What game are you wasting time on?

[octavius]

Diablo 2, 1.09 Patch.

Battling The Ancients with a bow wielding Amazon on Nightmare. Holy shit, this was the most difficult fight so far.
Hit and run seems to be the only valid tactic. Fortunately my Amazon has about 40% extra movement (would have been 65% with her previous bow), so after some reloads I learnt to avoid the Leap Attacks and Whirlwinds. One direct hit with a LA would be fatal.
I watched some YouTube videos to compare, and as usual I was disgusted. Seems the Valkyrie and Merc are near invincible with the newer patches, while in 1.09 they have a very short life expactancy.

Of course, it would have helped if I had remembered that I can quip the merc with weapons and armour...

 

[Cael]

Also been playing a little Red Baron recently. And I dicked around a bit with Secret Weapons of the Luftwaffe and F-117A Nighthawk Stealth Fighter. Digging the hell out of old flight sims, tho I've been playing with an xbox controller as I haven't quite justified a joystick purchase to myself yet (but I'm edging closer). Gonna jump into TIE Fighter at some point soon

Once you figure out the best way to earn points is to put in an extended range fuel tank and take up a photo run, and go on a joyride in enemy territory for as long as your fuel holds out, F117A becomes pretty boring... I prefer Gunship 2000 :D

 

[BlackGoat]

Also been playing a little Red Baron recently. And I dicked around a bit with Secret Weapons of the Luftwaffe and F-117A Nighthawk Stealth Fighter. Digging the hell out of old flight sims, tho I've been playing with an xbox controller as I haven't quite justified a joystick purchase to myself yet (but I'm edging closer). Gonna jump into TIE Fighter at some point soon

Once you figure out the best way to earn points is to put in an extended range fuel tank and take up a photo run, and go on a joyride in enemy territory for as long as your fuel holds out, F117A becomes pretty boring... I prefer Gunship 2000 :D

Thanks for the rec

Spoiler

This is good

 

[Jack Of Owls]

F117A becomes pretty boring... I prefer Gunship 2000 :D

I remember really enjoying Microprose's Project Stealth Fighter for my old Commodore 64 so many years ago, which was basically a crude prototype for F117A. I'm surprised no one ever used the data files & missions from Gunship 2000 and did a Falcon BMS 4.33 kind of thing (which used Falcon 3 files, I believe). It would be cool to see it updated.

 

[Cael]

F117A becomes pretty boring... I prefer Gunship 2000 :D

I remember really enjoying Microprose's Project Stealth Fighter for my old Commodore 64 so many years ago, which was basically a crude prototype for F117A. I'm surprised no one ever used the data files & missions from Gunship 2000 and did a Falcon BMS 4.33 kind of thing (which used Falcon 3 files, I believe). It would be cool to see it updated.

I spent way too much time in my youth playing Gunship 2000 and Red Storm Rising...

 

[Strange Fellow]

I'm done with Superhero League of Hoboken. It was fun for the first couple of hours, but that's it. The RPG elements are terribly shallow, with no options in combat bar attacking (or using a superpower, which is the same thing since none of the ones usable in combat do anything but deal damage), which makes it so that the only entertainment you'll get out of it is reading the enemy descriptions, which are admittedly hilarious, with Espevangelists FUNDRAISING and Lawyers SUING for AoE damage, Marketoons enrolling hapless party members in focus groups for mental damage, etc. It's fun for a while, but grows repetitive fast, and there's too much of it.

The meat of the game lies in the quests you recieve from the Superhero HQ, which take the form of typical adventure game puzzles. Unfortunately, the puzzles get pretty dumb, and there are far too many items to be picked up and locations to visit -- and while the game is initially good about giving you directions, it quickly stops, and you'll have to memorise the names and locations of dozens of train stations, marketplaces and other named locations yourself (or just use a walkthrough, which is a much better idea). What's more, the quest-based structure ensures there's virtually no pacing to the game. If you've wondered whether pacing is important to a good adventure game, try this one and you'll see that yes, it is.
The writing is good and funny, the setting is novel (probably the purest satire I've seen in a video game, Meretzky didn't pull his punches) but I'm sick of the actual game.

Next up is Mordheim. I've played a few hours and it seems brilliant so far, except for the UI which is awful.

 

[Kabas]

I played a bunch of games recently
The Quest - my recent attempts at Daggerfall Unity reminded me that i didn't finish this one. Now i remembered why i didn't finish it.
Mechanics are a bit too simplistic for me and i think i reached the point where being a pure mage has become really tedious.
A damn pretty game though, especially considering that this is a mobile port. There is some weird fetish thing going with the writing, kinda charming in it's own way.

It stares back - early access indie rts. Features are a bit barebones right now and only 9 missions of the main campaign, but the art, the music and the presentation pretty much carry the whole game.
Very cheap on steam.

Rising Kingdoms - a warcraft 3 like rts, a very good one. Hero and unit abilities tends to be fun to use and encourage pairing specific units with specific heroes.
Like, the human paladin hero can turn his swordsman/paladins phys. attacks into more damaging ranged attacks(they will start shooting magical beams with their swords). The witch queen hero can levitate, rendering her immune to melee attacks at the cost of the ability to move, and can turn all the surrounding cursed enemies into rats(meaning you will want to pair her with the fellow witches who can apply this curse). The foresters wolf queen can be built either as a summoner of an invisible high-crit white wolfs or as a werewolf who can deal some good damage herself. Fey hero is an asshole who redirects damage from herself to her allies. And the first darkling hero you will get in the campaign can literally teleport into heaven and reappear with full health and free item.
Instead of exp and levels you have glory which is spent on hero abilities and increasing your total army size. Glory is acquired by subjugating the lesser races who can give you an access to their units and other various bonuses, like the troll cannon that shoots trolls across the whole map.
The campaigns are not that interesting by themselves though, rarely anything special when it comes to mission structure.

 

[ebPD8PePfC]

Magnetic Daydream - I'm playing it for 15-20 minutes here and there. It's a puzzle game similar to portal, but you can also turn the portal on its side, so the object leaving it will also change gravity. So turn the portal twice, and the object will fall to the sky instead of the ground. The objective is to get to the exit door.
Since you can change the direction of gravity, every square object can be stood on from all 6 faces. This means brute forcing a solution is harder, but when you do succeed it feels scummy - did I actually solve it, or did I abuse the game again? I like it. It turns the game from a pure puzzle game to a test of engine limitations and finding odd solutions.
For example, Unlike Portal where the portals were 2d, here the portal has a thick 3d solid contour. So by running forward and repeatedly shooting portals under you, you can effectively fly forward at 30-45 degrees. I've managed to solve two levels this way.
The game is fun, though it's so unpolished that it's hard tell whether I actually solved the puzzle or just broke it enough to get to the exit.

 

[Carrion]

Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory

I played the first two Splinter Cell around the time they came out. They were pretty enjoyable, but one playthrough was enough for both of them, and I never got around to playing the third game until now. Many people seem to consider it the best in the series, and it comes up in every "best stealth game" discussion out there, so I thought it was time to finally give it a go.

I've done four missions so far, and it's... alright. It took a while to get used to the controls, but the gameplay is generally fine, and there are some neat mechanical things like how the game takes the sound level of the environment into account. I'm guessing there's a bunch of improvements from the first two games, but it's been so long since I played them that I can't really tell for sure. The AI is fairly perceptive but a tad lazy in its searches, and you have your typical stealth game guards that like to patrol pitch-black areas where they can't see two feet in front of them. I guess one thing I was expecting a bit more from was the level design, which seems very straightforward. There isn't necessarily anything wrong with that, but so far it doesn't seem like that much of a leap forward from the previous games. Every level up to this point has had a pretty straight path through it, with some minor branches thrown here and there, more for the sake of having exciting side objectives like "find 5 weapon crates" than offering alternative paths through the level. It's not like I expected huge, sprawling levels or anything, but I was hoping for a bit more freedom in how you approach each level, as the acrobatics and other cool things somewhat go to waste when you can only use them in specific, unavoidable points in the game. There was this bank level that I was hoping would be some grand, multi-level affair with high-level security that would really put your skills to the test, but it ended up being basically just a small yard, a lobby and a couple of corridors — not bad, but a bit underwhelming despite all the cameras and laser tripwires and alarm systems and military reinforcements. Maybe Thief 2 just set the standard unreasonably high.

In any case it's still a fun game and probably the best third-person, hide-in-the-shadows stealth game out there.

 

[Swigen]

I just got Arcanum and I think I’m having a good time!

 

[Strange Fellow]

Mordheim: City of the Damned. Is there some sort of level scaling based on days/missions passed going on here? I've had a string of defeats since foolishly trying for the first "story" mission too soon. I used to be able to beat Normal and even Hard difficulty missions handily (hence the hubris), but now I can barely get a grunt or two down before routing even in Normal missions. Is it just my imagination trying to justify my sucking, or should I start over?

 

[DeepOcean]

Finished off The Last Crusade (eehh, was not that into it)

Man, hated Last Crusade so much, and any game that has musical puzzles automatically makes me avoid it like the plague, Fate of Atlantis is much better.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Is there some sort of level scaling based on days/missions passed going on here?

For non-story missions, iirc the enemy parties are always "mirrors" of your own when it comes to the number of dudes, overall team value and whether you have an impressive or not. Mishun difficulty then applies a percentage bonus to the enemy stats.

 

[laclongquan]

Theme Hospital, again~

Control the pace, control the specific entry/exit points~

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Gave up on DuckTales: Remastered. "Gave up" is a bit harsh, considering I have only left to beat the final boss + epilogue, but I ran into the well-known bug that the game freezes at that point in the game. It's nothing that can't be worked around, but considering the age of the game, and that the problem has NOT been fixed by the devs (nor will it ever be, by the looks of it) I see no reason to put in any more effort than I already have.

To eliminate confusion I need to point out that there exist two DuckTales games that were released around the same time: The NES platformer and a home computer version called DuckTales: The Quest for Gold. This remaster is of the former title.

I never played the original, and didn't think I'd have much trouble with the game, remastered or otherwise. Wrong. I chose 'Medium' difficulty and needed four attempts to clear the Amazon level, which is the first level after the tutorial. I needed these tries to get used to the controls, get a better grip on the game mechanics and groan as I realized that enemies constantly respawn at an alarming rate... except when I need them to, as it turns out.

Once I finally beat the Amazon level and tried to take on the other four levels, I breezed through them in one sitting. That left the final level which is a pointless slog, only to have that gamebreaking bug at the end to sour the whole experience.

For a remastered effort I found some glaring omissions, like the lack of audio controls and a cranky interface, which leads me to conclude that while it does many things well and properly elevates the game (close) to modern standards, the end result is still a game lacking proper focus. Its difficulty still reeks of the 1980s, but everything else about it is aimed at modern gamers and younger players... and I doubt neither group is gonna find the game that appealing, despite everything.

A mediocre effort, one that's currently unavailable because some cheapskate only forked out money for a five-year license.

 

[Wyatt_Derp]

Just finished a run of This War of Mine. Is it just me or did the recent anniversary updates make the game easier? I breezed through it. Usually you get tough winters, the trader comes by very rarely, and enemies at loot locations are super challenging. I didn't lose anyone, morale stayed high, and I had plenty of loot (even diamonds) by the time the war ended.

 

[Abu Antar]

Darksiders 3. It's not great but I don't hate it (yet). I enjoyed the first two games. 1 more than 2, due to the repetitiveness of the latter.
Combat isn't great, but I am still very early in the game. I beat what I assume is the tutorial boss. One thing I don't like is how the dogde feels and the platforming is annoying. The main character also seems to be an edgy diva. We'll see how I feel about this after a few more hours.

Bravely Second. I've reached the games's twist and now I am collecting all the jobs I missed in previous chapters.

Underrail. I've finally settled on a build. My first build was a psi using monk. I got all the way to Core City, but I am now playing a psi focused build.
Helped Camp Hathor with their problems and now moving on.

Persona 5. I'm not far from th end. I'm in late November. I doubt that I can max out all confidants, which is a shame. Oh well. The palace that I just completed was the most fun. I've read that some people did not like palaces, but I prefercthe Persona 5 dungeons over the ones in P3 and P4.

Zero Escape: Zero Time Dilemma. Finally started up this game. Haven't played much, maybe an hour or so. I really want to know how this trilogy ends as I liked the two previous games in the series.

The Way of Nether (Tale of Wuxia: Pre-Sequel DLC).
I honestly thought that this would be my last post about it. I was 100% sure that I was fighting the final battle. It was epic and I was nervous as fuck, but I managed to win. I was very surprised that the game didn't end there, though. I can't wait to see what kind of fight(s) awaits me next.

 

[YldriE]

Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory

If you are up for more once you're done, do give Double Agent a go. The PC / Xbox 360 / PS3 version made the move towards what the series has become since, but the PS2 / GameCube / Xbox / Wii version was essentially a fat Chaos Theory DLC and retained the traditional gameplay.

If you emulate, play the PS2 version. The GameCube version has a terrible control scheme due to the lower number of buttons on the controller, and even then there are ways to make useful shortcuts; it's just a shit port really, no excuse.

 

[BlackGoat]

Terra Nova: Strike Force Centauri. People are still sleeping on this shit. I could do without these Wing Commander FMVs tho, lol. Pretty sad that this silly FMV bullshit put Looking Glass in the red and delayed the release, smh. It'd be a lot cooler if I could just be playing my own pilot instead of this milquetoast babby boy but either way I'm really digging it tho I feel like every engagement turns into a major clusterfuck with me backpeddling and panic shooting at incoming pirates. I'd love to see a modern update of this sort of game. Mech-y soldier sim with on the fly early Ghost Recon/Rainbow Six style planning and execution (waypoints, go codes, all that shit).

Knocked out Batman: Arkham Asylum which got old pretty quick despite being superficially fun. Fired up Arkham City and I'm already having a much better time tho we'll see how long that lasts. Played a little of the Sunsoft Batman NES game and man it feels good. Really chunky precise movement. Legit controls, but pain in the ass platforming. Gotta say, way better than Asylum.

Also continuing a survey of old sims. Barely dipped my toes into Subwar 2050 but eager to play more. Also Apache Longbow and Gunship 2000. Really wanted to get into some Mechwarrior games, but I couldn't get Mechwarrior 2 to run on my rig, but Mechwarrior 4 seems to do all right. Pretty legit, men. Where did this kind of game go?

Loom is still next as far as adventure games go.

Oh and I've been going back thru Half-Life 2. I really dug this shit when it first came out but when I played it again 10 years ago while in the midst of a "DOOM93 is the only FPS realness" fugue I didn't think that much of it, an opinion probably influenced by the general tedious trend of overly orchestrated "CINEMATIC intensity" vidya console bullshit. HOWEVER. While I still favor Half-Life 1 in the franchise, and my personal FPS preference is DOOM 93 4eva, playing thru HL2 in 2019 feels pretty great and often brilliant and really a sort of melancholy demonstration of what a particular kind of game could've been once upon a time and how the lessons taught and the lessons understood are seldom the same.

 

[ebPD8PePfC]

Conan unconquered - It's a tower defense game with RTS base management. Enemy waves attack every 5 minutes, while your buildings provide resources every couple of seconds, which can be used for building the base and raising an army.
The game lacks a speed up button (run the game at 2x speed, or more), a standard feature in other tower defense games. This kills the game. It takes 25 minutes for wave 5/10... this is insanely slow. The only way to speed things up is by telling waves to attack now instead of waiting the full timer, which means you lose income but get better score. It could have been a good challenge, but not when the levels are so long.
You might inadvertently ruin your economy on wave 2 by speeding it up, only to realize it 30 minute later at wave 8. It's not worth the risk when each level lasts so long.

It's not a bad game if you're new to RTS games and need a lot of time to think things over, but if you aren't, than you'll find that there's way too much dead time caused by the lack of a speed up button. Wait for healing, wait for resources, wait for enemy waves to get to base, wait for combat to resolve. Without a speed up button the game is simply boring.

 

[Cael]

Conan unconquered - It's a tower defense game with RTS base management. Enemy waves attack every 5 minutes, while your buildings provide resources every couple of seconds, which can be used for building the base and raising an army.
The game lacks a speed up button (run the game at 2x speed, or more), a standard feature in other tower defense games. This kills the game. It takes 25 minutes for wave 5/10... this is insanely slow. The only way to speed things up is by telling waves to attack now instead of waiting the full timer, which means you lose income but get better score. It could have been a good challenge, but not when the levels are so long.
You might inadvertently ruin your economy on wave 2 by speeding it up, only to realize it 30 minute later at wave 8. It's not worth the risk when each level lasts so long.

It's not a bad game when you get to play, but there's way to much dead time caused by the lack of a speed up button. Wait for healing, wait for resources, wait for enemy waves to get to base, wait for combat to resolve. Without a speed up button the game is simply boring.

For Tower Defence games, few beat Kingdom Rush or Demonrift.

 

[eXalted]

Some more Heroes 3 fan-made scenarios:

Amaranth Soul Shift
Adventurous feel, dynamic enemies and some interesting and funny events. I really really enjoyed this one.

Redbeak's Revenge
I was a little overwhelmed at the beginning (I don't like starting with multiple castles). I was thinking that I wouldn't like this map but slowly it really grew on me. Didn't have much plot but was a very good map anyway.

 

[flyingjohn]

Just finished 3 missions in warsong(genesis srpg) and i quit.

Its main gimmick is the exact reason i hate it.Srpg are not designed to control a large army.Couple this with no way to snap to heroes,no way to remove battle animation,slow cursor speed and a fetish for ai controlled allies,you get a very annoying slog.
Also the ai is a complete suicidal moron.

Vixen 357,which is mech langrisser shares many faults with this game but,actually fixes some:
-You can snap to heroes
-Battle animation can be disabled
-Quick cursor speed
-Ability to transfer units across the battlefield
-Range and melee are not one tile anymore

Unfortunately:
-Same bullshit with ai controlled units
-Barely any customization for a mech game
-Game length is on the low side(sub 10 hours)
-Leveling up is almost useless

I am gonna try langrisser 2 and hope it improved the series.

 

[Zep Zepo]

Gave up on Spiderman. Too much samey bullshit.

Starting on Code Vein today (The trial/demo). Should have the full game in a couple days.

Zep--

 

[Apostle Hand]

playing Hitman Codename 47

interesting game