Games

Finally finished Planescape: Torment.

Life feels a little emptier now. How do I possibly follow it up?

Crimson Desert added a bird feeder in an update a few weeks ago. You can now feed beans to birds. I have yet to confirm if the game has owls.

I finished Halo 2. Brutes kicking my ass still feels more fair than the Flood. One brute punched me so hard off the map it triggered a cutscene before killing me and resetting the checkpoint. I like the duel-wield mechanic as it lets you (with limits) carry more than the standard two weapons, but they just don't pack enough punch compared to the two-handed weapons. Energy swords on the other hand still are lethal with one swing. The Beam rifle is also still deadly if you can get the timing right, even the brutes go down in three well placed shots.

Also in the mother of all coincidences, I was kicking the tires of the StarFox 64 PC port Starship earlier this week before the Nintendo announcement. It is from the same crew that did the Ship of Harkinian Ocarina of Time PC port. Just out of the box it runs buttery smooth. It is probably one of the best showcases of the Nintendo 64 decompilations. Multiplayer is what drove me to explore in the first place, so I'm hoping to test it out with some buddies soon.

I thought I would start Halo 3, but all the Stellarisposting last week has me wanting to reinstall it. I haven't played it since COVID, so there's a ton of rework I'll need to figure out.

I have played no games this week

I'm the grass toucher they warned you about

Im playing Mixtape. So far it feels like a less fun Life is Strange.

Just recently started playing Esoteric Ebb and it is so much fun. So far it's Disco Elysium only in the sense of "the people who made it loved disco" but it's still political, it is thus far a lot more direct at calling out when you're being racist, and I'm having the giggles of death every time you get to ask who people will for in the election.

Fox looking kinda squanched if you ask me.

As much as I was complaining on earlier posts and still think Baldur's Gate 3 is better mechanically, I've gotten pretty far in Pathfinder: Kingmaker. My barony has now schools, a people's militia has been established on a strictly volunteer basis, the professional guard has been doubled especially along the borders to deter monster attacks, taxes have been lowered, and we now have 3 cities in the barony. We've also established friendly relations with the other new baron to the east and have repaired some roads that were left unkempt from the former bandit king.

I really like the "running your own society" gimmick and I don't think it gets done enough in a roleplaying fashion like this. I have a dormant game of Dragon Age: Inquisition that I start up every once in a while because I like having that same feeling there of building up my own rebel society that is making alliances with different people across the world. Throwing our weight around when it matters like "you know we have our own holy army, right? do you really want to do that?"

Too busy to play many games at the moment, but I have enjoyed pirating Tomodachi life. It is very, very silly. I made a photorealistic weevil and it fell in love with a goblin I made

Also on the topic of that Star Fox remake I can't stop giggling at this side profile

Planescape: Torment and also bought Arcanum because it was on sale for $3. Playing them on an old circa 2005 dell laptop running q4os

Finished Vagrant Story some time ago. A really incredible game, especially visually for the PS1. The writing was also really, really good for a 90s Square game. Not that the others are badly written (though some are poorly translated) but it had a remarkable lack of anime melodrama and silliness and I think it was targeting a slightly older demo than Square's typical output. The setting and characters were so interesting I was a bit sad the events were mostly confined to a ruined city with a very limited cast of characters. Would've loved running around towns and talking to people.

Started doing a new game plus run while I figure out what I wanna play next, at the same time I've also continued chipping away at Valkyria Chronicles 2 on my phone.

I've been playing modded Morrowind, Doing quests in Cyrodiil mostly. There's a modathon happening this month and they're dropping good stuff almost daily.

Total war Pharaoh still. I played Tausret for a bit just to try out a faction with good troops. They make a whole thing out of her being a woman, have loading screen blurbs about her relating to Habshepsut, recommend you pick the Hatshepsut tradition, and lets you dress her as Isis.
And it annoys me because she's "Beloved by Amun" and has no synergy with Hapsheshut, all her stuff synergises with Khufu and she starts next to the ruins of Akenhaten! She is just given the Isis relation because she's a woman! She's just recommended to go Hapshepsut because she's a lady! But she doesn't need trade routes because she literally gets the most resources! That's her whole thing!

Women get to be Amun too! Or at least Amunet!

Yesterday I played and completed The Dark Queen of Mortholme. Pretty cool, a bit yuribait tbh and getting the final ending way annoying

Today I've been doing Hidden Cats in Rome, I've got a soft spot for hidden object games, especially with animals!

I've been on a Baldur's Gate 3 binge lately. Experimented with crazy build ideas in the endgame, and among other things I made a monk that could traverse over 500m in one round (for reference, standard move speed is 9m/round)

Finally picked up slay the spire 2 and windrose this week.

Slay the spire is great when I'm sitting on my couch watching YouTube.

Windrose: I'm enjoying the base building, but the combat sucks. After the 300th time I was killed by a pig, I gave up and dropped enemy HP and damage to 20%. I do not understand how it would even be possible to get through the first mission on normal mode without dieing. Same with naval combat. There's no confidence building. Everything kills you, over and over. Stumble on a Dodo nest? 4 of them show up, hit you twice, and you die. Need to sail somewhere, 3 ships in your way destroy you. Need to rescue crew so you can actually sail in a pirate game, 4+ guards on each crew location, no sneak mechanic, and 2 hits before you die. I spent hours upgrading my gear, groups of pigs still killed me at least once every time I encountered them. Even once I set it to easy mode, if there are more than 4 enemies, I have to set up a respawn point before engaging, and leyroy Jenkins it. Yesterday, after 20ish hours of gameplay I finally made it to Tortuga, only to find out that there's no way to sell anything there. So it's currently a house building/decorating game with a pirate theme. I'm hoping now that I've slogged through the tutorial, the combat will get better, but considering most of the videos I've seen on it are building tutorials, I don't know if that will be the case.

Playing through the first Thief game. I started it years ago and stopped after some medical problems. I watched a video about it being an anti brainrot game and that made me decide to pick it up again.

Deadly Shadows was my first Thief game. People say it's not as good as the first two. I'm sure it's not but it was great for its time. I'm starting with the first game and then I'll do The Metal Age. I'm excited to see what all the hype is about with 2

Total Warhammer 3, continuing my Tamurkhan campaign. Lost Nuln to Clan Moulder because they showed up with 6 stacks which was more than my two shitty stacks could handle, and that kicked me out of the empire. Technically already won the campaign but I want to level up a Herald into a GUO to get an achievement but they kept dying to Moulder lol. Have now turned to the ruins of Grand Cathay and am at war with all the factions over there except Dechala who (thankfully) decided not to join the war I declared on Blessed Dread despite being allies. Honestly, Tamurkhan himself is so strong that I haven't learned how to build nurgle armies properly lmao.

Warframe, got Caliban, but Protea Chassis continues to be a myth despite two hours of farming for it. I really like that the new version of Belly of the Beast lets you get progress for just doing alerts because those missions are generally faster than Ascension. Bit weird that they give you more currency than Ascension but whatever, I'll take it. Already grabbed the archon shards and most of the cosmetics, and I have all the arcanes maxed so I probably won't grind them.

I'm still on Stellaris, this game is truly addicting. I have now 110 hours into the game and the empire I posted before on the previous Sunday thread was too fucked up by the war with the Awakened Empire I was forced to fight and my economy never recovered because I didn't have enough pops to generate resources. I ended up in third place (below 2 Awakened Empires and above 1 Fallen Empire) and the game ended while I was in the middle of a war with The Chosen. I could continue, but I wanted to start over with a different empire anyway. I can't wait for the Nomad DLC, cause I want to do a Space Pirate empire with it.

For now I'm doing a Worker Cooperative empire of cute gecko people that is sort of inspired by China.

Details if you're interested:

This is the empire, called Sociedade Cooperativa de Nexural, in english Cooperative Society of Nexural. Its Civics are Workers Coop + Free Traders, its Ethics are Igualitarian + Fanatic Xenophile and it's a Ring World empire.

The species is name Raxaris, plural is Raxari and adjective is Raxarianos, in english would be Raxarians. The empire adjective is Nexuralianos, in english would be Nexuralians. And their biography reads:

“The Nexuralians are a resilient people that freed themselves from the shackles of capitalism long ago. With the death of their liberator and first leader, Raox Du'Zeng, their society, through multiple erros and successes, now utilizes the so-called "Market Socialism" to conduct the empire into a new path, where exploration is not the rule, where everyone can be free.”

Their leader is a woman called Fati'Nuah. Her title is Receptáculo do Povo, in english Vessel of the People. Her biography reads:

“First leader of her people to reach the stars, she now seeks to develop the Nexuralian empire through the immortal science of the proletariat. The people already calling for what is now known as Fati'Nuah Thought, a series of political theories truly sovereign against the capitalist empires that threatens them.”

Objective:

“Past experiences showed our mistake in interfering with other nations, we won't make the same mistake against the other empires of the galaxy. The plan for the advanced socialism of 2400 is our main objective. Until then we will be pacific and impartial whenever we can. In 2400, our people being truly prosperous and with their quality of life elevated, we will finally turn internationalists again, and will export the revolution through liberation wars so that the people of the galaxy can choose their own path freed from the shackles of capitalism. Until then, commerce flows as always.”

Self-imposed restrictions:

• No conquest wars
• No forced subjugation
• No genocide/ethnic cleansing
• Neutrality in other empires wars (except defense of allies)
• Priority to diplomatic economy

Almost forgot: I have upped the difficulty too, previously I was on Captain, 800 stars, 2 Arm Spiral galaxy, everything else default. Now I'm on Commodore, 800 stars, 4 Arm Spiral galaxy, 1.5x Crisis, 2275 Mid-Game and AI Scalling set to Mid-Game.

Here's what the empire is looking like right now:

So far in this run I have tried to expand quickly but I'll kind of have to build tall instead of wide, and have managed to expand quite a bit, but there is a bunch of empires really close, so unfortunately I couldn't expand as much as I wanted. I have already started having good relations with two of the four empires I'm bordering and have already set up two branch offices, one in each. I have also found out another MegaCorp empire, but they are capitalists so I worsened our relations to declare rivalry against them and got a bit more Influence that was crucial to expand.

Outside Stellaris I have started playing Pokérogue again, I forgot how good this game is, and I have been wanting to play Warhammer 40K: Mechanicus (obligatory Children of the Omnissiah), I tried to play it twice before, but both times something else happened and I had to stop playing so I hope this time I actually get to play more than a couple hours of it because I remember liking the game.

Trying Darkest Dungeon again

2 big fights left in my BG3 honor mode run before going to the final part (me shadow sorcerer/shadowheart tempest cleric/laezel battle master/karlach giant barbarian), we ate all the tadpoles with shadowheart, being able to fire first (especially with sorcerer’s distant spell) at bosses from far away to lure them out and set up traps for them has made most fights easy so far, using globe and wet condition + chain lightning and call lightning is my usual go to for groups, I always try to prone and disarm bosses, elixir of vigilance is nice for the casters to go first and set the stage, angelic reprieve potion to give yourself more sorcery points and sleep it off to reset the level 1/2 spells, also the djinn summon is an always useful utility guy to whirlwind restrain enemies or be a tank target/bait or just thunderwave enemies off ledges

after this BG3 honor mode run I’ll want to check out Esoteric Ebb and try BG1 on and off until it clicks, seems that combat takes some getting used to, read the ‘avenger druid’ class is fun so will go with that

I played Save the World to find out what Apple means by

The app includes content that target people from a specific race, culture, government, corporation, or other real entity as the enemies in the context of the game. Specifically, the app concept is killing wealthy individuals on Earth.

I'm replaying through RDR 2. After I finish that I'll replay RDR :)

Cities Skylines 2 is good now. Idk when they finally fixed it but it now works great and is super fun.

Most of my city is pedestrian only with a lot of trams and bicycle infrastructure. I just made a university area that’s only accessible by train and a few huge parking garages right of the interstate with no further access for cars.

the ultimate rpg stardew valley modpack! it's fun, adds a lot of mechanics, a new farm and new crops and all the cool expansion packs (sword&sorc/east scarp, ridgeside village, SVE etc). did have to add a few mods i can't play without but beyond that i've been having a blast just dicking around

I'm playing nevermess to everness. It's so cheesy and dumb but honestly just what I need right now

I started playing the Duke Nukem franchise, starting with "Duke Nukum", aka the first installment. It is a nice DOS platformer, but I definitely suggest looking at the level maps to avoid getting lost. I also use ReDuke 4 source port, btw.

I like the new Star Fox designs tbh but I'm also not really a fan of the series, I've only played the SNES one. It is making me want to finally go play some of the others at least. I don't care for Slippy though, his eyes look wrong and it freaks me out. Too human-like I think.

Anyways as for what I've been up to, I'm playing Sonic Mania. I did a first playthrough already and now I'm doing a second one to get the real ending. I've already got all the Chaos Emeralds so now it's just getting through the levels again. It's a pretty great game! I like the remixed versions of old levels, the new zones are cool, and the bosses are all pretty creative and mostly fun. I think the game is a little too easy but I've also been playing a lot of 16-bit Sonic lately so maybe I'm just getting better at these games.

I did end up starting Drakengard as well. I've played about 5 hours so far and to be honest it isn't fun lol. It's not terrible I suppose but I can't say I'm enjoying it very much. I'm gonna stick with it though to see if the story goes anywhere.

I'm playing little bits of Fallout New Vegas

Strive 2.0 isnt hitting so ive started playing marvel

Been playing Neverness. Didn't know about the AI stuff before starting. Very unfortunate. The game has some pretty cool stuff in it.

Also trying to give Wuthering Waves another go since people were saying the combat was better, but I'm not sure about it. Hasn't hooked me in any real way yet.

As for Switch 2 stuff, I already couldn't afford to buy one, and now the price is going up. So I'll probably never play that new Star Fox unless my financial situation ever gets better which I'm not very confident in.