Never seen this thread before, but I'm playing Factorio right now. On next week's thread, I will be playing Factorio as well. Same thing the week after. At this point it's not really my choice to make anymore...
Patient Gamers
A gaming community free from the hype and oversaturation of current releases, catering to gamers who wait at least 12 months after release to play a game. Whether it's price, waiting for bugs/issues to be patched, DLC to be released, don't meet the system requirements, or just haven't had the time to keep up with the latest releases.
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PEAK with friends, otherwise, grinding through Marvel Rivals ranked, and keeping up with Nikke. I was also getting through FF16, but put that down for a little.
Got 3 games I rotate now of which only 1 I haven’t played before.
Death Stranding: Finished it on the PS4 way back when and bought the PC director's cut a long time ago but only recently picked it up again.
Cyberpunk 2077: Technically bought it day 1 but I am just now doing my first modded playthru.
Starfield: I am not a Bethesda fan so I was 0% hyped for this and only watched a lot of YouTube content about it. Randomly decided to pull the trigger recently tho. Completed the game vanilla first now I am doing a modded playthru and taking my time with it.
This one surprised me the most because I’m having fun and really enjoy my time with it. Funny thing is that most of the negative stuff mentioned about this game absolutely holds true, the game kinda ass. And Nasapunk is an oxymoron. But I’m a raccoon I enjoy trash. And if u shove 600 mods down Todd’s throat you actually get a really cool experience out of it.
Still wouldn’t recommend it tho.
I have somewhat similar thoughts on Starfield. I actually quite enjoyed my first playthrough of the game and wouldn’t mind playing it again, but I’m not sure I’d recommend it to someone. I thought the ship building was pretty good, and was probably my favourite part of the game, and playing through the main quest and major side quests were fun too, but beyond the clearly written out stuff there’s a lot of nothing. It’s the kind of game I’d have several shorter playthroughs of, spread out across a considerable period of time, rather than one or two really long ones or many back to back. I’m glad I played the game, and I’m glad I have it available to play again, but it’s certainly not a perfect game by a long shot and deserves its criticism. The criticism just doesn’t bother me as much as it bothers other people.
Im playing gta 3 on ps2. Nice nostalgia trip but the story telling is kinda dated especislly since gta 4 was my first real playtheough of a gta game back in the days and that has great story telling (and the protagonist even talks!!!!)
This week end an old buddy of mine is visiting and we will probably be picking up some old gc and ps2 titles.
Also had some more fun on my wow private server.
If you get a chance, you should definitely check out Kinetica for the PS2 if you can get your hands on it, a great racing game and perfect for couch co-op!
Thanks for the tip!
Just started Gran Turismo 4 carreer got my b licence but man i suck hard in this game
I'm playing Disco Elysium on android and I gotta say I'm loving it. I couldn't really get into it on PC but I'm enjoying everything about it here.
I need to take another look at that game. I loved the narrative design, and I thought the world was interesting, but I got stuck and lost and didn't know how to get past the bouncer dude.
Farcry Primal. Saw it was on sale recently, so I decided to snag it. It's not bad so far and a fun setting to mess around in. Works with my linux setup and steam deck.
I'm working through Act 3 (Lawful route) of Tactics Ogre Reborn. It was getting a bit challenging, until I tried crafting to get +1 weapons and armor.
I've been playing Conan Exiles, a survival crafting game that's been out for several years but still receives regular major updates.
It's a bit generic - there's little I haven't already seen in another survival game - but it's more polished than most due to having a major developer behind it. There's a lot of content, bespoke animations for nearly every weapon, and the base building is a delight. Exploration is also great due to diverse biomes and the game's climbing system, which also lets you grab the wall while falling and slowly slide to a halt - this looks and feels great and turns avoiding falling damage from a headache into a cinematic moment. It's not parkour, but it tugs the same strings.
The game has an unfortunate tendency to crash when messing with companion inventories, though that may be due to a Steam Workshop mod I'm using (one I can't bring myself to remove because it makes inventory and companion management so much easier). Aside from that hiccup - which only triggers once every few hours, which is tolerable for me - and knocked out enemies occasionally falling through the ground (you need to drag them back to your base to recruit them as NPCs), the game has been rock-solid.
I'm somewhat tempted to buy the new Dune game by the same devs, but I've heard mixed things about the solo experience.
I second this as a sandbox builder game. Self hosted a server and played with my wife for a few months. I feel like I barely scratched the full content of the game. Base building and taming/companions really is a delight. Especially building a full fortress with all the "staff" for the crafting stations.
I just scooped up Killzone Shadow Fall and I'm enjoying it, even though the beginning part of the game was basically a half hour long movie disguised as a tutorial. I also got the Shadow of the Colossus remaster for PS4 so that's next.
For quick sessions, I've gone back and started half heartedly trying to 1CC Danmaku Unlimited 2 since the new trailer for 4 just came out.
Mam, I really should have got into the Killzone franchise when I was younger. Always grew up with playstations, but never bought any of those games, how's Shadow Fall been so far?
It's been generally fun but I am really bad at this kind of game so I end up lagging too far behind where the story wants me to be, so enemies teleport seemingly out of nowhere. I also can't seem to identify where the alarms are, which makes it even worse. That's a me problem, though.
If you like story driven FPS games with good art, it'll probably scratch the itch for you. It's not as much as an interactive movie as the games from the era of quicktime events but there is a little bit of linear play to it. Overall it's pretty standard fare. I read a review that was something like "It's not a great FPS game but it's a great Killzone game" and I think that tracks.
Cool, I should definitely go back and try to play that series, I've always been entranced by the jet black suits of armor and the glowing red goggles. It reminds me a lot of Jin-Roh. Such a cool aesthetic.
This week Blasphemous (the past week I played (and finished) Resident Evil 4 Remake)
Is it your first time playing Blasphemous? How are you liking it? I just finished it and have.... mixed feelings about it.
Yes. It’s my first time playing it. At the moment I like it. It recalls me the feelings of Salt and Sanctuary that I love it.
But it has some things that could be improved and the level of difficulty of some areas are too high. I would appreciate more checkpoints to solve this.
Also I have at the moment some confussion on how the things work. For example, I recently got my third “potion” and I have no idea how I did. I also guess that I can improve my character like if I level up it, but apparently you dont have levels or I dont know how to do it.
Also I had to search in google how to close the game in the PC version.
I never played S&S but it's on my wishlist. Would you say you prefer it over Blasphemous?
(...) the level of difficulty of some areas are too high. I would appreciate more checkpoints to solve this.
The terrible platforming and abundance of instant-death hazards was one of my major gripes with the game. Especially when the controls are very clunky, hitboxes are janky and grabbing a ladder is inexplicably difficult. I'm not a platformer guy though, but it felt very unfun to me. Also some of the enemy design and placement is just deliberate made to waste your time, which is another complaint I had about the game.
Also I have at the moment some confussion on how the things work. For example, I recently got my third “potion” and I have no idea how I did. I also guess that I can improve my character like if I level up it, but apparently you dont have levels or I dont know how to do it.
Yes, the game is extremely opaque and very hard to play without consulting a wiki. You get more flasks by finding or buying more Empty Bile Flasks, then taking them to one of the blood fountains you can find and paying some currency (Tears of Atonement) to fill it. The healing amount can be upgraded by sacrificing one flask and paying a Quicksilver item and some currency to a guy below Albero.
Upgrades are done at Mea Culpa Shrines, which you find throughout the world. Instead of levels, what upgrades are unlocked is tied to how many shrines you have found. You can't grind for levels, they only unlock by exploring.
Would you say you prefer it over Blasphemous?
Yes, S&S is like a Souls in a metroidvania way.
Yes, the game is extremely opaque and very hard to play without consulting a wiki.
Absolutely, that's what I feel about it.
Tetris Party for the Wii
Blast Off for the PSP
Both emulated on a Retroid Pocket 4 Pro. Just been getting into emulation properly over the past few months and I've been loving playing retro games.
Assassin‘s Creed Unity
I‘ve complained it the past about Shadow of War that I felt like I had to fight Talon to get him to go where I want him to. Now that I’m close to 100%ing ACU, I want to apologize to Talon cause ACU has the most sluggish, slow, and imprecise movement I‘ve ever wrestled with in these kinda games. Really made me realize how good I had it in Shadow of War lol. Every enemy just screaming at me on sight for no reason and tryna pick a fight with me when there‘s 50 people around me is also getting annoying. I think I love these games mainly for their sight-seeing and podcast side-activity capabilities now (collecathon). And revolutionary Paris is definitely a good sight-seeing location.
DiRT Rally 2.0
I‘m more of an arcade racer fan, but I‘m trying to challenge myself a bit with this one. I sometimes don‘t understand why I‘m spinning out, but I‘m hanging in there. The goal is another 100%, we‘ll see how far I can go! It‘s a pretty good rally simulation game, for anyone who doesn‘t know. It‘s also dirt cheap (hah).
Octopath Traveler
Hardly playing it atm but man, the theme song speaks to me, what a good piece. I‘m done with all chapter 1s, currently following a guide to pick up the missables before I go into the next chapters. There‘s something cozy about voiced pixel graphics JRPG storytelling to me. To anyone who‘s never heard of this game: Imagine old Final Fantasy titles, still pixel graphics, still turn-based, but with a few modern twists and the graphics pop out like a children picture book with modern effects. Full 60 at native res at max graphics on the Deck.
EVO The Search For Eden
Dome Keeper
Straftat
I remember I watched ChristopherOdd play Dome Keeper for months, that game is so satisfying and chill.
For sure, but can be also quite challenging. :)
Pikmin 2
I've mostly played on the Switch this past 2 weeks as my kids have taken over everything else...
Also a bit of Outrun, Circuit Superstars and Absolute Drift.
Finally completed the hitman 3 main story! Time to get to the story missions and achievements
Nice! What did you think? I’ve played the trilogy more times than I can count at this point. The side missions are probably my favourite from them though actually. In particular the Seven Deadly Sins and especially Patient Zero are the pinnacle of the series imo.
I really enjoy the soundtrack and how polished the game has become. My initiation to the series was Absolution and I think the game made big steps with each release since then. My favourite locations are still from Hitman 1, maybe because I played them the most, since I always started at 1 when I played 2 and now 3. Nothing beats the endless options and emerging stories of Sapienza for me
Sapienza is definitely my favourite level too, with Hokkaido at number two. Chongqing is also up there, along with Dubai. Miami would probably round out my top five. Honestly I like all the levels except maybe Colorado, and Mumbai was a bit annoying on a first playthrough but I’ve learned to like it a bit more now.
Very similar to my toplist I think. But that also means not many new favourites from Hitman 3, sadly. I was initially very confused by the Berlin level, but I think that is the one that I will try for some achievements first. So much stuff happening everywhere!
Berlin is really cool if you play it the way the devs probably intended. There’s lots of really great areas for accident kills, which I think is the “correct” way to do it since there aren’t any opportunities. Of course you can just shoot and drag them but I think every target has at least one or two accident kills available. The electricity one with the timing of the beat drop is one of the more fun ones.
Hahaha now I am going to look for that one first, that sounds awesome
Just started Dread Delusion and Monster Sanctuary. Both are real good so far!
OK, seeing the fighting game community is experiencing some kind of tag fighters resurregence right now, I decided to give them a fair shake.
I had not before because they seemed too much work. Like, picking and learning 1 character is so difficult that I felt exhausted just at the thought of picking and learning 3. I also always thought the team composition aspect of it adds a premeditated layer of strategy that I could do without.
All that said, I still felt I was missing out, so I picked up Dragon Ball FighterZ and Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 this week.
Now, I faintly remember watching parts of some DBZ episodes when I was younger, and just loathed it. I did have a weird and not necessarily good taste as a child though, so I'm not sure if I'd hate it as much now. That said, I still do not feel desire to check out the show, TBH. I feel it doesn't have a lot I'd be interested in after playing the game.
Before getting to the gameplay, and even though I bought it on a deep sale, I'd like to bring up that buying it was not a pleasant experience. Bandai successfully bamboozled me into buying the base game and the first season pass separately, which costs $2 more than the FighterZ Edition, which includes both. TBF, I could not have foreseen my desire to buy the season pass because I don't know much about the roster and couldn't have foretold I will like and want to designate Android 17 as the point in my team.
I'm willing to admit the fault is mine as much as it is Bandai's, but I still feel bitter about the $2 😅
Gameplay is surprisingly super fun, although I'm yet to figure out how to effectively do tag combos, chain supers, or any of the super fun shit I picked up the game to ultimately experience. Learning BnBs and getting familiar with the game mechanics has been fun so far. It helps a lot it's an Arc System Works game and I'm familiar with their combo systems and whatnot.
I still haven't fucked around enough with Marvel to talk about how I feel, but I can say I bought it on a deep discount too, did not run into any issue buying it because it's the Ultimate edition, so no DLC bullshit, and I'm excited to learn Viewtiful Joe and Amaterasu.
Even though it's revered, a reason to hesitate before buying UMVC3 was it still has delay netcode to this day, which more or less means it's unplayable online. I hope this changes at some point, but just the act of buying it now represents the first instance of my breaking the "no rollback = no buy" rule… I don't feel good about that, but the way I try and cope is justify it with: (1) it's a super deep discount—less than $5—and (2) it's Mahvel… way I understand it it's the quintessential tag fighter… avoiding it would feel like avoiding Kurosawa while exploring Japanese cinema.
Old ratchet & clank on RPCS3 are a freaking blast.
Love emulating games! I need to remake my library on my new PC.
Extra long post today, so I'm experimenting with spoiler tags to not take up too much space. Let me know if it's a good idea.
Blasphemous
I finished Blasphemous. I didn't go through the DLC as I apparently missed the chance for the True Ending by not doing it early anyway, so I couldn't be bothered as I wasn't really enjoying the game that much. Also I've heard it's even more annoying. I'll save it for a hypothetical second playthrough. I did beat the one optional DLC boss I had access to - Isidora - and the difference between the main game and the DLC is staggering. I first tried the last two bosses in the main game, but Isidora took me probably 50ish attempts. And I'm not sure it was "fun difficult" either, that second phase sure was something.
My notes remain the same: terrible platforming (and an overabundance of it) and design elements that are deliberately meant to waste your time and/or piss you off hold back what could otherwise have been a great game. I respect the artistic vision, I just didn't have a lot of fun playing it.
LIMBO
As a palate cleanser I played through LIMBO, which I bought solely because it is supposedly an indie darling and was being delisted on GOG. I didn't really like it. I don't enjoy platformers, and this is a mediocre puzzle platformer. Despite being assured otherwise on here I did not think the "vibes" were enough to carry it. In the end it's like a 6/10, and I'm glad I only paid a dollar for it. Maybe I'd think otherwise if this was 2010 and it was my first artsy indie game, but for contrast literally just the other week I played through GRIS. In my opinion that's an artsy puzzle platformer that's worth it on vibes alone. I hope INSIDE is better as I foolishly bought both.
After that I was in a mood for something different, and after realising how easy setting up Xemu was I went headfirst into Ninja Gaiden Black. I played Ninja Gaiden (2004) on the original Xbox as a kid back in the day, but I never finished it and always wanted to go back. With Ninja Gaiden 2 Black being released recently-ish and Ninja Gaiden 4 on the horizon this felt like the perfect time to play the definitive version of the best game in the series.
Now, I don't know whether I'll be able to finish it. I'm playing on "Normal" and not "Ninja Dog" (the easy mode). I'm 8 chapters in now and so far so good, but I'm well aware of the game's reputation as being prohibitively difficult. And I never did beat it back when I still had teenage reflexes.
That being said, I'm loving the ever-loving shit out of every moment so far. There is nothing like Ninja Gaiden combat out there, the relentless nature of every single encounter with extremely aggressive enemies constantly forcing you to push yourself to the limit and use every tool and trick at your disposal is satisfying like nothing else. It's extremely fast, but at the same time measured, deliberate and precise. You can't get away with button mashing, you have to consciously use actual combos and you have to use the right techniques and right weapons at the right times. The essence mechanic is also unique and offers constant mid-battle decisions.
The story is... it's there I guess. It's pretty terrible, truth be told. And the voice acting is hilariously bad early 2000s style. But let's face it, nobody plays NG for the story. At least the environments are cool and well designed, as are most of the monsters and characters (let's not talk about Rachel). The futuristic mashup with traditional Japanese ninjas and samurai is a very cool setting.
The graphics also need to be shouted out. Sure, I turned up the rendering resolution by 6x in Xemu, but still. Barring some low-res ground textures and the like the game looks phenomenal for a 2005 console release. What Team Ninja were able to extract out of the scuffed ass original Xbox hardware is just black magic. Character models still look great and the animations are fantastic.
Definitely recommend checking it out if you like character action games. NGB is considered by many to be the peak of that genre and it's easy to see why.
Hearts of Iron IV with the Millenium Dawn mod as a newbie.
I'm playing on recruit difficulty, cause the AI would have gotten a bunch of bonuses whereas I would have been left with 0 advantages. I'm playing as Hungary with the goal of going through the historical route till 2010, cause the hungarian focus tree seems to prefer that, and I'm in the process of puppeting Slovenia by inflience alone and attacking Slovakia way later.
We love irredentism. I'm not an actual irredentist nutjob, but grand strategy games bring out the most unhinged version of ourselves.
I might be a bit obsessed with Project Wingman at the moment.
Full thoughts
I finished the campaign, bought the DLC, finished it and started another playthrough using two-seater planes (WSO is an actual character and you don't get to enjoy her when flying solo). I absolutely love this game and I'm happily planting it on my list of favourites from now on.
It has action, drama, surprises and challenge - all tied together into a neat little package. The story actually goes a bit harder then expected and served as an interesting mirror to Ace Combat campaigns. It went in a very different direction than I thought it would.
Mission design is pretty simple - fly to the AO and kill everything. There's no time limits or special objectives for the most part. They do at least make up for it with varied map design and weather conditions. There's also a healthy mix of air, land and water targets (sometimes at the same time) to keep things interesting.
I wish they'd make more use of take-off and landing sequences as they show up like 2-3 times throughout the campaign and once in the DLC (this one even includes a full taxi sequence from the hangar!). It's a simple addition that most people would probably skip but I still love for a bit of additional immersion. Does anyone know if there's a non-sim flight combat game that utilises these sections in a more regular way?
Is it a perfect game? Considering the price and size of the development team I'd say it's pretty close to being as perfect as it can be given the circumstances. There are some issues like the missile spam and number of enemies at times but over all none of these are serious enough to dampen my excitement about this title.
Oh! Both final bosses, as in from the main and DLC campaigns, can be a bit much in terms of "spectacle". We go from relatively grounded challenges to enemies that belong in Gundam rather than contemporary military game. It's a bit of a whiplash compared to the rest of the playthrough.
It's a fantastic title that will become a mainstay on my hard drive for a long while. I really hope these guys make a sequel some day. Direct, spiritual - doesn't matter. I need more flight combat games from this studio.
Project wingman is rather incredible.
It really is. I could really use more surprises like this.
soul reaver remastered