Finished Any Games Lately?

I really, really hope Asobo does a second Plague Tale. My memory is that that's the plan, but of course there's an infinite number of factors that can derail plans in the game industry. In addition to enjoying the gameplay and the characters in Innocence, it was a real showpiece, especially from a small studio. I'd love to see what they could do on the next gen consoles, with some ray tracing making their gorgeous environments even more so (and their darkened, torch-lit abbatoirs even more terrifying).

Star Wars Fallen Order finished, quite enjoyed it although I played with the difficulty low as I didn't find the moves easy to adopt. Enjoyed the story, the unexpected visitor at the end was a great touch and I thought it was a good length for what is essentially a shooter.
The RPG elements didn't really allow you to role play but it's Star Wars so not sure that is really an issue.

I finished Disco Elysium. What a game! Fantastic writing and world building, a great mix of wackiness while still being quite touching, with so many brilliant ideas in it.

It's going to be pretty high up in the rankings for favourite game this year, possibly even the top spot.

halfwaywrong wrote:

I finished Disco Elysium. What a game! Fantastic writing and world building, a great mix of wackiness while still being quite touching, with so many brilliant ideas in it.

It's going to be pretty high up in the rankings for favourite game this year, possibly even the top spot.

I can't wait for this to be released on PS4. Hearing so many people rave about it is making me anxious to play.

I just finished There Is No Game: Wrong Dimension. It's a pretty funny non-game that is hard to explain, but if you enjoy quirky genre-breaking stuff like Pony Island or The Hex, take a look at it. There are two or three frustrating puzzles (at least for me) but most of it is quite clever. If you're on the fence, the game was based on a jam game the devs did a while ago and you can play that one for free.

Homefront.

Where did this come from? An old humble bundle I suppose.

Run, shoot the men, run some more. It’s Ok, they’re from Korea, not like real people from America. Then there’s some bombs and targeting and some more men to blow up. Oh the horrors of war, we have to hide in a mass grave etc.

Why do I keep doing this? At least it was only 5 hours long.

Redherring wrote:

Why do I keep doing this? At least it was only 5 hours long.

Sounds familiar. Now you should buy the sequel so you can glower at it on your Steam list. That's how I take it to the next level of "Why do I keep doing this?"

gewy wrote:
Redherring wrote:

Why do I keep doing this? At least it was only 5 hours long.

Sounds familiar. Now you should buy the sequel so you can glower at it on your Steam list. That's how I take it to the next level of "Why do I keep doing this?"

They made another one?

*consults google*

Oh, they rebooted into an open world game. Fantastic. No thanks, I’ll just move on to whatever’s next in the pile, let’s see...

Spec Ops: The Line. Oh great

Doublefine's Headlander. What a fun twist on Metroid. Loved it.

brokenclavicle wrote:

Doublefine's Headlander. What a fun twist on Metroid. Loved it.

That game is so good.

As far as Metroid games go it's not difficult with the exception of a few areas. But so much fun and loved the 70s sci-fi zany theme.

I've thought about re-playing it again now and again but want it firmly out my mind before doing so again.

Finished Borderlands 3.

Really loved this one. Think I liked it more than the second game which I also really enjoyed. Played through all the DLC in order of release and really liked each of them. The Hammerlock Wedding one was my favorite by far. Loved the look of the planet, theme, and the quests (side-quests included). Plus it was huge. There were so many new zones. And It kept going on far longer than I thought. Even had some nice post content.

But I played the dlc pretty much one after another once I thought the game was nearing its end. By the time I was done with the dlc I was 60hrs in to the game and over-powered for the main quest. And even being over powered it still took me 18 more hours to complete. Wow!

Still had fun but kinda diminished as nothing was a challenge at that point. If I had to do it over again I probably would have done the Moxie dlc then saved the other dlc till after the game was over.

Tried out some of the post game content and no interest in the mayhem mode. And can't see playing as a different character anytime soon. So going to put the game to bed and move on.

Just got a Switch with Zelda Breath of the Wild. The plan was to focus completely on that. But while I was trying to finish up Borderlands my wife started playing Zelda and has become obsessed with it. We had a stay-cation this week and any free time away from doing things she's been playing Zelda.

So likely not playing Zelda until she finishes. May go back to Doom Eternal, or Control, or man that Dying Light - Hellraid dlc looks intriguing. Decisions. Decisions.

I just finished Wasteland 2. Gameplay was OK. Plot and characters were pretty forgettable outside of the nostalgia factor from playing the first way back in... damn I'm getting old. So overall, it's not great, not terrible. I guess I'd rate it 3.6 roentgen. That rating would have been more clever if it were Fallout game, but alas.

gewy wrote:

I just finished Wasteland 2. Gameplay was OK. Plot and characters were pretty forgettable outside of the nostalgia factor from playing the first way back in... damn I'm getting old. So overall, it's not great, not terrible. I guess I'd rate it 3.6 roentgen. That rating would have been more clever if it were Fallout game, but alas.

Did you forget to use the good dosimeter?

I beat the Battletech campaign a few days back for the strategy game club. And even with no background with the franchise, it was really good! The tactical maps were varied and interesting, and there’s a lot of good crunchiness to the build out of the mechs; not just the type of mech you want to take along, but the load outs they can support, how much ammo you want to carry into battle, and even how much armor you want to put on them. This opened up options from the heavily armored Dragon that didn’t have much in the way of weapons, but could absorb hits and punch a fool out, all the way to dedicated missile boats like the Trebuchet where a lot of armor might be stripped off to make room for more missile ammo or heat sinks, since they should be kept far from the front line. The strategic layer of managing money and time between jobs was also fairly engaging, although the huge cash infusions from the story missions took the edge off the difficulty there. The other noteworthy thing is that many fights are battles of attrition, which means you are seldom at risk of randomly losing someone (unlike in the recent XCOM games). This made the battles comparatively easier on the nerves as well.

I think XCOM 2 is a better game than Battletech, but I also think I enjoyed playing Battletech more. And I plan to hop back in with the Career mode as well at some point this year, since the game really is a lot of fun.

Finished Rebel Galaxy after starting and stopping a couple times. I really enjoyed the space trucking part of it. I look forward to a part 2 and what they can add to the game.

Xardion (SNES)

Xardion is an action-platformer with light RPG and metroidvania elements. You control 1 of 3 mechs with their own unique abilities and you can swap between them on the fly. Unfortunately only one of your mechs has the ability to shoot up and there's a ton of flying enemies in the first stage, so the game restricts your choice at the very beginning of the game. Your mechs also level up individually, so by the time you reach a stage where you want to try out the other mechs they're so badly under-leveled that it's not worth the effort to grind them up. The game having three characters is a total lie. You have one. That's it.

In the last stage of the game, you find the ancient, super-powered mech of legend, Xardion, who joins you in your mission to save the galaxy. And it's a total dud! Xardion plays exactly like your basic mech that you start the game with. Even it's weapon is identical down to the graphics. It does a little more damage, but that's it. What a let down.

At this point the Metroidvania part kicks in and you have to revisit earlier levels to assemble Xardion's ultimate weapon. And this takes a grand total of 5 minutes. One piece of the ultimate weapon is literally sitting at the entrance of one of the stages. You then go on to fight the final boss which consists of you standing in front of him, not moving, and mashing your special attack button for a couple of minutes. This special attack also causes the screen to violently flash between black and white. I'm not overly sensitive to flashing lights and I had to look away during the fight. You know how when you were a kid and adults said that playing video games would damage your eyes? Oh, they weren't wrong. They were talking about Xardion.

Overall, I enjoyed this game. It certainly wasn't good, but I had fun. Xardion is a very short game and I beat it in about 3 hours, so that worked in it's favour. Any longer and I would have gotten frustrated with the game.

Djinn wrote:

Xardion (SNES)

Xardion is an action-platformer with light RPG and metroidvania elements. You control 1 of 3 mechs with their own unique abilities and you can swap between them on the fly. Unfortunately only one of your mechs has the ability to shoot up and there's a ton of flying enemies in the first stage, so the game restricts your choice at the very beginning of the game. Your mechs also level up individually, so by the time you reach a stage where you want to try out the other mechs they're so badly under-leveled that it's not worth the effort to grind them up. The game having three characters is a total lie. You have one. That's it.

In the last stage of the game, you find the ancient, super-powered mech of legend, Xardion, who joins you in your mission to save the galaxy. And it's a total dud! Xardion plays exactly like your basic mech that you start the game with. Even it's weapon is identical down to the graphics. It does a little more damage, but that's it. What a let down.

At this point the Metroidvania part kicks in and you have to revisit earlier levels to assemble Xardion's ultimate weapon. And this takes a grand total of 5 minutes. One piece of the ultimate weapon is literally sitting at the entrance of one of the stages. You then go on to fight the final boss which consists of you standing in front of him, not moving, and mashing your special attack button for a couple of minutes. This special attack also causes the screen to violently flash between black and white. I'm not overly sensitive to flashing lights and I had to look away during the fight. You know how when you were a kid and adults said that playing video games would damage your eyes? Oh, they weren't wrong. They were talking about Xardion.

Overall, I enjoyed this game. It certainly wasn't good, but I had fun. Xardion is a very short game and I beat it in about 3 hours, so that worked in it's favour. Any longer and I would have gotten frustrated with the game.

I remember seeing this game in the video store but I don't think I ever rented it. Needed to rent FF3 for the third week in a row and hope nobody had erased my save

I finished the campaign in Super Arcade Racing. There have been a bunch of retro style indie arcade racing games that came out or are in development recently and I haven't found a ton that are particularly good but this one was a lot of fun. The racing feels a lot like the classic Micro Machines games. The story is tacky and over the top but obviously in a tongue-in-cheek kind of way. I beat the campaign in about 2.5hs but it's only $5. I could go back to get 3 stars in all the races. If there's people playing multiplayer, it could be fun too.

I also gave up on Carrion. I was trying to force myself to finish the game because many people raved about it and it was a short campaign but I started it after a couple of days of not playing and couldn't find my way around the nuclear power plant and I got so frustrated I decided to give up on it. The navigation really needs improvement. If they did not want to include a map, at least they could improve on the echolocation ability so that it is more helpful in finding where to go. Aside from that, while the first 20-30 min were exhilarating, the game did not have much to offer after that. The combat/stealth is really bland and the level design makes it really obvious how to sneak upon each enemy. The same goes for the puzzles, they are really obvious. Each time you get to a pool of water, you know you have to release some biomass, and use the other ability, and so on. The story was also uninteresting. We've seen the biochemical experiment gone wrong or used for evil a million times. Just meh.

Pink Stripes wrote:

I also gave up on Carrion. I was trying to force myself to finish the game because many people raved about it and it was a short campaign but I started it after a couple of days of not playing and couldn't find my way around the nuclear power plant and I got so frustrated I decided to give up on it. The navigation really needs improvement. If they did not want to include a map, at least they could improve on the echolocation ability so that it is more helpful in finding where to go. Aside from that, while the first 20-30 min were exhilarating, the game did not have much to offer after that. The combat/stealth is really bland and the level design makes it really obvious how to sneak upon each enemy. The same goes for the puzzles, they are really obvious. Each time you get to a pool of water, you know you have to release some biomass, and use the other ability, and so on. The story was also uninteresting. We've seen the biochemical experiment gone wrong or used for evil a million times. Just meh.

Carrion really needed a map. It's level layouts were very confusing at times. I did a 100% run and just getting back to some of the early areas to get stuff I missed was very hard. I kept going around in circles until I looked up a map on the internet. I do think it was fun when you got bigger and unlocked some of the more powerful abilities to totally wreck enemies that gave you trouble earlier on. I would love to see a sequel or DLC set in some other environments. I think an urban setting and a space station could both be really cool.

Rykin wrote:

I remember seeing this game in the video store but I don't think I ever rented it. Needed to rent FF3 for the third week in a row and hope nobody had erased my save ;)

I did rent Xardion from the video store as a kid and I loved it. That's why I decided to replay it now. I remember feeling extremely excited when I unlocked the titular robot and took on the final boss with its awesome power. And, as an adult, it's honestly still pretty exciting, but the mediocre gameplay does mute the excitement a bit for me now as a jaded adult. I do still think the game is worth playing though.

Whelp, keeping up with the nostalgia tour, after nearly 20 years, I finished a replay of Halo: CE. Granted it was the anniversary edition but still Halo is Halo.

I had a lot of fun with this title, and I found it fascinating revisiting the original landmark title in the series after a couple of decades of experience. Even with the graphical facelift, there's only so much you can do with the looks. The enemies and weapons are limited over time and I found myself missing the variety that appeared later on. Then there's the mechanics you can't do in Halo but appear in later editions, like sprint or doubling up on plasma rifles.

Once I got past what Halo wasn't, I remembered what Halo still was. A groundbreaking title that took what existed before and added some truly novel mechanics. I remember an old PC Gamer Preview (when Halo was still a PC title. Also I'm old) that was raving about the fact that you could exit the environment, enter an internal structure, jump into a vehicle seamlessly, and your NPC allies could hop on as well. The word that was used repeatedly was "seamless", and looking back, yes it almost was. Under today's lens, however, you can see where the wrinkles and seams are but you can't discount how revolutionary the game became.

The enjoyment of Halo originates partially from being the first title in the series. The story is simple but shows promise and isn't weighed down by 20 years of additional lore getting crammed into the universe. Master Chief and Cortana are just a plucky young duo. They are both a true tabula rasa that is lost in later editions in place of character development. The sound effects are familiar but revolutionary in the 2001 lens, and the music is still iconic and absolutely beautiful to this day.

Overall, Halo is still a great game, which is high praise for a nearly 20 year old FPS that has been improved upon by countless titles over time. It makes me look forward to diving back into Halo 2 in a few weeks.

But for now, I'm going to revisit Star Wars: The Old Republic, drive around Italy in Euro Truck Simulator 2, conquer the Italian peninsula in Rome: Total War 2, and maybe becoming el jefe in Tropico 5. In short, time to play some titles a la carte before feasting on the big titles coming in the near future.

Another old Playstation Plus freebie done: Rise of the Tomb Raider. Now do I buy the 3rd one in the trilogy or just wait for it to hit PS Plus like the rest of 'em?

Trachalio wrote:

Another old Playstation Plus freebie done: Rise of the Tomb Raider. Now do I buy the 3rd one in the trilogy or just wait for it to hit PS Plus like the rest of 'em?

If you just finished the second, you may want a break from that world (or I would anyway, I don't like getting burnt out on games that I would otherwise love). And we are two years out from when Shadow of the Tomb Raider was released, you may be able to wait and be in good shape.

My son and I have finally started playing the latest Battlefield games. We both adore Battlefield 1, because it's *gorgeous* and who thought they could make a good shooter out of the horrendous fighting in WW1? What I appreciate, as a military history nerd, is how realistic the environments are, even if some of the weapons and uniforms are slightly steampunked and over-calibrated.

But I will never understand shooters--especially realistic ones--that allow you to spawn so close to enemies. Especially the nth-iteration battlefield series.

Trachalio wrote:

Another old Playstation Plus freebie done: Rise of the Tomb Raider. Now do I buy the 3rd one in the trilogy or just wait for it to hit PS Plus like the rest of 'em?

If you played the previous two, did you think they got better, or worse? I thought Rise was worse than the reboot (yes, there's more to do, but there's too much to do, and it's all just uninteresting padding, and the story itself was markedly dumber than the first one, which was mostly just serviceable), and Shadow merely continued that trajectory.

Evan E wrote:
Trachalio wrote:

Another old Playstation Plus freebie done: Rise of the Tomb Raider. Now do I buy the 3rd one in the trilogy or just wait for it to hit PS Plus like the rest of 'em?

If you played the previous two, did you think they got better, or worse? I thought Rise was worse than the reboot (yes, there's more to do, but there's too much to do, and it's all just uninteresting padding, and the story itself was markedly dumber than the first one, which was mostly just serviceable), and Shadow merely continued that trajectory.

I did think the story in the second one was a little bit worse than the first and there was some gameplay continuity between the two that bothered me. When I finally unlocked the skill to climb walls faster or use my climbing axe with a rope as grappling hook I couldn't help but think I'd already "learned" to do that in the first game... so did Laura forget that skill between the two games?

Trachalio wrote:
Evan E wrote:
Trachalio wrote:

Another old Playstation Plus freebie done: Rise of the Tomb Raider. Now do I buy the 3rd one in the trilogy or just wait for it to hit PS Plus like the rest of 'em?

If you played the previous two, did you think they got better, or worse? I thought Rise was worse than the reboot (yes, there's more to do, but there's too much to do, and it's all just uninteresting padding, and the story itself was markedly dumber than the first one, which was mostly just serviceable), and Shadow merely continued that trajectory.

I did think the story in the second one was a little bit worse than the first and there was some gameplay continuity between the two that bothered me. When I finally unlocked the skill to climb walls faster or use my climbing axe with a rope as grappling hook I couldn't help but think I'd already "learned" to do that in the first game... so did Laura forget that skill between the two games? :P

Ahh the age old fall into Hades in a God of War game trick. Sorry Kratos no cool skills for you.

Shadow of the Tomb Raider. First game I have completed in quite some time. Really enjoyed it. Prompted me to start Horizon: Zero Dawn on the PC, which is becoming more obligation than exploration. I think SotTR impacted my enjoyment, as I just like all the climbing and exploration elements. TR's implementation is so much more to my liking in TR. H:ZD really seems to spoon feed that part of it.

Two games I have finished in the last couple of weeks:

The Banner Saga, which marries a solid turn based tactical battle system with a beautifully meloncholic story of hope and tragedy on a dying world. The writing is superb and I can't believe it's taken me so long to get around to playing it. 9 hours of perfect balanced gaming that left me so glad I'd played it. Loved every second.

The other is Doom (2016) which i can't actually call "Doom" but have to say "DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM" when ever I talk about it. It's terrifically entertaining with very fluid combat that's easy to learn, hard to truly master backed up by a surprisingly robust story that's more than enough to keep you going through the campaign. I knew people liked it but I wasn't expecting to enjoy it as much as I did.

However it's also very visceral and I had one unfortunate moment - I was busy chainsawing a demon in half when mini-sorb (8 years old) walked in. They were very much in the "Oh wow, that's cool!" camp which had me explaining to them that maybe the game was a little out of their age range, leading to a small tantrum. The joys of parenting.

Just beat Ghost of Tsushima, which is a beautiful game to look at, but is aggressively paint-by-numbers in the open-world tropes department. I quickly grew bored of it since no matter how interesting the Tales were, it was all "ok, time to stab some dudes in a new village!"