What game are you wasting time on?

[Darth Roxor]

Finished Albion. Very weirdo game in ways more than one.

The most fascinating part of it is probably how it stands with its legs apart in old and nuskool rpg design philosophies. On the one hand, it has dungeon crawling blobbery with all that entails, and on the other it has a lot of storyfaggotry. But both the aspects hardly feel finished, in fact I suspect the way Albion finally ended up is a far cry from its original vision. Stats that do nothing, mechanics listed in the manual that don't at all work like that in the game, big empty spaces of land, annoying cargo cult features, etc.

Still, I thought it was a cool game overall, if uneven or even downright confused. The beginning is very strong, and the first continent is alien enough to rival Morrowind in that aspect. And then you end up among space celts, wait what. Then there's a cool big continent with a complex and time-specific intrigue, which may have been the game's peak point. Then you meet the illuminati... and finally turn a space ship into a gigantic tree.

I liked the dungeons quite a bit though. A few of them may have been just a tad too long for their own good (druid HQ, kenget kamulos HQ), but they were true gauntlets that felt exciting to break through, and finishing them always felt like a relief after so much effort. Except the FUCKING equipment makers' lab, whoever designed that piece of shit should be sodomised with a rebar.

The backstory for the human presence on the alien world was also pretty weirdo, but in a good way. The people who made this game definitely had a lot of creativity, lots of things about it are very original.

 

[deuxhero]

Started a play of Fallout 2 for first time in forever. I forgot just how empty this (early?) game is. Skill checks are rare beyond straight speech, sequence is basically a straight line, quests only have one real solution and (sometimes) one that goes out of your way to be an asshole (rather than do it for your own benifit).

 

[Burning Bridges]

Most of playtime nowadays is Arma 3, Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 and sometimes X-Plane.

None of these games will interest anyone here but I also have discovered Hardspace Shipbreaker and that's an extraordinary time sink. Basically a work simulation in a science fiction setting that actually makes you feel like you accomplish something. They made dismantling the spacecraft enough of an intellectual challenge to keep things interesting and made sure all tools / activities feel rewarding to operate. The graphics are great and the physics are what you can expect from a 2021 game.

 

[Fenix]

Exanima.
What a fucking pain. Like, seriously.
Who do you need to be, to beat the game? Twice korean? Trice asiat?
As I said, I rolstomped most of the arena no problem, but playing experience you get there don't help AT ALL to figth in game, as layout is VERY different - one cart near your figth and you lost your figth. Or stool. Or anything. And darkness.

 

[deuxhero]

Finishing up Metroid Prime, just need two artifacts (truth and spirit), five missile packs and a power bomb expansion for 100%. Only 10.5 hours of play showing on clock, it's way shorter than I remember. Already confirmed mines and magmoor are cleared, so that helps narrow it down.

Edit: Down to two missile expansions and have cleared both Overworld and Drifts, meaning they're in the west side of the ruins, and the final artifact which is where I need to go at the end anyways. I think one is in the Ruined Nursery, since I dodn't remember getting it, but no idea where the other one is. Also turns out I miscalculated and had all bomb expansions anyways.

edit: Now everything except Phazon Program pirate lore, aqua drone (FUCK!), some impact crater enemies and one missile expansion.

 

[Apostle Hand]

playing Tales of Maj'Eyal and Puzzle Agent good games

might and magic for blood and honor is shitty game too much shitty things to do

 

[Riskbreaker]

You tried Hellpoint? I enjoyed that one quite a bit more than Mortal Shell.

I tried the first Surge a bit and it did nothing for me. I actually enjoyed the combat somewhat but the setting was bland af, environments felt pretty unconvincing - the first outdoors location you explore feels like random, visually completely unappealing collection of wrecks and ruined structures. That pretty much all of it I can remember.

I just managed to get a Hellpoint steam key for $2.00. Will check it out.

Shit, that's depressing. I'm guessing it was in some indie bundle recently?
Anyhow, I do hope you'll enjoy it. I'd go as far as saying its my favourite non-From Souls-like.
(Nioh I've maybe spent more time with but that thing is a huge time sink with epic case of feature bloat.)

 

[DeltaForceOperator]

I play The Darkest Dungeon and recently have installed TOEE with Temple+. The Darkest dungeon has nice gothic horror theme and is 2D drawing, which is excellent. They call it crow quill, or something. Characters and scenery are big and easily discernible, which is big plus.

 

[HansDampf]

Killer7 (Gamecube): ...
Having said all of that, I don't think I will ever forget the sound of the enemies' laugh.

Great game. But shit. But great.

loud

 

[Jack Of Owls]

You tried Hellpoint? I enjoyed that one quite a bit more than Mortal Shell.

I tried the first Surge a bit and it did nothing for me. I actually enjoyed the combat somewhat but the setting was bland af, environments felt pretty unconvincing - the first outdoors location you explore feels like random, visually completely unappealing collection of wrecks and ruined structures. That pretty much all of it I can remember.

I just managed to get a Hellpoint steam key for $2.00. Will check it out.

Shit, that's depressing. I'm guessing it was in some indie bundle recently?
Anyhow, I do hope you'll enjoy it. I'd go as far as saying its my favourite non-From Souls-like.
(Nioh I've maybe spent more time with but that thing is a huge time sink with epic case of feature bloat.)

Spoiler

I get most of my keys using GG Deals search engine and just select the lowest price that shows up for any given title. In this case, I'm pretty sure that it was a private seller that got their key in an indie bundle and just resold it. At least I hope that's the case. Some of the prices I've seen using GG Deals were suspiciously low but I don't investigate these things too much. However, if I knew for certain ahead of time something seriously shady was up, I probably wouldn't go for it. All the keys I've purchased from there activated with no problems on Steam.

 

[Deflowerer]

Trying to enjoy Hexen but can't say I feel it. Like the level design and wandering around, but enemy encounters are such a fucking slog.

 

[Jack Of Owls]

Trying to enjoy Hexen but can't say I feel it. Like the level design and wandering around, but enemy encounters are such a fucking slog.

Once you get out of the main hub and stop chasing your tail trying to find the hidden switch (or two... or three), the lvl design improves and the game world opens right up and becomes fun. Stick with it.

 

[Deflowerer]

I have no problem with level design. It's the grindy mobs and shitty weapon variety.

 

[Jack Of Owls]

I have no problem with level design. It's the grindy mobs and shitty weapon variety.

tbh, I always had much more fun with Heretic and played it a couple of times since 1994. Hexen was a bit of a slog but I don't regret my time with it.

 

[Sceptic]

Trying to enjoy Hexen but can't say I feel it. Like the level design and wandering around, but enemy encounters are such a fucking slog.

You could switch to Fighter, he can dispatch things much faster than either other class, at least in the early and midgame. You could also take the difficulty down to skill 3 or even 2, this will reduce the number of enemies.

 

[Curratum]

Ah, Hexen... A strange game... The only winning move is not to play.

 

[Ezekiel]

How do you dismiss your partner in Streets of Rage 2? I've never had a partner just randomly show up and am finding a lot of useless results on Google. I must have accidentally pressed one of the keys for player 2.

I've already disabled the other "controller," but he won't piss off.

Edit: Screw it, just gonna restart. Was doing well.

 

[Ivan]

Psychonauts 2

An excellent experience that lives up to what I had in mind for a sequel both in graphical fidelity and subject matter. During my play I was impressed at how well the game controlled. Raz always felt responsive and there were very few instances of invisible walls that would hinder my enjoyment. I had a great time thoroughly exploring the map for collectibles and engage with as many NPCs as I could find. The writing always put a smile on my face and I thought it was smar that the game presented a new cast of characters for the us to meet rather than retreading too much from the first. I came away impressed with the gameplay variety presented by the different worlds and the nifty camerawork that's done during the many transitions therein. Some that standout: the cake hallway from Bob s Bottles, the coffin from Ford's mind. I also particularly loved the visual of being inside Ford's fractured mind, the visual was delightfully creepy and reminded me of something out of Majora's Mask.

strengths:
-presents a new cast of characters to meet and enjoy. I was afraid it would tread too much content from the first

-art and graphical fidelity are outstanding, complemented by a great variety of level themes

-Raz controls buttery smooth. I loved using the telepathy ball to navigate the levels as quickly as I could. I loved how much airtime it grants you to skip over platforms

-Combat: I liked that different enemies encourage you to switch to particular powers to take them down. I think it was smart of them to have some of them dole out a good amount of damage to keep you on alert

-smart employment of a fast-travel system

-music was great throughout, going to comb through the soundtrack online for favorites

weaknesses (i.e. irritations/annoyances):
-audio-lines overlapping was common

-for OCD players (not me): the audio for the baggage items seems oddly quiet, making it more difficult than it ought to be find. The figment tracker doesn't tell you which particular map in a world contains missed items, so you may very well spend a lot of time looking for those few handful figments across the many maps per level

-minor UI gripes: not being able to go to the above or below category when shopping at Otto's shop if an item doesn't exist on the current row (e.g. row 1 has 2 items, row 2 has 4, you can't go up from row 2 to row 1 if you have items 3 or 4 selected)

-deliberately annoying voiceover for Archetype Raz

In sum: a great continuation of the series that nicely shuts the door on Raz's arc. I think it's likely the next entry will feature a different protagonist. I like the move toward more deliberate use of specific tools in combat and would like to see this emphasized more in the future.

 

[Catacombs]

Horizon Zero Dawn:

I had fun playing this. The plot was predictable, but there were parts that surprised me, which I always appreciate. Aloy was a good character to unravel, but I hated or didn't care for the rest of the cast. The combat was fun during the early game and got repetitive quickly. I beat the main story in 50 hours. The DLC added about 10 hours of extra content. For a PlayStation port, it's one of the better ones I've played. I had minimal issues with frames and bugs.

 

[fork]

Yeah, Hexen and Heretic. Most people only played Doom and now want to try these cult classics they missed, and are disappointed when they realise how fucking bad these other, more niche cult classics are. Two options from here:

1) pretend you love these shit games and score some points among people who were retards back then and still are retards now.

2) be honest and call the games shit, because compared to the most important contemporaries, they are just that: Utter shit.

Now, there's a case to be made for playing these games today, bacause they're better than pretty much everything released recently, but they're still really kinda mediocre at best.

 

[Straight elf]

I just finished Black Book. I really enjoyed the game and it has not really received any attention on the Codex so far, so here are some of my impressions:

Black Book an interesting combination of choose your adventure and card game, similar to Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales but in my opinion Black Book much better. The game is set in 19th century Russia and very nicely immerses the player in traditional Russian mythology, including all the beautiful weirdness stemming from the unique mix of Orthodox Christianity and residues of shamanistic pagan beliefs. Another topic explored by the game is the early industrialization and its effect on the traditional Russian rural society. The game is full of lore so if you are interested in any of the topics above, the exploration of the setting is a reward in itself.

I played the game with Russian voices and English subtitles and really enjoyed the story, although there are small errors in the English texts, like occasional typos and such. The game comes fully voiced in English too, but the reviews on Steam say the quality is poor but I don't understand why anyone would not play a game like this with the original anyway. The game is quite long for the genre - takes about 20 hours to finish, but it managed to keep me entertained throughout its entire length, which is rare these days. In particular, I liked there are actual (and logical) C&Cs in the game - the choices made by the player organically influence future developments in a meaningful way, not just through slightly different dialogues or endings as it is often the case even with AAA productions. Also, the game tracks the morality of your decisions based on Orthodox notions of virtues and sins and your "sin count" influences many dialogues as well as the endings. Interestingly, the game is not balanced. You play a witch in the game, so by default you are evil. If you want to play good, the game is simply much harder. For example, as a witch you have a bunch of chorts (3 for starters and more as you progress with the story) who you can command. You can either send them to pester the population, which is sinful but they leave you alone and come back with loot and money. Or you can give them nothing to do leaving them idle to pester you (represented in game through rather severe combat debuffs based on which chorts are idle). You can partly avoid the penalty by sending some chorts on pointless tasks, such as counting the grains of sand on the beach but that requires you to choose the required skill on level up (and miss out on other, more directly useful skills) and you can never send all your chorts on the meaningless jobs, meaning you will have to suffer at least some debuffs.

The card-based combat is quite entertaining, the success is based on exploiting synergies between cards. Importantly there is not too much combat, so it never really starts feeling like a chore. The graphics are shit (Unity junk) but I liked the character drawings in dialogues. Overall, I feel like the game is really worth the 25 euro asking price, if only for the setting and tons of interesting lore.

 

[samuraigaiden]

Been playing some Ultima 1. It's kind of a silly game, isn't it?

Not super far. I knew about going into dungeons to get HP from Akalabeth, so I reached level 3 or 4 in one sitting and suddenly the transport store in Britannia had air cars and space shuttles. Didn't expect the game to just throw the space stuff there without any explanation. I did read the manual, I know it mentions space ships. Still, it makes no sense to just have them be available at the store after a couple of trips to the local dungeon.

Death's Awakening, The Dungeon of Doubt, The Horror of the Harpies, Where Hercules Died... I like the dungeon names in this game.

There's a nice flow to Ultima. There was a nice flow to Akalabeth too.

I looked up a map to understand the layout of the continent after getting really confused because I forgot the I command. I could've figured there were 4 continents by just using I in the overworld. This made me think how mysterious and wonderful this game probably felt back in the days before FAQs and walkthroughs. I figured there are 2 kings and 2 sign posts per continent just by exploring, and then used the same map I consulted before to confirm it.

Since I've already visited all the kings and all the sign posts more than once, I assume my focus now should be getting as far as possible into the dungeons to kill what needs killing.

 

[jackofshadows]

I just finished Black Book. I really enjoyed the game and it has not really received any attention on the Codex so far, so here are some of my impressions:

It has its own thread. Unfortunately, staff have missed this very good game so Black Book haven't made it to the main page while it should have. Its affiliation to RPG genre is debatable, elements are very weak and yet it positions itself as RPG adventure and I think deserve it regardless.

 

[Abu Antar]

I've been playing Mafia III lately. Spent around 20+ hours with it. Did one DLC and started the other two. I was very far along in the main story. I had two people left to kill on the kill list, but I can't play anymore. For the past three or four hours, I did not feel like I had all that fun. Doing a long mission, where I had to get to a guy in a brothel, I got detected and had six enemies from all directions coming at me. That was the last straw, and uninstalled it was. I laso had many technical issues, with crashes, soft locks and the like. It was an okayish game, but the repetitiveness and some other questionable design decisions draws the whole experience down.

Other than that, I think that I might be nearing the end in Lords of Xulima. 70 hours in, not much left of the game, I think. While I do like the game, both exploration and combat, at times I feel like the game doesn't respect the players time. Overall, a good game, with some flaws here and there.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Music is about the only really good thing in Mafia 3. Everything else is so-so.