Xbox Game Pass for Console, PC, and Android

After I finished Cacoon I went on to Planet of Lana and finished it over the weekend. It was also a fantastic adventure puzzler with a clever way to make use of a pet.

Next up, Jusant.

W00t! I got my Steam controller working with Game Pass games!

Turns out the updated-for-steam-deck configuration interface kinda sucks. I figured out the basics ok, but the sensitivity tuning options are eluding me.

So it's back to swapping between mouse and controller for Starfield I guess. But this is good to know for the future.

Oh sweet, I'll have to fire that up again. I played the hell out of RoboQuest a year or so ago. It's got some great old-school Doom qualities to its gameplay that you don't see a lot of in modern shooters. For one thing, the robots you play as are fast. And they've done a good job of bringing that speed into the 3rd dimension with double jumps and skateboard game-like rails to ride on. The other thing that reminds me of Doom is the enemy attacks are mostly projectiles that move slowly enough that they can be dodged. The way the damage and health math works out, you have to actively defend yourself by dodging enemy attacks if you want to get anywhere. That kind of active, movement-based defense was a cornerstone of Doom's gameplay, but it's largely absent from modern shooters.

The only one I'm guilty of buying full $60 is Mario Wonder but I knew that would be a long time before that went on sale and I wanted something on the Switch. Other then that Gamepass and PC sales have been fulfilling all my gaming needs.

Be sure to check out Rollerdrome. I played a bit of it on PS5, and it is fantastic.

I don't think this has been announced already, but Steamworld Build is coming to game pass on the 1st December. I've been looking forward to that releasing, now I don't need to buy it

Were those announced or a complete surprise drop?

Yeah, stealth drop is what I am seeing.

I finished the first game last week, so I can speak about that one, at least.

For most of the game, it's a slightly-more-difficult-than-average third person shooter. I didn't have a hard time with that part of it, as someone who only plays one or two shooters a year.

However, there are boss fights that can be big difficulty spikes. This is complicated by the fact that when you first encounter a boss, it's often randomly chosen from a couple options, and then it may have a few random effects on it that make it either harder or easier depending on your luck.

When I played the game solo, I had to get get coop help on a couple bosses, otherwise they would have been hard stops. In my finished playthrough, a buddy and I ran through it together, and while some bosses were difficult and took a few tries, we usually got through it. There was one boss in the back half of the game that we had to call in a third person to help, though. That was frustrating.

The weapons feel great, building out your character via gear and skill points is interesting, and the world has some interesting lore (though it picks its most drab settings for the start of the game). If you have some friends to go through in coop together, you can have a blast.

I've heard that Remnant 2 is basically better in every way, so you could also jump straight to that.

Against the Storm is supposed to be very good, excited to play that one.

Sad about the mid reviews coming out for Steam World Build I liked the look of it.

Thank you for the long detailed response beanman. I will download 2 and give it a shot. If I hit a wall I will just chalk it up to the genre and give up.

A bit random but I really wish MS would release a Portal like product that played Game Pass content. I have it installed in work around method on the Deck but I think a dedicated device would be smoother. Altough I would be happy with a dedicated app on the Deck.

That kind of goes along with this story - Microsoft Wants Game Pass On PlayStation, Nintendo, And "Every Screen" Possible

Native support for Game Pass on Steam Deck is my number one desire for Game Pass right now. I would try so much more stuff if it was available.

XCloud works for some non-twitchy stuff, but I can't even play something like Sea of Stars there because the delay makes the timed button hits too difficult.

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I mean there are all kinds of handheld devices out there that you can play gamepass games on already. I own a Logitech G Cloud that runs it well.

Windows runs quite well on Steam Deck too and then you can install many Game Pass games or just stream. Would be nice if Windows optimized the interface a bit more for a handheld tho.

It’s not true for Game Pass streaming on Deck tho. By design Edge streams game pass games as well as the official “native” apps do. All of them depend on the hardware being optimized for good streaming performance. The Deck has very good hardware for streaming (unlike most tablets or cheap laptops). If you follow the official guide for how to set Edge Beta up as a full screen Steam app on the Deck and apply custom controls settings then it even feels just like the “native” apps. TBH I’m surprised Microsoft hasn’t released a Steam app that is exactly this so it’s a one click install for anyone on Steam. Maybe Steam won’t allow an app to be a web wrapper around a web page that requires non-Steam auth to work? I don’t know. I can probably figure out who to ask tho.