What game are you wasting time on?

[Assisted Living Godzilla]

Finished Psi-Ops Mindgate Conspiracy. Had to use virtual PC to not infest my PC with StarForce DRM.

And that dogshit ending - bad guy is gone, maguffin recovered so what we gonna do? Put a fuking cliffhanger out of ass.
Cliffhangers are shit but this one was even worse because there was nothing that would lead to it.
Nothing.
Three seconds before "To Be Continued" shows up there is ATTACK HELICOPTERS assault and credits starts rolling.
what the hell

Oh and there are these annoying beasts from another dimenshion. Invisible, shows up moment before they grab you and damage for noticable HP chunk, can't be shot earlier.
Still - throwing enemies, mind control and forcing them to shove the barrel in the mouth was rewarding enough.

RIP Barret
PSI powers unlocks - you have training exercise to complete.
And in each seassion Barret have different haircut becasue why not. And fistful of roasting quotes when you die, fail or kill enemies. Neat.

This game is pretty fucking great. Some of the best use of psychic powers in a game because it was basically a big physics engine showcase for Havok. You can play it two player with one player controlling the character and the third person shooter stuff, and another controlling the psychic powers...it's great. By the time the monsters show up, if you're playing two player, you can stand on stuff like the wood pallets (it's been years since I played it, but I think it's got those) and because stuff will stay level when you're floating it, you can stand on them and fly yourself around the stage while shooting shit at the same time.

Did you not use the Aura View power to see the invisible monsters?

 

[sullynathan]

Mega Man X is good, F.E.A.R. is good, X-Men origins is ok. Playing good games again is good.

 

[Baron Dupek]

Did you not use the Aura View power to see the invisible monsters?

Did I forgot to metion about Aura View? Yes, it's enabled every time my character enter new room. Does not change the fact that these psi beasts can't be shot earlier, I have to walk p.close and almost get caught by them.
Some games make really retarded ideas about "how to give more challenge to the player", with panzerkleins, mutants in Far Cry and psi beasts here.
They would be ok to fight if you could shoot them from further without exposing yourself to their attacks at close combat distance...

 

[Ocelot]

Replaying Enter the Gungeon after the big update it received.

I dropped this game in the past after ~2 hours of gameplay because the pacing was shit. That was fixed and early game is much better now. It stills feels like a an inferior version of BoI with an unhealthy gun fetish except it's actually fun to play now. It doesn't take itself too seriously and it contains many references to iconic characters (e.g: Flash Gordon), plus it received more content with the update which is neat.

What nearly breaks the deal for me is the horrible pixel "art" design. Everyone and their mother makes pixel art games nowadays because of small budget and trends and only a few actually make them look great. Gungeon in particular has some of the worst pixel graphics I've ever seen, not because the design itself is bad, but because all environments past the main lobby are a clusterfuck of items that fly around and distract you for no good reason. Just try playing this game with a friend. It's strange because some devs have obviously taken inspiration from titles with great pixel graphics (again, BoI) but they fail to implement something as simple as keeping it visually simple for the player.

 

[Kabas]

I've tried some turn-based goodness recently

Chaos gate is fun. I must admit though that i never played the original x-coms. The only one x-com-like i played is the one where you terraform mars, Ufo: aftershock if i am not mistaken. Also that firaxis x-com enemy unknown, but i droped this one.
I am feeling a bit exhausted from how much time every single mission takes for me even with the sped up animations. I just finished the second mission and now i am wondering:
-should i bother with the random missions
-will i be punished if i decide to not level-up the other space marine squads and focus only on my A-team
-what psyker spell should i take for my librarian. Will the psyker purge going to be useful for the next mission?
All in all, it's fun as i said, but i need to mix it up with something to avoid burnout.
The one thing that i will never get exhausted from is the soundtrack however, i can listen to these chants forever.

Age of fear series, i decided to start in order from the first one with the knight campaign. Leveling up your squad is fun and there is some interesting quirks here(like if your unit deals a finishing blow to an enemy he has a 20% chance of getting *enemy type* slayer bonus)
Itemization isn't bad either and i already found some interesting "trade-off" items in the shop. Like the ring that gives your hero a bonus to speed and backstab damage, but also makes you a coward(morale penalty). I am wondering if this one is worthwhile for my segmented movement knight.

And at last, the Fantasy general. From the old and forgotten times when fantasy was about orcs being crushed by the coordinated assaults of the unicorns, balloon snipers and the warriors who are made of air. Missions are flowing faster than the rites of war so far.
It's also has some beautiful music.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

I revisited Aquaria for the first time in over a decade.

The history of the game is interesting in several ways, but most notably in its time of release - just a few months away from the Indie Game Scene's take-off in 2008, so in a way it 'rode the wave' of that to gain even more recognition... even though it was already winning game-related awards.

Aquaria is your typical Metroidvania-game with one noticable difference: Gravity is not an issue through 99% of the game. This makes exploration and navigation almost painless, but also means that the devs had to come up with other ways to limit your travels through the game. Their solutions were innovative and don't feel forced, which is more than can be said about most games of its ilk. There is a LOT to see and do in Aquaria, and once you reach the area known as Open Waters you'll have access to about a dozen maps that you can explore freely, giving it a huge sense of non-linearity.

I'm not gonna spend time talking about the game itself, but instead mention how it felt for me to play it again after so long: When I originally played it I ended up 100%-ing the game, finding just about everything there is to find. The game felt fresh, yet was also a throwback to many classic games of years before. But playing it again now... it doesn't feel so fresh, and that's for two reasons: I still remember it all too well, and its style and game design elements have been used so much in subsequent games that Aquaria has become somewhat of a cliché.

Seeing how much of Aquaria felt familiar and has been used in other, younger games made me realize something: Aquaria is one of the best Metroidvanias ever made, and is a damn good game. But the rise of the Indie scene has so many small developers scrambling to get a slice of the cake, and Aquaria cast a long shadow which many wanted to copy and make their own, so some of its glory has been lost, so to say.

So if you haven't played Aquaria, I recommend you give it a go. It's at its best when it feels fresh.
If you're a Metroidvania fan and you haven't played Aquaria yet - get lost poseur, you failed the test.
If you haven't played Aquaria in a while - I hope you've forgotten most of it, otherwise you may end up feeling somewhat disappointed like I did after this revisit.

Finally, Aquaria has one of the best video game soundtracks of all time, IMO. I liked it so much that I spent time and money hunting down the game's soundtrack on CD - the only time I've done so just for a game's soundtrack.

 

[Average Manatee]

-should i bother with the random missions

Not really needed but gives ammo and xp. One exploit to alleviate ammo consumption (since it sucks to run out when ammo drops are 99% random):

Spoiler

Eject your clips with 1 shot remaining and they'll be refilled for free by the next mission

Aside from that XP isn't a problem, you'll probably have soldiers capping out at the highest rank by mission 5 or 6.

-will i be punished if i decide to not level-up the other space marine squads and focus only on my A-team

IIRC you'll never need more than 3 squads. If you take casualties you'll need to replace them with greens from the other squads though. Up to you if you want to save-scum to avoid the need for XP grind.

-what psyker spell should i take for my librarian. Will the psyker purge going to be useful for the next mission?

I found Quickening to be really, really good. Without it it's almost impossible to do aimed shots with the rocket launcher (very powerful in situations where you want to snipe from long range), and it's similarly invaluable for the Heavy Bolter (fire your first shot @ 20 AP unaimed, then subsequent shots aimed @ 8 AP). Vortex is good when you just want to annihilate a dozen packed enemies that are trying to rush into melee with you.

I must admit though that i never played the original x-coms.

 

[ItsChon]

-snip-

Thanks for writing this. I remember watching some videos about Aquaria several years back and thinking it was pretty cool. I put it at the back of my mind as a game I'd have to try in the future and totally forgot about it. Now I get to hit it up and see how it feels.

 

[flyingjohn]

Playing some wargames(mostly ssi stuff) for the apple 2.
Well the keyboard only movements are infuriating.1 for up or left will never make sense to me.(it is based ona hex,i know).
Also most of the scenarios seem to focus on only one battle.
The ai is also either extremely scripted or just weird.
But the selection of scenarios is quite diverse,you have arab isrraeli wars,muricca civil war,ww2,cold war,etc.Especially for that era.

I guess the 1980-1985 era strategy and simulation genre seems way too limiting to somebody playing today.Especially after the amiga and ibm pc's came around and introduced mouse as a standard movement option for games.

Edit:And speaking of limitations,the rpg genre is one of the rare genres where you can play the late 70's and early 80's stuff and not be phased by the limitations.

-Audio not present,irrelevant.Doesn't impede anything and stuff like dungeons of daggorath uses the limited audio to its strengths.
-Graphics are not amazing,irrelevant.Dungeon crawling does not need top of the line graphics and the scale of ultima 3 is more then enough for people who want some exploration instead of dungeon crawling.
-Not enough processing power for ai,irrelevant.The dice will make sure enemies can actually pack a punch and as long as you have plenty of nice options(equipment,spells) none is gonna be worried about the ai making stupid mistakes.
-No mouse.Irrelevant.Movement is mostly designed on square grids which are perfectly fine on a keyboard.And you don't have multiple people on the screen to control anyway.
-Loading times,irreleva,oh wait.Well not a problem for emulators.

It really is a timeless genre i guess.

 

[Azalin]

Finished Streets of Rage 2 on steam,it remains as good as I remember it to be from my childhood,too bad they don't really make this kind of beat'em up any more.I miss those times.Maybe I will install Yakuza 0 after this and give it a go

 

[Ovplain]

Finished 'Expeditions: Viking.' Did start to drag on a bit towards the end, got kinda sick of the combat, but overall it was pretty sweet.

4 hours into 'BATTLETECH' now and I already feel pretty good about this one too. Despite not knowing anything about the universe and finding the whole concept of 'mechs' pretty silly. I'm 'all in' anyway.

 

[No Great Name]

The review for Yakuza 1 on the PS2 is finally up here.

There isn't too much to say about this game. The game is heavily story-driven and there are a lot of unskippable cutscenes to sit through when playing through the main story. The game attempts to be open-world in a similar sense to Grand Theft Auto, but it somehow feels less important and less complete. Most of the random activities that are available to the player, things such as the batting cages, arcade minigames, gambling, and seducing hostesses just weren't really worth doing in my opinion as the rewards were either nonexistant or would actually end up costing you. The side quests on the other hand have much better rewards, but a lot of them are hard to find unless the player talks to the right person at the right time in the game's plot. The game also does a terrible job at keeping track of which ones you have already activated but not finished since there's no log or anything of the sort. The player has a missions list, but only the title and a vague description of the side quest is given.

There is also a lot of combat, whether it be plot related or one of many random encounters the player can run into while running around the town. Unfortunately, most of the game's difficulty comes from fighting the controls rather than dealing with the AI itself, although there are a couple of bosses that are really annoying due to how good they are at dodging and blocking everything. Aiming attacks is a bit finicky and I found that my character will inexplicably get turned around somehow which led to me accidentally throwing attacks in the wrong direction. This combined with the fact that the attack combo strings are easily buffered, I found myself not only attacking thin air, but performing an entire combo against thin air which almost always just let my opponent get a free hit. It's pretty much impossible to continue combo strings if you only press the buttons on hit confirms and so buffering them is the only real way to perform them. It's unfortunate too because you need these combo strings in order to break an enemy's guard or knock them down since stray hits here and there aren't all that helpful and only do chip damage at best. Weapons have a limited number of uses before they permanently break and pretty much every combat area the player finds himself in will have something to pick up and use against enemies. Unlock regular attacks, weapons can't be guarded which is great against enemies and bosses that love to block attacks although attacks with weapons have the same buffering problems that regular attacks do. In the end, it took me more than half the game to get used to the jankiness of the combat although it's very satisfying to emerge victorious after beating particularly large groups of enemies all by yourself.

tl;dr
Combat is jank, open-world is not rewarding, play for the story and characters instead.

I've already started playing Mega Man 2 next and it's a pretty fun and short game, but I have already noticed that it's not nearly as difficult and punishing as Mega Man 1 was.

 

[Adon]

A while back someone told me about Tesla Effect and ever since then I've been interested in the Tex Murphy series as a whole and so I've begun from the start.

Tex Murphy: Mean Streets

Other than the awful side-scrolling sections, and how long it can take to travel, I adored this game. I must adamantly admit that I was giddy playing through the game as I filled out two sheets of paper with notes, names, and locations. It was a nice change of pace compared to how much gets handed to you in modern games, heck, even in comparison to the later Tex Murphy games. I don't know what it is, but there's a charm to this game, and even Martian Memorandum that makes them really fun and memorable. From the way the game/characters look and act, to the way the world is to the freedom of approach and figuring stuff out.

I also thought it was interesting for the game being less about puzzles and more about figuring information out from people and learning where to go next. Not a perfect game by any means, but a charming old gem that I wouldn't mind going back to. Easy game to exploit, however, as the game doesn't track of what information you've uncovered. So it's super easy to save, pay money for information, and reload at no cost.


Also:

Spoiler

Tex Murphy: Martian Memorandum

Like I said above, I also found this game to be very charming. Much more of a traditional adventure game with voice acting and small FMV clips giving characters more personality (characters such as a photographer with a questionable french accent). Much like Mean Streets, the characters here are what makes the game as well as uncovering the plot. It gets a slight edge for getting rid of the travel system of MS and of those side-scroller sections while expanding on the conversations by giving you branching dialogue trees and items that you can use on characters. MM also expands on the exploration wonderfully. It was amusing to have the game call you demented for trying out certain things.

My only real issue with the game was how slow Tex would walk. This would make it really annoying having to back to certain areas if you missed something. Well, specifically, it was Rick's place in the jungle and one of the last sections of the game where you have to "outrun" this robot.

Tex Murphy: Under A Killing Moon

This was pretty much what I was expecting from this series. "Full" motion videos (I say full in quotations because clearly a lot of the time only 1 character was actively moving while the other was frozen in place, obviously due to technological limitations), more of a brooding atmosphere that's proper for a sci-fi noir post-apoc setting, traditional puzzles, etc. In fact, the setting is noticeable different from the last two games. While Under A Killing Moon is clearly post-apocalyptic, the tone is more dystopian compared to its predecessors. Here Tex also has more personality than the other games, and Chris Jones plays him spectacularly. One thing this and MM share that I really liked was its humor.

Only thing that's terrible in this game, and in TPD, is movement. While the game is still a point-n-click game much like MM, the game is now in first person view, which is not bad, but the movement is awful. Sometimes the mouse is way too sensitive, and at others Tex just moves so slow. I imagine this has more to do with how old the game is than anything else. Either way, now you have a world that you can much more visibly explore as well as having to physically travel to characters and talk to them. All pretty good changes that made the game more engaging.

Overall, I liked it, but must admit at being slightly disappointed at the mutant designs in this game compared to MS and MM; not the characters themselves, tho, they all ranged from good to great for their purposes and were distinctive from one another. That and the plot, while not a rehash in any way, felt like it was retreading ground from MS with the Brotherhood. It was just done in a bigger and more straightforward way. Regardless, it was a good game and one I had fun with. So much so that right after I finished this game, I went ahead and started up The Pandora Directive.

Tex Murphy: The Pandora Directive

Ohohoho, let me start out by saying that I ended up playing this for 3 straight hours and only stopped to go eat lunch when I first started it up. I haven't finished it yet, I'm close to the end (Day 9) and let me tell you, I can easily see this being my favorite. From the X-files-esque plot and mystery to the puzzles. This game felt almost as big of a jump as the jump from MM to UAKM. Expanded areas from UAKM (We can finally go to the Ritz' lobby), proper FMVs, some C&C on top of everything else that made the last game entertaining. The vidcall with Elijah Witt where you pretend to be his long-lost son had me cracking up.

The puzzles have also been pretty great -- in particular the box puzzles have a been a joy to figure out. It's been a while that I had to sit down and figure shit out for a good while. I only ended up having to look up the laser room puzzle because the instructions made it seem like I couldn't go through a square I had been to before. Turns out that was not the case.

I'm looking forward to finishing this.

That being said, I must admit at not being excited to start Overseer. I can't imagine that game topping TPD, especially since it's pretty much a remake of Mean Streets. What made that game so charming is so far away from how UAKM and TPD have been that it feels like it's going to be devoid of anything worthwhile.

 

[Strange Fellow]

Good shit

Was planning on going back and trying these out ever since I saw that new one.
Is there any continuity between games, and if so how much? Do I need to play them all, or could I just skip to the best one (which sounds like The Pandora Directive)?

 

[Adon]

Good shit

Was planning on going back and trying these out ever since I saw that new one.
Is there any continuity between games, and if so how much? Do I need to play them all, or could I just skip to the best one (which sounds like The Pandora Directive)?

There's some loose continuity up to and including Under A Killing Moon by way of a handful of recurring characters and references to Mean Streets and Martian Memorandum. The Pandora Directive has a stronger sense of continuity with a lot of recurring characters and locations from UAKM.

However, I wouldn't recommend skipping any one of these. They're all worth going through for different reasons and they're not terribly long.

If I had to pick one to skip, it'd probably be Mean Streets (the least referenced game in the series so far) if only because Overseer is a remake of that game and the only thing, continuity-wise, that's necessary to know from MS is that that is the case where Tex meets Sylvia Linsky. But the way she's shown in UAKM is drastically different from MS that you're just as good with the information you get from UAKM given how little she's in that game anyway.

 

[Strange Fellow]

Had another bout with Idiot-kabalen (The Idiot Solitaire) today. I've been going at it regularly for a few weeks now, to no avail, thus proving the accuracy of its name; I can only surmise that it is called The Idiot because you'd have to be an idiot to believe it's actually solvable. The website says that the solution "happens very rarely," which I can confirm. My blood pressure is reaching dangerous levels.

Like any good drug addict, I feel the urge to pass on my misery to others, so here are the rules:

Spoiler

(Ace is highest.)
1. Start by placing four cards on the table, face up.
2. Remove any card from the table that is from the same suit as another and has a lower value. So if two of the cards you start out with are the queen and the two of hearts, you can discard the latter.
3. Whenever a free space opens up, you're allowed to take the topmost card from any of the other three piles and put it there.
4. Whenever you're out of moves, i.e. when the topmost cards of all four piles are from different suits, lay out four more cards from the deck, one on each pile. Repeat until all cards from the deck are laid out.
5. You win when only the four aces remain on the table. If more cards than the four aces remain on the table, you have laid out the whole deck, and you're out of moves, you lose.
6. Stay away from this if you know what's good for you.
7. Fuck you.

Maybe it has an English name, if anyone recognizes this I'd love to know.

 

[Sceptic]

That being said, I must admit at not being excited to start Overseer. I can't imagine that game topping TPD, especially since it's pretty much a remake of Mean Streets.

TPD is up there as one of the best adventure games ever, so of course Overseer doesn't top it. That said I do think it's worth playing, partly because of how awesome Michael York is, partly because it expands on certain characters in ways that segue better with Tesla Effect (and you MUST play this one). As long as you know what you're getting you'll enjoy it. Which brings me to

If I had to pick one to skip, it'd probably be Mean Streets (the least referenced game in the series so far) if only because Overseer is a remake of that game

I'm super happy to read how much you're enjoying the series, and especially how much you liked the investigative approach in MS, which makes reading this bit puzzling, especially with respect to what I quoted above. MS is in many ways the better game, and its gameplay is unique and great, so why skip it at all? Sure in terms of continuity you lose nothing, but why miss on a great game in its own right? I honestly would say that the best way to enjoy the series is to play all six in order and not skip any. Replaying the same story in MS and Overseer is a small price to pay for experiencing MS in all its unique glory (and its shitty action sequences!) and for being blown away by Michael York and the ending of Overseer.

Spoiler

Just be happy you didn't have to wait SIXTEEN FUCKING YEARS to see that cliffhanger resolved.

 

[Adon]

That being said, I must admit at not being excited to start Overseer. I can't imagine that game topping TPD, especially since it's pretty much a remake of Mean Streets.

TPD is up there as one of the best adventure games ever, so of course Overseer doesn't top it. That said I do think it's worth playing, partly because of how awesome Michael York is, partly because it expands on certain characters in ways that segue better with Tesla Effect (and you MUST play this one). As long as you know what you're getting you'll enjoy it. Which brings me to

If I had to pick one to skip, it'd probably be Mean Streets (the least referenced game in the series so far) if only because Overseer is a remake of that game

I'm super happy to read how much you're enjoying the series, and especially how much you liked the investigative approach in MS, which makes reading this bit puzzling, especially with respect to what I quoted above. MS is in many ways the better game, and its gameplay is unique and great, so why skip it at all? Sure in terms of continuity you lose nothing, but why miss on a great game in its own right? I honestly would say that the best way to enjoy the series is to play all six in order and not skip any. Replaying the same story in MS and Overseer is a small price to pay for experiencing MS in all its unique glory (and its shitty action sequences!) and for being blown away by Michael York and the ending of Overseer.

Spoiler

Just be happy you didn't have to wait SIXTEEN FUCKING YEARS to see that cliffhanger resolved.

Ah, you misunderstand. If I had to pick one for continuity reasons, it'd be Mean Streets, but in no way shape or form would I ever personally recommend for anyone to skip that game. I had way too much fun in general to ever tell someone to actually skip it. Like I said in the same post, they're all worth playing through.

 

[Azalin]

Finished Memoria,it's a pretty good adventure and a big improvement over it's mediocre predecessor Chains of Satinav,storytelling,dialogues,riddles are all better.Graphics are good,so is music,hell even the voice acting doesn't suck this time since the new voice actors are good(too bad the old ones reprise their roles).Recommended.

 

[sullynathan]

Been playing Risen, GOG says I have put 13 hours in it, just in two days. Risen has been alright so far but this will be a quick comment. It is very very close to Gothic but newer which makes it very repetitive. The combat the overall world design, quest structure, faction system is all the same as Gothic 1, even the weed quests are here. It's all so unimaginative because it just seems like Piranha bytes took their old game and pasted it in an island with some pirate motif, but the island could still be mistaken for Gothics prison colony, even down to the different factions of bandit group/less bandit group.

Stealth is still the exact same just based on characters seeing you or not and if you're in sneak mode, blacksmithing is still the exact same, some of the physics and animations are the same but even worse at times and combat is still almost the exact same as Gothic 2 but worse now. You don't have manual lock-on but a soft auto-lock on and it can be quite annoying to use. You're attacking an enemy but if you move the camera in a direction then the game stops targetting said enemy, which becomes a problem because if you dodge an enemy before the enemy attacks, or before the enemy reajusts its position or if you dodge too far, then you stop being locked on to said enemy and you will almost always miss hitting the enemy with your weapon.
Too much standing behind blocking, it felt almost exactly like I was playing Ocarina of Time, that game came out in 1998, Risen came out in 2009 and Piranha can barely do better.
AI is still dumb as hell and highly predictable. You can still aggro most enemies you encounter and then make them follow you to your overpowered partner early on or to a town where them get destroyed. My early partners AI pathfinding fucked up and he stopped taking me to town. Thanks man.

Being too much of the same makes Risen far too predictable for my liking. It was soon till I entered town and quickly learned and found myself doing petty tasks and at times fetch quests for individuals to gain favors with certain factions that occupy the same town for whatever reason. Gothic did make me prefer this though just due to each faction being very far apart and not occupying the same town. You already know which characters will try to pick a fight with you just due to their voice sounding like an asshole like Gothic. You don't really want to explore most of the outside world until you get armor because you did the exact same thing in Gothic, etc. etc. The game is far too safe for my liking making it feel like a retread of Gothic with new textures.

Fuck it, I will download Gothic 3. As much as I gave it shit due to being exhausted with the game after almost 70 hours of play that mostly was boring. It was far more ambitious, adventurous and open than Risen is. It was like the previous Gothic games but actually tried something new.

 

[Villagkouras]

I tried playing Chasm, a game that was kickstarted 5 years ago (well, I had never heard of it) and it's out now. 5 years. For this. It belongs to Metroidvania genre but it sucks. Apparently, the devs decided that all it needs to give replayability to their game was to add procedural generated dungeons and they wanted to perfect the formula. First of all, I want to come back to a game because the game is good and I'll have good time with it. I know everything by heart in Dark Souls and other games that I love and I'm coming back to them because they are good games. Chasm is not one. It has very very clunky combat. Dungeons are filled with absolutely nothing. I had to reach about 25% of the game to gain one new ability. Mobs health is bloated and lack any AI. Probably they added more HP to them because they couldn't code satisfying combat (why not give another 5 years for this?). Oh and their biggest trick, "procedural content" is bollocks. I watched a couple of streams in YT and the dungeons were the same, they only changed the loot (I'm talking about health items, gems etc, significant items were on the same spot). Very bad game, avoid it, just wait for Dead Cells or Death's Gambit which I pray to be good.

Anyway, during the last month I managed to beat some games I wanted to, here it is:

Risk of Rain: Yeah, I beat it (9 hrs total time) and I don't know how. I couldn't get past level 3, suddenly I had one good run and beat the game (with Acrid). But I will come back to it to unlock new characters and try new things. Because the game is fucking good, Chasm devs, not because there is procedural content. I was late to the party for this game, but I still recommend it.

Cursed Castilla (gifted some time ago by Abu Antar, thanks man!): Nice homage to games like Ghosts 'n' Goblins. Sometimes it was a bit clunky, but most of the times it was fun. I got the bad ending, apparently there are some hidden stuff I don't know if I'll ever come back to find. But, the game is good, levels are short and difficult, bosses were fun. Overall, if you find it at low price, get it, even for nostalgia's sake.

Lara Croft GO: I played this at work, summer is great for me at work. Overall, it's ok. It's not a challenging puzzle game, expect 3-4 hours of gameplay, but somehow it feels like Lara is an actual tomb raider. I don't know how they captured the atmosphere better than the latest "AAA" Tomb Raider games, but they did. That's the high point of this game, don't expect to be challenged.

Frostpunk: Most of you have played the game and know what this is about. I liked it, but they overdid it with the "moral" stuff. Most of my people survived the endgame and after this I get a message like "Was it worth it?", just because I ordered the kids to work. Are you kidding me? Who the fuck would complain to work 12 hrs, in a warmer place, just to avoid DEATH? But the game was good, excellent presentation, nice atmosphere, stupid moral questions most of the time.

Broforce: I played it with 2 friends, couch coop, stoned, couldn't stop laughing. GOAT, under these circumstances.

Figment: It's an easy and short isometric action game, with nice cartoony graphics and good soundtrack. Really, some songs are very good. It also had the premise for a good story, but they managed to water it down a bit, probably because they didn't want to make it a "mature" game. Overall, nothing excellent, but I don't regret playing it.

Kathy Rain: I had to edit this post, because I forgot I finished this, something that happened a couple of days ago. It's not a bad game and adventure fans will probably like it, but I think I'm done with adventure games. If this praised game doesn't make me remember it after two days, I think it's my problem with the genre. It had nice dialogues and voice acting, easy riddles that made sense, overall it's ok.

 

[Egosphere]

Max Payne 1. Really loving it so far ( just killed Lupino, doing the horror level ).
The gameplay is so simple yet really frantic. No cover means every gunfight is do-or-die.

 

[Azalin]

I bought and started playing Lords of Waterdeep,the video game adaptation of the boardgame and it's a good adaptation.If you like that boardgame or if you interested in a simple worker placement game with an rpg flavour,get it now while it's on sale.

 

[mastroego]

I agree, nice port - though I don't own the boardgame, so let's say it plays nice.
Definitely very "flavourful".

 

[Jason Liang]