as well, but the game did sparked some interest in me, when I have first seen it. I have purchased it with all other Paradox game during GOG sale, and I was drawn into the game a lot and enjoyed it. But after a while, my attempt ended with being annexed by Great Britain . For me it would be Hearts of Iron, which I would consider as a miss when I have launched it first time after purchase. I do not know, if I ever will get into the game and enjoy it at least half as much as EU series.

 

@all others: any hints, where can I find and learn little bit more about how to play Victoria 1 + Expansion would be welcome. The learning curve compared to EU and EU2 is much higher, and l feel little bit clumsy with it

[teknoman2]

well, i think i should try to see if its possible to save both ag center and highpool in wasteland 2. the damage in each progresses as you make progress saving the other so the way i see it, if i kill all bandits at highpool but not help with the water pump failure, i should have enough time to partially save ag center

[Fenixp]

After 20 hours of playtime, I am finally ready to play Endless Legend with all expansions I have purchased. Yay! I'll probably try out the evil war bugs of war. Also, there's a content manager right in the main menu which allows you to enable and disable DLC at will. Amplitude gets the honorary badge of UI design.

[melkathi]

They have been great with UI from the start. It is what made Endless Space stand apart from many other 4X space games.

[Keyrock]

I'm playing IS Defense.  It's from the devs that made Hatred, you know, the controversial game that was evil incarnate because you murdered a whole bunch of people in it, which had never ever been done before in video games ever.  Anyway, you know the turret section that devs always feel compelled, for some reason, to put into shooters?  This entire game is the turret section.  Sounds terrible, right?  That's what I thought too when the game was first announced.  Who would want to play the ****ty turret section from shooters for an entire game?  Turns out I was wrong.  This game is really intense and quite fun.  If the turret sections in shooters were anywhere near as good as this, I would actually look forward to them.

 

The game doesn't have much story.  Basically, it's 2020, ISIS has grown completely out of control and now they're invading your shores.  You're a dude in a turret mowing down wave after wave of them.  The turret is motorized and can rotate full 360°.  Most of the attacks, so far, have come from in front, but the enemies will flank you occasionally.  You have a machine gun and a rocket launcher.  The machine gun has infinite ammo, but you do have to reload.  The rocket launcher only has so many rockets.  You can also call in supply drops, infantry, artillery support, air strikes, and helicopters to help you.  You earn skill points during the game which you can use to give yourself bonuses such as faster reloads, faster moving rounds, incendiary rockets, more health, stronger infantry, etc.  It's basically survival mode.  You're eventually going to get overwhelmed.  The goal is to last as long as possible and kill as many enemies as possible.  To unlock the next level you have to (cumulatively, you'll never do it in one try) destroy a certain amount of infantry and vehicles.

 

I've only gotten to the second level so far and I don't know how many there are, so I couldn't tell you how long it is, but it's only $8 and it's good mindless killing fun. 

[melkathi]

In other words they continue try to milk controversy for attention, hoping it will make people notice them. But for all I care they can **** back off into obscurity.

Edited April 20, 2016 by melkathi

[Keyrock]

In other words they continue try to milk controversy for attention, hoping it will make people notice them. But for all I care they can **** back off into obscurity.

Oh they're definitely milking controversy again, but the game is actually pretty good.

[Hurlshort]

In other words they continue try to milk controversy for attention, hoping it will make people notice them. But for all I care they can **** back off into obscurity.

 

Why is it worse to ISIS as an enemy than any other real world faction?  Granted it is a lot less likely than China, Russia, or even North Korea, but those all get plenty of play as the bad guys in games.  

[Leferd]

Empire: Total War with the Darth Mod.

 

Playing my best bit at being the Worst Imperialist I can be. Dominating the West African, Caribbean, and North American Trade Triangle. Subjugating Indians in South Asia and the New World. Making lots of money with The East India Company. Also, fought off Pirates of the Caribbean.

[Humanoid]

 

In other words they continue try to milk controversy for attention, hoping it will make people notice them. But for all I care they can **** back off into obscurity.

 

Why is it worse to ISIS as an enemy than any other real world faction?  Granted it is a lot less likely than China, Russia, or even North Korea, but those all get plenty of play as the bad guys in games.  

 

 

On first glance I assumed it had you playing *as* ISIS and thought "oh those rascals, courting controversy again". Now that I properly ready the post, I don't get how it's controversial at all, yeah.

 

 

That said, it sounds boring either way. Now maybe if it was an ISIS Afterlife Simulator it might be interesting, assuming the recruitment promises were true.    (Though knowing the state of the games industry right now, each of the 72 virgins would be a separate piece of DLC)

[melkathi]

 

In other words they continue try to milk controversy for attention, hoping it will make people notice them. But for all I care they can **** back off into obscurity.

 

Why is it worse to ISIS as an enemy than any other real world faction?  Granted it is a lot less likely than China, Russia, or even North Korea, but those all get plenty of play as the bad guys in games.  

 

 

I avoid most games that use real world factions (at least recent history).

And you can see me ranting about "the evil Russian" in entertainment. Like that evil Russian in Tomb Raider - only reason he was Russian was that he was evil *nodnod* quality writing that.

[Keyrock]

That said, it sounds boring either way. Now maybe if it was an ISIS Afterlife Simulator it might be interesting, assuming the recruitment promises were true.    (Though knowing the state of the games industry right now, each of the 72 virgins would be a separate piece of DLC)

 

It's not revolutionary, it's a simple arcade game, it's just executed quite well.  If anyone here is old enough to remember the old Beach Head games, this is a modern version of that.  It's simple arcadey killing fun.  My biggest gripe is that it only has 3 maps.  On the other hand, it costs the price of a burger, fries, and soda at a fast food joint, so the price fits, I guess.  It does have modding support, or at least it has a mods section (currently empty) in the main menu, so hopefully more maps get made by someone or conversions where you're shooting unicorns or, better yet,  liberals. 

Edited April 20, 2016 by Keyrock