Screenshot thread

[A horse of course]

Warhammer: Chaosbane (N.B. I wrote this before the Tomb Kings expansion came out, not sure what that's like)



If you’ve played Path of Exile, Reaper of Souls et al you know what you’re getting – should you enjoy clicking through corridors full of enemies in pursuit of the next shiny gear set, you’re set with Chaosbane.

How much you enjoy the grind itself can depend a lot on how you arrange your skills and how well it suits the types of enemies you face – so it helps that skills can be swapped out at will between fights. As Empire captain, I started enjoying the game a lot more once I threw out my old skill tree and focused on a more mobile one. It’s important to point out a number of these skills are clearly meant to work in sync with other classes in co-op, so playing in solo as I did won’t give you the full picture.

Sadly, the game suffers from the same streamlining as many modern titles, with extremely linear level layouts, no sidequests whatsoever, and little of value worth the trouble of exploring. Once you’ve cut through the main story, you’ll be running Diablo 3-inspired invasions, boss rush and “expedition” modes in the same areas.

Visually the game has improved a lot since the rather rough-looking character models shown when it was originally announced, and lighting looks great in certain parts. Unfortunately, the environments feel very “gamey”, as if they were randomly generated with algorithms, but the developers then decided to use only a handful of these iterations for each act. Vermintide at least managed to make some of its levels feel like genuine locations from the Warhammer world. Sound effects are good enough, with nice meaty thwacks and booming muskets, but music is uninspired and I ended up putting on an audiobook instead.

The AAA price tag developers were asking for at launch is absolutely ludicrous, but if you liked Diablo 3, it’s certainly worth ten dollarinos or so.

Spoiler

 

[A horse of course]

Kingdom Come Deliverance



One of the only first-wave cackstarter titles that I actually failed to pledge to. My two major problems with the project were A: It sounded a lot like CLANG!, which I’d been fucked over by, and B: I was extremely skeptical of a game based solely around the viability of first-person melee combat (yes, including Dark Messiah). Well, it didn’t turn out to be a scam like CLANG! Was, but I turned out to be right on the money about the combat. For all those years of development, the team built an entire game around a combat system that fundamentally does not work when used in conjunction with multiple combatants, obstacles, or any kind of change in terrain height.

There's a very inconsistent use of timed quests, where some quests would be highly sensitive to the passage of time and others would completely ignore it. The tutorial was agonizingly long and the difficulty and encounter scaling also seemed off to me, with quests given to you within the first few hours sometimes taking you along some of the most dangerous paths on the map. On a related note, in the early game I was repeatedly frustrated by some insta-death ambushes where your horse would throw you before you even had time to react to the enemies coming into vision.

I also wasn’t too fond of Henry, who seemed so bland that he should’ve just been replaced with a custom player character - but who sometimes made comments or independently made decisions I disagreed with - the worst of both worlds when it comes to pre-made vs. custom characters. Story-wise the game seems to meander about far too much, whilst the finale was very abrupt and unsatisfying - something the Band of Bastards DLC was a significant improvement upon. The Inquisition/heresy DLC was an interesting change of pace but lacked enough alternative approaches to dialogue choices.

Visuals are strong, with only a few awkward models here and there, and music is usually pleasant to listen to, although some tracks are a little harsh on the ears and a little repetitive after 50hrs. I don't think anyone can fault Warhorse for their commitment to trying to capture a sense of "authenticity" to the place and era, but no matter how many minorities I killed, I had the strange feeling that the developers had more fun making the game than I did playing it.

I really wanted to enjoy the game but the negatives make it difficult for me to recommend. I know I'm in the minority since most of us here would love to support more Gamergate incel slavic white nationalist titles, but the heart wants what it wants. I did very much like the busty childhood friend romance, so I’ll give the game that. I’m rooting for the sequel, but I’d have to feel confident they’d at the very least overcome the problems with the combat system before giving the Warhorse another chance.

Spoiler

 

[A horse of course]

War for the Overworld



A more faithful attempt at aping the classic DK2 formula than Dungeons or Impire that sadly doesn’t quite capture Bullfrog’s magic. The main campaign is short and unimaginative, hitting a difficulty spike about half-way that just forces you to fail, retry, rush and win every time you hit a difficult level and never really challenges you to think about changing your opening strategy or dungeon layout in the way the original’s campaign sometimes did. It seemed like they had some ambitions with the story but then just said “fuck it”. I read that the Heart of Gold DLC campaign was more aimed at “builder” players who wanted to enjoy constructing interesting rooms layouts and exploring the maps, but the only level I played just seemed like the same shit minus infinite gold resources, so I dropped it and never even touched the third campaign, which didn’t seem to have any real story at all. I don't mean to be glib and dismissive of the developers efforts - everything from the visuals to little touches like ambient sounds are evidence of their affection and admiration for the classic DK games, but it didn't work too well for me.

You can get the whole package for dirt cheap in most sales, but I wasn’t too impressed myself. At least it wasn’t Dungeons. Am I just too old to enjoy the genres of my youth? Shouldn't I be married with kids by now? God that's a horrible thought.

Spoiler

 

[Verylittlefishes]

Year Walk is very unsettling puzzle/adventure about pre-Christian rite in Sweden. Love my Wicker Man stuff.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/269050/Year_Walk/

 

[DJOGamer PT]

. For all those years of development, the team built an entire game around a combat system that fundamentally does not work when used in conjunction with multiple combatants, obstacles, or any kind of change in terrain height.

I've been saying this from the first reveals relating to the combat mechanics, the issue is that they tried to make something realistic over something functional and fun.
But imo the biggest issue is not the fact the system is a mess (there are no ARPG's with genuinely good combat, but they usually compensate it in other departments), the problem is that the game tries to present non-combat related skills and stats as viable options for a character build, but the truth is that you can't finish the game without having invested in some form of combat specialization.
For example, after looking to all the perks/skills/stats related to the combat mechanics and doing Captain Bernard's training I completely gave up on a combat focused build, because I knew I hasn't going to have fun with it, and focused my efforts on a cunning thief character (so stealth + speech) and I was doing very well up until the main quest forces me to partake in a battle wich culminated with a boss figth on what amounts to a thunderdome (with no way to talk him out, trick him or lead him into a group of friendly npc's). It was at that point I gave up on the game.

 

[Wunderbar]

. For all those years of development, the team built an entire game around a combat system that fundamentally does not work when used in conjunction with multiple combatants, obstacles, or any kind of change in terrain height.

I've been saying this from the first reveals relating to the combat mechanics, the issue is that they tried to make something realistic over something functional and fun.
But imo the biggest issue is not the fact the system is a mess (there's are no ARPG with genuinely good combat, but they usually compensate it in other departments), the problem is that the game tries to present non-combat related skills and stats as viable options for a character build, but the truth is that you can't finish the game without having invested in some form of combat specialization.
For example, after looking to all the perks/skills/stats related to the combat mechanics and doing Captain Bernard's training I completely gave up on a combat focused build, because I knew I hasn't going to have fun with it, and focused my efforts on a cunning thief character (so stealth + speech) and I was doing very well up until the main quest forces me to partake in a battle wich culminated with a boss figth on what amounts to a thunderdome (with no way to talk him out, trick him or lead him into a group of friendly npc's). It was at that point I gave up on the game.

Runt is the only mandatory fight in the whole game, if your combat skills suck you can try cheesing him with a bow.

 

[A horse of course]

Terminator: Resistance



Classic comfy mediocrity. A semi open-world stealth/shooter hybrid with scavenging and light RPG elements that’s unashamed Terminator fanservice from start to finish. Thematically and in presentation, Resistance draws primarily from the original movie, relying on Terminator Salvation to fill out specific elements such as Skynet’s taste in architecture and post-apocalyptic daytime scenes. There’s nothing too ambitious in either storytelling or gameplay, but in a way this is the game’s strength - everyone gets to live out their Future War fantasies without any significant speedbumps like fart-sniffing devs trying to “subvert expectations” of the franchise.

The game’s major weakness is that the open-world levels make Skynet’s minions far too easy to take out with potshots and cheap hit-and-run tactics – being sighted by a gang of Artificial-Americans should be a terrifying experience, but it’s usually safest and most tactically sound to just snipe one, then hang back, wait for their detection routines to reset and repeat it all over again. Even at the maximum difficulty the fearsome hunter-killer gunships and lumbering mechas (which I think are new to the series, but I’m not really familiar with the Terminator "expanded universe" - can you imagine being such a loser you actually know these details?) lose much of their threat when you can just whittle away at their armour with pea-shooters from handy crevices. The Terminators are at their most threatening when T-800s stalk you through hospitals or ruined mansions, where escape is not guaranteed. The issue isn’t simply that enemies do too little damage or are too vulnerable themselves, but that they need to be far more aggressive and predatory - the Terminators are supposed to be a genocidal threat to humanity, not an american patrol in Iraq ambushed on the way back from a brothel. The final battle was also a little bit of a letdown, as whilst it was a cool set piece, the last fight just sort of peters out without any major challenge. Some sort of boss arena or fight against the T-800s, at the very least, would’ve given more of a sense of accomplishment.

Graphics are alright aside from the awful FOW limitations, and character models are good enough for a C-list developer trying to make it against AAA studios, with the two love interests at least looking more attractive than the nightmarish “female” character models you usually see nowadays. On the other hand, the animations on the dog were so bad I thought it was meant to be a reprogrammed Terminator or something. In any case, what really stands out is the soundtrack – particularly the main theme, stalking track, shelter hub theme and the final push. After generic garbage like Terminator Genisys’s score, it’s nice to hear music that really captures the best of the original theme whilst doubling down on that retro-futuristic 80s synth vibe.

Certainly not worth the asking price at the time of release, but 20-25 dollars is more than reasonable for what you’re getting (sex scenes). I mean, I still pirated it, but it’s their fault for not having a girl with big tits on the cover. On a related note, I'm surprised nobody has commented on the disturbing psychosexual implications of Sarah and John's relationship. Anyway, I give it four thumbs out of five (the game, not platonic incest).

Spoiler

 

[Citizen]

Local Man Ressurected By A Multi-Headed Tentacle Dick On A Quest To Get His Lower Jaw Back

It's LoK: Soul Reaver. I play the dreamcast version, since it's pretty obvious it's the definitive one.

PROOF!

 

[DJOGamer PT]

Runt is the only mandatory fight in the whole game, if your combat skills suck you can try cheesing him with a bow.

Informative.
I migth give the game another try. Some day...
But still, not only is that disappointing - not just the bow cheese but mainly that the devs purposely made a segment where you don't have any say in the outcome - it also highlights a flaw in Henry's character. The fact that he is suposed to be his "own man" independent from the player, but at the same time the devs where trying to make game where it's up to the player to decides who Henry is, just mesh well at all and leads to these conflicts of design.

 

[spekkio]

Fire Emblem 6 - The Binding Blade

Having all "modern" Kaga FE games (FE 3-5 for Snes) completed, I've decided to witness the decline firsthandheld:

At first teh graffix gave me a haeadache:

I mean, where are teh hot graphics of Thracia? What's with the shitty palette and low res?

But some things look interesting. 3 types of elemental magic were merged into one skill?

All menus have quick help now:

Shop / Depot UI FUCKING FINALLY is divided into item types?

Other things are familar AF thou. I mean, I've immediately known which unit type is good at what and which weapon does what:

But one thing is certain - new combat animations are teh sexx:

And since my team already has an obligatory loli healer and hot pegasus rider, all is well I guess. Sorry, Kaga-san.

 

[octavius]

My character after completing the first part of Evil Islands: Curse of the Lost Soul.
Very limited use of companions. Used them mainly to finish off some of the toughest enemies like Lake Lizards and The Demon. Used Archer as support, but even with 70 Attack and a Longbow made of Dragon Bone he hardly made a dent in the enemies. The Sandwoman was much more useful as a healer/buffer, and with her help I was able to make a frontal assault on The Dead City.

 

[Citizen]

^

 

[A horse of course]

SHOGO: Mobile Armored Division



Yes, I'm pretty late to this - I've had it on maGoG for years but could never get the damn thing working acceptably until last week. Monolith's other big stumble in the early 3d FPS market shares more than a few elements with Blood II - quite literally in fact, as parts of Blood II were cobbled together with assets from Shogo. Both games are an absolute mess of narrative progression, level design, balance, unfinished and broken cutscenes, and bugs, but Shogo's critical reception seems to have been relatively mild compared to The Chosen, possibly due to being standalone and lacking the baggage of fan expectations.

As these messes often do, Shogo started off as an ambitious idea - a Battletech FPS/sim with considerably more freedom of navigation than the final product. As usual, the project quickly sank into the mire of development hell and six months before launch the studio made the decision to cut their losses and release what they had in the best shape it could be hammered into. The end result is a murky swamp of bland industrial bases, lifeless cities and terrifying aborted anime character models. Apparently some on the team wanted a grounded, Patlabor-esque approach to the art direction whilst others drew from more stylized mecha OVAs, resulting a rather unconsistent (sometimes creepy) look to the various assets.

For tonight's gameplay, monsieur will be served a laughably short early-00s FPS with hitscanning enemy soldiers who can randomly crit-gib you from across a room the milisecond you turn a corner. I tried playing around with the difficulty but it seemed to make very little difference - most of your deaths are from instant crits on any level of difficulty - you can be splattered by a single hit on easy where you might've survived several wounds on hard. Mecha combat is much less prone to RNG deaths (assuming you avoid stepping on cars), but you still end up playing it more like Raven Shield or SWAT once you hit enemy mechas with nuke cannons. Most environments are bland, visually incoherent, or both, but the actual level design isn't that bad - it's reasonably logical and doesn't rely too much on backtracking, unlike Blood II.

Narratively, the story isn't difficult to follow per se, but it is missing a lot of pertinent backstory and there are numerous instances of levels obviously being scrapped and leapfrogged, then explained away in text exposition at the start of the next playable sequence. It's weak, but comprehensible, and unlike in Blood II, I did laugh at a few of the jokes.

Craig Hubbard has mentioned he'd love to resurrect Shogo at some point in the future, but apparently nobody is interested. Not a great loss - there are far better anime-inspired western games, better FPS, and better mecha games out there.

Spoiler

MAGIC CLAW

Spoiler

 

[yellowcake]

Dragon’s Dogma: Dark Arisen




This is a really weird one. Whilst I was initially quite excited about the prospect of an open-world fantasy RPG with actually good combat, I must’ve uninstalled the game two or three times during my playthrough of the main quest. The plot was excruciating. NPCs were flatter than my ex-wife. The sidequests were interminable fetch-and-farm endeavors. Traversal between different areas of the map is soul-crushingly tedious. Enemy variety is absolutely pathetic, and I probably made a horrible mistake by ignoring warnings about not playing a standard melee class. Environments are ugly as sin and have little of interest to uncover via exploration. The soundtrack was entirely forgettable. Then, strangely, the game seems to improve right as it’s ending. The narrative and dialogue start to hint at more intriguing subplots and background lore. The final dungeon is moodier and more challenging, and the music takes on an ethereal but material, otherworldly but homely air. Then it’s over. What happened? Did they run out of time, hack the game to pieces, and just push It out the door?

I didn’t even really intend to go through the DLC dungeon, Bitterblack Isle, since I’d read it was basically a high-level postgame challenge and I hadn’t even enjoyed the main game, but thought what the hell - might as well take some screenshots. I entered and almost got one-shotted by some palette-swapped goblins. But the combat was intense, the loot was actually quite good, the music was better, and just the general feeling of hacking through the dungeon reminded me of old fantasy art of a party of adventurers braving the depths of ancient ruins – you know the stuff I mean. So I kept at it. The monsters got bigger, scarier, and more varied, the loot kept getting better, and the stakes got higher as you got farther and farther from safe havens. It reminded me a lot of Souls games, but without so much of the frustration I associated with that series. You started thinking carefully about how far you could push the party and its resources, and how much loot you could carry back. You looked for alternate routes and hedged your bets against random invasions from high-level monsters. The route to the final boss is dripping with atmosphere and after dying two or three times with a comically underpowered character I finally got his damn attack pattern down and beat him. At this point I’d completely reversed my opinion of the game and wished the entire vanilla map had been built around this carefully curated dungeon crawling.

Beating the DLC once opens up a second run of the entire area - locking everything behind you, flooding the area with even worse minibosses, and spawning an upgraded version of the final DLC boss. I didn’t enjoy this run as much as the first since, depending on your build, you really need a character of roughly double the level and equipment of what you need for the first run. This makes grinding the same areas over and over again 100% mandatory, though the second run triggers a flood of new sidequests for the best weapons and armor, which gives you a real target beyond watching the XP meter rise. My other complaint goes back to playing a standard melee class - which was even more frustrating in the DLC due to the necessity of relying on AI ranged and magic classes for most of the harder enemies. Spending every fight running around waiting for your pet mage to use the correct spell or your archer to hit the right target is maddening. Still, you do get that tiny ego boost when you finish everything after so much effort.

I honestly can’t say for sure whether I can recommend Dragon’s Dogma or not. Based on the main game I’d probably say no. It’s one of those games that doesn’t outright fail at anything in particular, but it’s so uncompromisingly mediocre that it ends up even less than the sum of its parts. From a gameplay perspective the DLC area really clicked for me, though. It’s so very tightly designed, with the interconnected map, encounter design, loot progression and general challenge scaling coming together almost perfectly. Unfortunately, if you’re interested in roleplaying, story, dialogue, characters or interesting quests then there’s not much for you anywhere in the game. Also, never forgive Pearl Harbor.

Spoiler

I'm sorry sir but I have to admit you have bad taste in computery graphics. DD is one of the best looking games I know.

 

[A horse of course]

Duke Nukem 3d: Alien Armageddeon mod (don't ask me which fucking version. Sometime around August 2019, I dunno)



One of the biggest releases of the past year or so, Alien Armageddeon has all the usual custom content you'd expect from a big cherry vanilla TC - new weapons, new enemies, new level packs, music, sound effects and all that good stuff. Probably the most notable addition is the addition of classic Bombshell as a co-op partner controlled by a friend (lol) the AI, or solo if that's not your thing.

As is true of most big eDuke projects, each level is gargantuan, brimming with environmental details, hidden items, secret jokes and sometimes alternate paths. Functionally they're mostly what you'd expect - keycard hunting with some minor variation in objectives here and there, such as a timed escape from sunken ruins. The general feel of the new weapons is of course classic Duke, and enemies are usually supercharged versions of their vanilla compatriots, though there was one slightly irritating long range, sniper-like enemy you'd only really want to counter with the his own railgun. I'm not an enormous fan of long-range combat in Build games, and it was one of the things that turned me off Ion Maiden when I tried it last year. I think AA follows the modding tradition of urban levels playing to the strengths of Duke - environmental design, interactivity, civilians running about and so forth, whereas the secret bases, alien hives and such are less interesting to explore or intuitive to navigate. Perhaps that's just me though.

There are only two or three particular issues that drag the experience down a little. First, there's an annoying radar screen added to the UI for some reason. You might counter that it can probably be turned off, but the fact is that's it enabled by default. As something of an artist myself, I respect the intentions of the creators. Second, I felt like a few sections were balanced around having two players rather than going solo - especially when they throw a lot of miniboss enemies at you. Thirdly and most importantly, it was difficult to decide which of the two playstyles was less gay. Now, if you play as Bombshell, you're likely a man being digitally transferred into the body of a bimbo-ized "companion" to the AI-controlled Duke player. This strikes me as very similar to a lot of bisexual sissyfication fantasies. Conversely, if you play as Duke, and the AI Bombshell is your companion, that's acceptable, right? Not if you think about it more carefully. Duke is not a tabula rasa avatar waiting to be "worn" by the player - Duke is a strong, independent character with a clear and unambiguous personality of his own. In this way, if you play as Duke and become aroused by the Bombshell sprite, this is somewhat similar to NTR fantasies of being the "bull" who lusts after the object of the protagonist's (the player) affections. If you do download the mod, I recommend you think carefully about these issues before asking a friend to join you in co-op. Taken alongside the addition of a trannification ray as a new weapon, it raises serious questions about the intentions of the mod authors, some of whom may well be European.

Spoiler

 

[Tytus]

Duke Nukem 3d: Alien Armageddeon mod (don't ask me which fucking version. Sometime around August 2019, I dunno)



One of the biggest releases of the past year or so, Alien Armageddeon has all the usual custom content you'd expect from a big cherry vanilla TC - new weapons, new enemies, new level packs, music, sound effects and all that good stuff. Probably the most notable addition is the addition of classic Bombshell as a co-op partner controlled by a friend (lol) the AI, or solo if that's not your thing.

As is true of most big eDuke projects, each level is gargantuan, brimming with environmental details, hidden items, secret jokes and sometimes alternate paths. Functionally they're mostly what you'd expect - keycard hunting with some minor variation in objectives here and there, such as a timed escape from sunken ruins. The general feel of the new weapons is of course classic Duke, and enemies are usually supercharged versions of their vanilla compatriots, though there was one slightly irritating long range, sniper-like enemy you'd only really want to counter with the his own railgun. I'm not an enormous fan of long-range combat in Build games, and it was one of the things that turned me off Ion Maiden when I tried it last year. I think AA follows the modding tradition of urban levels playing to the strengths of Duke - environmental design, interactivity, civilians running about and so forth, whereas the secret bases, alien hives and such are less interesting to explore or intuitive to navigate. Perhaps that's just me though.

There are only two or three particular issues that drag the experience down a little. First, there's an annoying radar screen added to the UI for some reason. You might counter that it can probably be turned off, but the fact is that's it enabled by default. As something of an artist myself, I respect the intentions of the creators. Second, I felt like a few sections were balanced around having two players rather than going solo - especially when they throw a lot of miniboss enemies at you. Thirdly and most importantly, it was difficult to decide which of the two playstyles was less gay. Now, if you play as Bombshell, you're likely a man being digitally transferred into the body of a bimbo-ized "companion" to the AI-controlled Duke player. This strikes me as very similar to a lot of bisexual sissyfication fantasies. Conversely, if you play as Duke, and the AI Bombshell is your companion, that's acceptable, right? Not if you think about it more carefully. Duke is not a tabula rasa avatar waiting to be "worn" by the player - Duke is a strong, independent character with a clear and unambiguous personality of his own. In this way, if you play as Duke and become aroused by the Bombshell sprite, this is somewhat similar to NTR fantasies of being the "bull" who lusts after the object of the protagonist's (the player) affections. If you do download the mod, I recommend you think carefully about these issues before asking a friend to join you in co-op. Taken alongside the addition of a trannification ray as a new weapon, it raises serious questions about the intentions of the mod authors, some of whom may well be European.

Spoiler

Which version?

 

[A horse of course]

Version 2.0

 

[PulsatingBrain]

 

[Darth Roxor]

What kind of reward are we talking about here?

 

[Theodora]

Ed123, did you have all these 'reviews' pre-written and are you just reposting them, or are you composing them as you go? (And this is since you were last on Codex... a year ago?)

 

[A horse of course]

Ed123, did you have all these 'reviews' pre-written and are you just reposting them, or are you composing them as you go? (And this is since you were last on Codex... a year ago?)

Everything before Shogo is mostly pre-written except for some modifications to reflect major changes in the geopolitical scene over the past year.

 

[A horse of course]

Guess what my next writeup will be lads

Spoiler

 

[Love]

Guess what my next writeup will be lads

Spoiler

Nocturne? I remember being frightened to hell by the demo with the zombies in the theater, but I never bothered with it. Hoping for you to change my mind!

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Guess what my next writeup will be lads

Spoiler

Max Payne?

Spoiler

probably Tex Murphy or something

 

[A horse of course]

Guess what my next writeup will be lads

Spoiler

Max Payne?

Spoiler

probably Tex Murphy or something

Close. It's

Spoiler

Bloodrayne 0.5

Just finished Episode 1 and it's breddy gud.