What are you playing right now?

[Chilloutman]

does anyone played STALKER Clear Sky? I need some info!!

[GhostofAnakin]

Maybe it's because I'm early on and not familiar with the maps/layout yet, but Destiny 2 seems a lot less intuitive than Destiny 1, in terms of getting around and finding things to do.  Not sure exactly how to explain it, but so far that's my impression.

[Keyrock]

I've been trying out different weapon types in Monster Hunter World, trying to find my favorite.  I started out with the ol' sword & board and it's decent and flexible, but doesn't really excel at anything and the damage is kinda weak.  I used a longsword for a while, which is a pretty decent and versatile weapon.  I tried the lance for a while, which is exceptional at parrying and really good when fighting a single enemy, since it has the best defensive capabilities of all the weapons and it's fairly easy to keep a single enemy in front of you where your shield protects you.  However the weapon is terrible against packs of enemies, since you move at a snail's pace while wielding it, making it very easy to get flanked, and it lacks any sweeping attacks that can hit lots of enemies.  I tried the buster sword, which does lots of damage, has a variety of attacks, and allows you to block.  It however suffers the same problem as the lance of you moving at a snail's pace while wielding it.  I finally settled (for the time being) on the hammer.  Surprisingly, the hammer allows you to move around quickly and you can dodge roll with it (you can't parry, though).  It does massive damage and it can stun monsters if you hit them on the head (it's also great for breaking body parts).  It has both direct straight ahead of you attacks and sweeping spinning attacks that can hit everyone around you, and you can even charge up your powerful spin attack and the super overhead smash while on the run.  Of course, there is a drawback (no weapon is perfect), the recovery time after attacks, and especially after charged attacks and combos, is very long, leaving you exposed.  Still, it's my favorite so far, and who doesn't want to run around with a ludicrously gigantic hammer?

Edited January 30, 2018 by Keyrock

[LadyCrimson]

Edit: LC, please post a picture of your Palico pal.  I am giddy with anticipation.

Oh I didn't notice this earlier.

I ended up becoming a little weary of thinking inside the Palico editor and ended up making him a little ordinary. I still want to make some kind of wacky colored one. I might make a 2nd character just for that. Wasn't too happy with my female avatar's face outside of the editor. She has these very weird cheeks inside the game that aren't apparent in editor. Maybe a helmet will cover up her face before long. Not sure if that's just going to be the case regardless but I'll have to try again. I hear you can't change their actual faces later, just hair/makeup and clothes or something.

 

I haven't gotten very far in the game, yet, which I expected. Trying to "git gud" with the weapon combos and even targeting (pressing down on the stick didn't occur to me at first...) of a new game always gives me conniptions so I don't play for too long at a time initially. :D I have a feeling I'll be using the free-roam a fair bit, just to enjoy the world without the timers.

[GhostofAnakin]

Okay, even with its flaws, Destiny is my guilty little pleasure.  It's run seeing my character level up and unlock all these powers, and honestly there aren't that many good sci-fi-type games out there that I like.  So it scratches two itches for me.

[SonicMage117]

I've decided to wait fir the pc port of Monster Hunter World and if that turns out bad, the console version will probably be half price by then.

 

Anyway...

https://youtu.be/70d9irlxiB4

 

A review of Celeste:

How the hell are games getting so good these days?

Seriously, this platformer is not what it seems at first glance.

 

----

 

Amidst the incredible level design and tight controls, there exists an unbelievably profound commentary on self discovery & depression (which is honestly unheard of within a 2d platformer). I hesitate to say whether the gameplay or the story is the highlight here, because the two are so inseperable that it's hard to tell which compels me to keep climbing the most.

 

To clarify - that's a good thing, because on their own both elements have struck an amazing balance. This game is all about dying until you get it right, which might be off-putting for some but rest assured there is a distinct lack of frustration attached to this game. Each level has this difficulty ramp-up within the individual chapters, culminating in a very steady difficulty curve leading up to the final level's big finale. It feels very natural, but you're still going to die a lot.

 

And if the base game wasn't enough for you, there are also hard mode versions of every major chapter which seriously put your skills to the test in a completely remixed version of the vanilla map - without all of the collectibles (thank god).

 

Music is a 10/10 - it does exactly what it needs to do and then some

 

Sound design is a 10/10 - Nothing sounds out of place and all of it is unique from level to level

 

Gameplay is a 9/10 - Lowest score here - only because of a couple non-intuitive aspects of character movement which don't become apparent until very late game. Extremely solid other than a few minor gripes of mine

 

Artstyle is wonderful. You'll be drawn in by the uniqueness of every level.

 

Story is, surprisingly, wonderful. No number value because it's hard for me to rate in that way. You'll either adore the characters and relate heavily to the main character's struggles, or not.

[Orogun01]

does anyone played STALKER Clear Sky? I need some info!!

Yes, it's a bug.

[SadExchange]

I'll throw in my 2 cents as well for Monster Hunter World.  I have about 9 hours into the game and am currently Hunter Rank 5.  This is my first Monster Hunter game and while some of it seems easy enough to get in for a first time player, the mechanics are very interesting because I feel like I need to watch a bunch of youtube videos or read wikis to understand other aspects of the game.  Like, capturing a monster.  I don't believe it's actually taught in the game, it's definitely talked about and I have the potential for investigations, however I only have somewhat of a understanding of how to do it from a webpage.  While this is fine, and probably to players of the franchise, the tutorial is not needed, it would have been nice to get possibly a tutorial mission, that can be skipped, to learn how to capture a monster.

 

Also, I started out with the sword and shield, but then changed and have since been with the longsword which has been a good play style.  I've upgraded my bone sword a few times, along with my bone armor and only now understand that in the beginning, you actually want to mix your armor types up to get protections and that the only way to increase skills on armor is to wear two different pieces with the same skill and that upgrading won't increase the actual skill, but defense only.

 

I will say the gameplay is just solid fun.  Like Keyrock said, the environments and ecosystems are hands down the best with the ecology and pecking order within each environment and every hunt is different.  I got the mission to take down the Amnath monster, or T-rex looking guy and that took a solid 30 minutes with different large monsters getting in the fray from time to time which was just awesome to stand back and watch.  That fight, from star to finish, was one of the best fights in a game I've had in a long time due to all the different components and what could happen.  Even after taking him down, I couldn't harvest all his parts that I wanted because another large monster was harrassing me before the timer ran out and while I might have been pissed because of that, I actually wasn't because of having so much fun and that feature actually adding to the overall ecosystem of the world.

 

I've been doing a fair amount of investigations, side missions, but as I said, am unsure of other things still and will definitely have to spend some time on the net figuring stuff out.  Like in the first area, the ancient forest, should I be looking to unlock more campsites?  I have the two from the story missions, but have no idea if there's more to unlock or how to unlock.   How does I use the grapple hook I always saw in gametrailers to latch onto flying creatures or to latch onto creatures after they've shaken me off.  How do I switch what kind of bombs I throw?  How do I, or can I bring more than 1 weapon with me on a hunt?  

 

I know it's just the idea that this game has a lot of depth to it and it'll take time to learn for sure, but there are just constant little questions, nothing that's huge or stopping my enjoyment, that I would like to know before I hit the 20, or 30 hour mark and look back and wish I'd have known from the beginning.  Anyway, after 9 hours so far, 2 cat paws way up for this one!

Edited January 30, 2018 by SadExchange

[Keyrock]

Yeah, MHW has a pretty steep learning curve and the game leaves a lot to be desired as far as tutorials go.

[Melusina]

Mages of Mystralia - I decided to start this again, after full month of not playing and I'm hooked. So hooked I created gogmix just so I can't put Mages of Mystralia and Nine Parchments at top.

[Tale]

Stellaris still. This time I'm playing a Hive-Mind because it's the last type of empire I haven't played, other than an exterminator type. And I just don't want to dragged into eternal war, so it's unlikely I will play that.

 

I'm already at the Crisis stage, this time it's a 2X crisis. One Contingency hub popped up in my territory and I eliminated that first, needing to make several goes at it to test my fleet and reduce the strength of the defense fleet. Another hub popped up on my border and started attacking me as much as my neighbor. It became priority 2. I've now reclaimed all worlds it took for the hive, including the neighbor's planets, and have started testing my new fleet comp against the defenses. Still going to have to do this in waves, it seems.

 

The last two hubs are far from my space. And they've been kept contained by the two Awakened Empires running around. A decadent Xenophile and a Custodian Machine Empire. Despite the Xenophile's problems following the conclusion of War In Heaven (that I singlehandedly won for it, you're welcome), it's managed to build up its fleet to a level I never saw during the actual war. 200k. The custodians are fielding similar fleets. Neither will attack a hub, which are typically guarded by 300k fleets, but they've taken and retaken a couple times over the surrounding planets.

 

The League of Non-Aligned Worlds has been busy with a machine uprising in my neighbor's territory. The same neighbor the Contingency appeared on the border with. These are the only guys left that still hated me and had power. Now neither is true of them. It's amazing what losing your border systems and frontier outpost can do to relieve border friction.

 

Despite this war, I somehow slipped myself into the League. I had to get in the hard way, since I rejected the call to neutrality back in WIH. So I think my strategy is going to be waiting for their machine uprising to end, rallying the Federation to me, and using them as a meat shield to protect my fleet while I clear out the hubs.

 

 

Oh, and I've now assimilated a Psionic pop into the hive. Just one initially, but I've already started breeding it. Soon I will be purging the lesser races of my empire and replacing them with Psionic substitutes. Just need to make sure I have the strength to handle the backlash once the atrocities begin. Fun fact: It's the neighboring species I've been talking about that used to hate me. I am about to turn their entire race into GODS

[Chilloutman]

Didn't know that you are so ok with genocide Tale

[majestic]

Didn't know that you are so ok with genocide Tale

 

Well what do you expect from a hive-mind?

[ShadySands]

Thinking about starting up another Stellaris game myself. I was trying to wait for the next DLC but I've been dying to play a one system/planet challenge.

[Tale]

Didn't know that you are so ok with genocide Tale

The genocide was probably when I assimilated them all into the Hive, then tinkered with their genetics to make them useful.

 

At this point I'm simply consolidation. I have the tech to change portraits, so I might even preserve some of their appearances and names in my new master race.

[GhostofAnakin]

Yeah, I don't like Destiny 2 as much as Destiny 1.  I'm up to level 20 now (I know, still relatively early) but there's barely anything to do.  Story mission, a couple of side missions, and the occasional public event (not touching the Crucible PvP stuff).  By this point in Destiny 1, there were bounties and other stuff to occupy your time, on top of the stuff I mentioned previously.

[SonicMage117]

Finished Prototype 2 main story which took me around 12 hours and finished Shadow Tactics around 24 hours.

 

I'm delving into Dark Souls II. So far so good

 

Still debating on whther to get Kingdom Come Deliverance or some games on the Lunar Sale which is only a few days away.

[redneckdevil]

For my son's bday we took him to a VR arcade. 2 games I must mention. Minecraft is ****ing awesome in VR. The second game was fallout 4, while reg I can't seem to even force myself to finish must less play,in VR....it seems like it was made for VR. Roaming the streets, killing **** in vats. Literally had a blast and could actually see myself wanting to finish the game if I played it in VR.

Now to look up and do research on VR on the PS4 if it's worth it or done decently and if I have to upgrade my PS4.

[Malcador]

Not in the mood for anything engrossing so just been chewing though more Overwatch competitive. Been on a good run, undefeated in 2 days worth of play. Guess I lucked out and got carried well

[Gizmo]

Playing Tyranny, and 'NecroVision - Lost Company'.

Rather disappointed that Tyranny is not turn based. I'm not sure where I got the idea that it was, but I was looking forward to it; and probably wouldn't have bought it, had I known it was RT/wP.

Tyranny does seem to be a good BG/POE clone.  I intend to play through to the end; but I enjoyed the [initial] conquest mission more than the rest of the game—so far.

Edited February 1, 2018 by Gizmo

[GhostofAnakin]

Despite me not being as big a fan of Destiny 2 as Destiny 1, I do have to say it's still addictive to keep playing just to level up and find better gear.  I've been ignoring the main quest and just been doing that the past couple of days.  Case in point, the main quest mission I'm at recommends being Level 7.  I'm currently Level 20.

[GhostofAnakin]

More Destiny 2.

 

I've reached the level cap of 20 (don't own the Osirus DLC that lifts that to 25), and now I'm just "leveling" my gear.  My gear's at around 230 right now.

 

Again, maybe I'm just not looking closely enough, but none of the merchants seem to sell decent stuff.  Every single good item of inventory I've got has been found via loot drop by enemies.

[Katphood]

GTA IV: TLAD

 

Trying to win all the gang wars before going for the endgame.

[LadyCrimson]

FFXV's 1.21 update had me playing it for a bit again last night/this morning, since they added a few small new thingies and I had to check them out. There's even a lot of new chatter-dialogues for the group and guest npc's, which is always nice. Less repeats/more variety with those is always good. Plus there's evidence that it's likely a new explorable area/quest(s) may open up in a previously closed off area/Chapter. Which is kinda cool. Royal edition supposedly opens up Insomnia/end game a bit, now perhaps they're going to do more with Chapt. 10 as well. Probably won't be extensive, but anything is better than the purely linear boxed in feeling of the later Chapters.

 

They sure have been adding stuff all these months in all these patches. Although it'll probably never truly "fix" all the story and pacing problems, it's quality-of-life plus small changes here and there with the net effect = the game feeling a bit richer/varied. I've liked it so far. Can't wait for Royal Pack/next month to see what's what.

[marelooke]

Found an interesting article about how the happiness stuff works in Fallout 4. I seem to remember someone here running into that wall as well, so I'll be doing some experimentation and then posting my findings. Goal is to bring at least a few settlements to 100 happiness.