Finished Any Games Lately?

Has anyone played Book of Travels? It looks really new and interesting, but I'd love to hear something from people who have played.

I finished Steam World Dig 2. Fun game! If you enjoyed the 1st you'll enjoy this one.

I never played the first but loved the 2nd anyway

Stele wrote:

I never played the first but loved the 2nd anyway

Same.

I finished Torment: Tides of Numenera. The bizarre setting was the standout feature. Writing was good. Companions and gameplay were adequate.

Finished Night in the Woods a couple weeks ago and Vanishing of Ethan Carter (well, kind of - grumble) last night.

Finished The Medium. What a dark game! It was amazing. The best thing is that it has an iCue profile with it so it interacted with all of my case fans. Turning green when I was in a forest setting, or half blue/half orange when I was in both worlds at once, really enhanced the experience.

I beat the first Halo game!

Now I'm onto Halo 2: Anniversary, which feels and looks much, much better. The new cutscenes are amazing, the guns and vehicles have more weight to them, and just overall a fantastic game.

I don't even like Halo that much (which I know sounds weird since I'm playing through all of the MCC), but this truly is a fun FPS.

Got two finished games from the Christmas break:

I played through and finished Guardians of the Galaxy during the break. It's fantastic and sports probably the best dialogue in any game I've played. Tons and tons of side interactions with the group (quips, comments, notes about the environment and my behavior) and everyone has something interesting to say. Every guardian gets their moment and they are all worth seeing. It does get a little gamey in sections (I really don't need to slide down any more slopes) but I really enjoyed this one. It was kind of perfect game to play after watching the latest Spiderman movie.

I also finished Art of Rally, which is a top down, almost toy-like rally racer with surprisingly realistic physics. The game is a bit of love note to the sport itself, replacing licensing with great little stories about the series themselves and the cars that take part. I quite liked Art of Rally, even putting off getting heavily into Forza Horizon 5 until I had finished it. There's definitely a skill curve you fall off of when you put it down for a bit. I'm glad I saw it through even though I might have been a bit tired of the concept by the time I finished the last race. Good stuff all around.

Finished The Dungeons of Naheulbeuk this evening, about 35 hours all told of isometric, cartoon tactical RPG. It was quite funny in parts but the dialogue started getting in the way a bit. I liked the gameplay and the battle formats, but similar to games with bosses this had a couple of battles at the end which had brand new things going on which was frustrating.
Overall, worth it given the Epic sale on at the moment.

I just finished Greak: Memories of Azur, which I started just after posting my GOTY list a couple of weeks ago. As I said somewhere else, it's sort of a cross between The Lost Vikings and Hollow Knight in that you control three characters with different abilities that are hand-drawn and traditionally animated and look beautiful. While there is some going back to places you've been to explore them some more if you want to, I would hesitate to call this game a Metroidvania, like I've seen some outlets label it. I would say it is more of a puzzle platformer, and while the different skills of the three siblings will allow you to access places that the other two can't, there really isn't any new gear or abilities gained or found throughout the game that will give you access to previously inaccessible parts of the map, if that makes sense. So it's not a Metroidvania.

As I said, the game is beautiful (I'm a sucker for games that look like 2D cartoons), and at 6 hours (or so says HowLongToBeat --it took me over 10) it's a game you can enjoy for a few days and finish quickly. The puzzles are not difficult (they're mostly traversal and they all revolve around using the siblings' skills in one combination or another to open gates or move platforms), and the boss fights are not too demanding (it only took me a few attempts each, and believe me when I tell you I am terrible at boss fights), so it's a nice, chill little game.

The only negative aspect is the grappling hook, which is one of the special abilities of one of the siblings. It is so poorly implemented that it made me furious every time I had to use it. And of course you almost always have to use it to avoid falling in the water. And of course this particular character can't swim and falling into the water means instant death for him. And of course I wanted to throw my controller at the TV screen and curse in at least two languages. Other than that, super nice, chill little game.

Just finished Deathloop and it wasn't what I expected based on the trailers. I enjoyed it very much once I stopped trying to play it as a stealth game and just started capping people...quietly. Running through multiple loops and gathering info or setting off different chains of events was fun too. Even the surprise Julianna drop-ins stopped being so scary once my arsenal became insanely strong.

I recently finished Pony Island and then Inscryption.

I think I finally learned my lesson around expectations for these games.

The Frog Fractions comparison really framed the experiences for me poorly and when I tried to accept the games on their own terms, I had a lot more fun.

Spoiler:

Frog Fractions is comedy experience that happens to be a video game. The game parts serve the comedy.

Pony Island and Inscryption are games about game design with a comedic tone. P03 in Inscryption tells the player about the game-about-making-games concept towards the end.

They both use comedy, are games that build on the player's general experiences, and try to surprise the player.

But, the surprises in Pony Island and Inscryption come from interesting variations on a core game mechanic, whereas the ones in Frog Fractions are silly non-sequitur jokes.

I was expecting to find dramatically different experiences throughout Pony Island and Inscryption and be able to enjoy the experience even if I didn't enjoy the game mechanics. I don't think that's really possible, particularly with Inscryption, because it is much longer than Pony Island. Frog Fractions never really makes the gameplay challenging so you can keep having a good time and see more of the jokes.

I was really not having a good time for the first part of Inscryption which took me 10 or so hours. I was trying to move forward to see what was next and the game wasn't making that easy. I looked up some descriptions of what was going to happen and went back with realistic expectations and just messed with the mechanics on their own terms.

It was a lot more enjoyable at that point.

I probably would never have played either if not for the Frog Fractions comparison, but that seems to have made me enjoy them much less.

If it makes you feel any better, I didn't know about Pony Island being compared to Frog Fractions, and I still didn't think it was all that great when I played through two weeks ago. In fact, I went in with almost no expectations at all other than it being short.

First game finished of 2022: The Gunk. It feels like a good Game Pass game: some fun mechanics with a nice presentation that doesn't overstay its welcome.

I have finished Sagebrush in one run. If you're looking for an interesting narrative game like Gone Home this might be something for you. (Trigger warning: the game is about a (fictional) religious suicide cult.)
It's on sale now for $1.79 on the PS-Store.
Btw, it's part of the "Bundle for Racial Justice and Equality" from itch.io - so ... you might actually already own it.

Finished Shu on Switch over a couple of sessions. Not a fan, but it was short. The controls just weren't precise enough for the level of platforming they wanted.

I actually managed to play and finish an offline game (I pretty much only played FO76 & BDO for the past year). Terminator: Resistence gets the honor of being the first game I've beaten in a long while.

A lot of the reviews for it aren't great (except the Steam User reviews), and I can largely agree with the complaints. The AI is really bad, the stealth system is overpowered, and the level design is very ten years ago. The AI was the most disappointing thing. Turns out that absolutely not stopping, ever, until you are dead! is NOT what terminators do. They stop looking for you if you can hide for more than 10 seconds, even if you shot them. I was playing on normal, though, so it might be a case where playing it on the hardest difficulty would make it appropriately challanging, but it still wouldn't feel right that the terminators don't register it when you are spotted by, or even when you kill, other machines on the map. I didn't really mind though, because it let me run around in the future war and they really nailed the aesthetic of it. So as a challanging game, it failed, but as a Terminator theme park, it excelled. They had a lot of nice easter eggs too.

Another completer of Deathloop over Xmas.

I've commented extensively on the relevant thread, so won't rehearse my views here.

Suffice to say that it will be interesting to see where Arkane go from here.

Marchantia wrote:

I have finished Sagebrush in one run. If you're looking for an interesting narrative game like Gone Home this might be something for you. (Trigger warning: the game is about a (fictional) religious suicide cult.)
It's on sale now for $1.79 on the PS-Store.
Btw, it's part of the "Bundle for Racial Justice and Equality" from itch.io - so ... you might actually already own it.

This was one of the big highlights of that bundle for me. Especially the ending - it really paid off in a way that I wasn't expecting. A great experience for anyone interested in narrative adventure/walking sim/whatever you call a thing where a game cares about narrative above all else.

Finished Omno on Gamepass. It's a nice laid back exploration platformer. Definitely takes some inspiration from Journey. The game consists of exploring different areas unlocking gates and collecting animals by solving relatively simple platforming puzzles. Nothing to write home about but it was a pleasant and chill 3-4 hs.

Completed Super Mario Odyssey but passed on tracking down Peach. She wants to be free let her be free.

Finished Astro's Playroom! It's a tech demo and, basically, a Playstation ad -- but also a ton of fun. Anyone who has or gets a PS5 should check this out!

LastSurprise wrote:

Finished Astro's Playroom! It's a tech demo and, basically, a Playstation ad -- but also a ton of fun. Anyone who has or gets a PS5 should check this out!

I would go further and say it's a surprisingly cute platformer. Who expected a great pack-in game with this console generation? If a sequel came out tomorrow for full price, I would likely pick it up.

Me too. I would play a whole game based around that marble suit!

kuddles wrote:

...Who expected a great pack-in game with this console generation?

Everyone who played Astro Bot Rescue Mission, the previous game, on PSVR, that's who! It's a fantastically inventive and charming platformer that's constantly demonstrating what VR can bring to the gaming table, and I was incredibly excited when I heard Team Asobi was doing a pack-in game for PS5. Nothing's been announced, but I very much hope they're currently working on a launch game for PSVR2.

Not finished exactly, but i have completed a game of Gladius: Relics of War over the weekend.

It a classic 4x game with a hex grid set in the Warhammer 40K universe. However, despite having all 4 Xs present and correct, it pretty much eschews Exploration, Exploit, and Expand in overwhelming favour of Exterminate, which for 40K is pretty much standard to be honest.

The races are all very asymmetric and play differently, with you needing to figure out which units are more effective in a given situation, then building the infrastructure to support your rolling Army as you set forth to conquer. It gets around the issues these games have with diplomacy systems by not having one - you're there to kill or be killed (although you can set an "ally" state in the menu before you start a game. Which makes you a craven coward and worthy of the Emperor's wrath)

Because it knows what it is, what anyone playing a 40K game is probably expecting and focuses on that core Extermination process, it's really very good and a hell of a lot of fun to play. Even if 40K is not your thing, I'd still very much recommend playing it if you like any sort of 4X game.

Sorbicol wrote:

Not finished exactly, but i have completed a game of Gladius: Relics of War over the weekend.

It a classic 4x game with a hex grid set in the Warhammer 40K universe. However, despite having all 4 Xs present and correct, it pretty much eschews Exploration, Exploit, and Expand in overwhelming favour of Exterminate, which for 40K is pretty much standard to be honest.

The races are all very asymmetric and play differently, with you needing to figure out which units are more effective in a given situation, then building the infrastructure to support your rolling Army as you set forth to conquer. It gets around the issues these games have with diplomacy systems by not having one - you're there to kill or be killed (although you can set an "ally" state in the menu before you start a game. Which makes you a craven coward and worthy of the Emperor's wrath)

Because it knows what it is, what anyone playing a 40K game is probably expecting and focuses on that core Extermination process, it's really very good and a hell of a lot of fun to play. Even if 40K is not your thing, I'd still very much recommend playing it if you like any sort of 4X game.

I've been noticing that it's been getting some updates on Steam, so I should really dive into it again.

I've been working through some of my steam winter sale purchases

1) Minoria - It's another metroidvania from the creators of Momodora. It's more very solid stuff, but the move pixel art to 3D models and stages makes it lose some of the charm. (Although it still looks better than something like Bloodstained.)

2) Vampire the Masquerade: Night Road - It's a neat story about a down on their luck vampire courier getting caught up in vampire shenanigans and politicking. It has the kind of choice and consequence I wish Coteries/Shadows of New York had, it'd even make a decent spine for Bloodlines 2 if they start over yet again...but it's a twine game. About as unadorned a twine game you could imagine, everything working with radio buttons. You get a character portrait for important characters, but that's it for bells and whistles.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed my time with it quite a bit, and will probably poke at it some more rolling a different clan and build, but at least lay out the character sheet nicely ya bums.

3) Lake - It's the eighties, you're a taking a break form you high-powered, high-falutin' programming job to moonlight as a mailman in your quiet little mountain hometown. It's kind of overwhelmingly nice and low stakes. You drive around, make deliveries, and get involved in people's stories as much as you want. It's a bit too relaxed and low stakes for me, or maybe it's just the graphics being only the level of competent stylized indie and the radio being so repetitive that makes the delivery parts drag a bit too much. But I can't rag on a game this nice too much.

4) Mortal Shell - I had reasonably high hopes for this one since the Bonfireside Chat guys liked it, but unfortunately, I ultimately didn't care for it very much. There was a moment in the middle where I got over the initial difficulty hump and I was working my way through the best designed area in the game (not a high bar) that I got into a groove and was having into a good time, but then I hit the end of the progression and still had a slog through the last third of the game. The hardening mechanic is initially interesting, but when you get the hang of it it's easily exploitable, and the story is kind of a satirical madlibs of soulsian obtuseness. At least it looks nice? But it's going down as one of my least favourite soulslikes.

Alien Love Gardener wrote:

a satirical madlibs of soulsian obtuseness

That could be an item description in one of those games.