What game are you wasting time on?

[Puukko]

Playing VTMR with the Age of Redemption balance/bugfix mod and some HD AI textures and a Reshade profile to make it a bit nicer looking. First of all, I love this take on the world - my only real exposure to WoD so far has been VTMB and this is very familiar yet the (for now) medieval setting gives it a unique flare. The flowery olden English of dubious authenticity is great and the voice performances are surprisingly solid. The combat... well, it exists. The game tried to go for some sort of Diablo feel, but it is still based on dice rolls where 2/3 of your attacks miss so it's about as exciting as room temperature porridge. But, coming from VTMB, I can deal with it.

 

[Modron]

Isn't the combat more akin to Infinity Engine round based combat complete with lots of auto pause options and only being able to do whatever number of actions per round? Been decades since I played it.

 

[Puukko]

No, there's no pausing as far as I know (gave the manual a brief glimpse) and you just click click using either weak or strong attacks and maintain relevant disciplines. And get body blocked by the AI.

 

[wyes gull]

Streets of Rage 4! Yay? I mean, it's only been, what, 25 years or thereabouts?
Not sure how good it is yet but it's been pretty entertaining, after 2 hours.
Still, feels more like a SoR cover band than the real thing. I'd complain but then there's fuck all side-scrollers nowadays and I can cross my eyes at the title screen and pretend Blaze is actually Blouse.

FTL on Normal is kicking my behind relentlessly and mercilessly.

PAUSE MOAR. Seriously. People pause and reassess way too little when they start out at that game.

Spoiler

Also, upgrade your engines.

 

[Puukko]

Regarding VTMR's shortcomings...
First, the pathfinding is often dodgy, even when patched. What seems to throw it off is when the actual distance is short but you have go around, like when you're right next to an elevated position, or when there's a table between. The character you control might get stuck running back and forth if you simply tell them to go straight up the cliff or around the table, and once you've manually plotted your way there, the AI members probably won't follow. In general I've had some instances where they like lagging behind, and once stopped acting completely until I reloaded.

Second, the lack of information. You've got a small pane with a few lines of information about what disciplines are being used, death messages and so on. Thing is, even this small pane gets replaced with the name of the enemy you're targeting, which you'll obviously be doing in combat, so you'll only really gets brief glimpses at it when you hover your mouse over to activate disciplines (which can't be toggled with keys save for Feed to my knowledge - I've got the number keys gathering dust here...) or if you opt to just stop attacking and take a beating to see what disciplines the enemy is using. So it boils down visual observation since numerical data is essentially nonexistent in combat. The only indication of how much damage you're doing is how fast the enemy's name turns pink and then red. With how big the UI is, why they opted to make such poor use of it and give you so little information baffles me.
Another thing are the discipline scrolls - they all look exactly the same! You've got half a dozen disciplines and twenty scrolls across three inventories and have to manually hover over to check what each one does - or rather, the name of the discipline which might not be the most indicative of its function.
Finally, the stances. You can set the party to aggressive/neutral/defensive. Guess what each one does. If you guessed that defensive makes your party behave like limp fish, while aggressive causes them to pick fights with neutral city guards, you were correct.

 

[Abu Antar]

I beat Syberia. Took me 6.5 hours. It was a bit slow paced, but I have to admit that it was a perfect "chill" game. Not overly complicated, and it didn't overstay its welcome. A small nitpick is that the game is very brown and grey. The next time GOG have a sale on the second game, I'll get it. Or maybe I own it. I have to check.

I I think I've reached the last third of Tales of Symphonia. I have all characters, and I am starting to get the Devils Arms. The second form of the Sworddancer went down. That battle was intense! I usually describe these games as button mashy action jrpgs, but if you try to do that in the tougher fights, especially these Sworddancer fights, you'll only last for seconds before wiping. I want to just collect all the DAs to unleash their full power. Can't wait to see how that boss fight will go.

Other than that, I have tried to not play a gazillion games at the same time. Dragon Quest XI and Underrail are the other two games that have my time stolen. In DQXI, I'm going to the world tree, and in Underrail, I am going on an extermination march in the Black Sea.

 

[Zibniyat]

Homeworld 1 (Classic)

I like its art direction, graphics (for a 1999 game they're good even today, especially compared to "artistic pixelated" trash that devs do), the soundtrack and the variety of missions and many possibilities to finish each one. The story didn't really grab me, but it's coherent, purposeful and good enough.

I dislike the awful camera with which I constantly have to fight, and apparently the existence of some mission-breaking bugs, such as the one I have encountered today in mission 10. I wiped clean the map of enemies, and for some reason the game just doesn't want to accept that I have completed all the objectives; apparently this is a known bug, known for like decades now, and it still exists.

The solution is to redo the whole mission hoping it won't happen again (most of the time it does not happen, but it can), which I will not do now. Maybe never. I do not like this game as much as I do Homeworld 2 (Classic), and frankly the possibility of it bugging again despite what I may or may not do makes me not want to even try it. So, if someone has a save-file for mission 11 and is willing to share, I'd be very glad to have it, I play through Steam. If not, then that's it I guess, I might just watch videos of the remaining missions or something. Otherwise it's a solid 8/10 game.

 

[Frank Capicoli]

Dead Rising 1: After completing three fairly long RPGs I was in the mood for something a little less demanding in time. I hadn't touched this game since it originally released 14 years ago and since it got a PC port a few years ago revisiting it has been on my backlog for a few years now. The game after all these years is still great minus a few small flaws like dealing with the survivor pathfinding. Dead Rising is easily one of my favorite games from 2006 and probably one of the best exclusives the xbox 360, since that console was such a piece of shit I'm glad it finally got a proper port off of it.

Real shame what happened to the series.

 

[Wunderbar]

Ultima Underworld.
Just found a lost blueprint, and trying to return it to its owner.

- Here is your blueprint.
- No, you don't have my blueprint!

unpacks blueprint from a coffer and initiates dialogue again

- Here is your blueprint.
- No, you don't have my blueprint!

Is this some kind of bug? Ohhh, it's not a blueprint, it's a scroll case!
unpacks blueprint from a scroll case and initiates dialogue again

- Here is your blueprint.
- No, you don't have my blueprint!

Wtf, this is most certainly a bug. I have a blueprint in my inventory and that NPC still refuses to see it!
wastes few minutes reading forums, solves the quest by drag-n-dropping a blueprint into barter panel

Guess I should've RTFM.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Ultima Underworld.

wastes few minutes reading forums, solves the quest by drag-n-dropping a blueprint into barter panel

I've learned to call the barter window 'the gibmedat-tray'.

 

[oldbonebrown]

Dead Rising 1: After completing three fairly long RPGs I was in the mood for something a little less demanding in time. I hadn't touched this game since it originally released 14 years ago and since it got a PC port a few years ago revisiting it has been on my backlog for a few years now. The game after all these years is still great minus a few small flaws like dealing with the survivor pathfinding. Dead Rising is easily one of my favorite games from 2006 and probably one of the best exclusives the xbox 360, since that console was such a piece of shit I'm glad it finally got a proper port off of it.

Real shame what happened to the series.

Do a save-all-survivors run or I'm taking back my

rating

 

[newtmonkey]

I have been trying out a few games to decide my next RPG to tackle, and I do believe I've found it:

Dragon Wars
So far it is amazing, with some fun opportunities to use skills, nice writing in the paragraph book, and what appears to be several paths to get out of the first area. The automap is nice, but has very little detail and functionality, so I'm also drawing maps as I go.

The combat falls in the middle of the blobber pack, I guess. I was pleasantly surprised to see that making use of buffing/debuffing spells can turn a hopeless battle into a close (or even resounding) victory. Of the classic blobbers I've played extensively/finished, I'd rank the combat in DW higher than that in The Bard's Tale 1-3 and Might & Magic 3, but lower than the combat in M&M 1 or Wizardry 1-3+5. Time will tell, of course.

 

[Mark Richard]

Ultimate General: Civil War is an extensive career mode during the American Civil War 1861-1865. The two parts to this game are split between management and combat. Surviving officers and units earn experience, equipment is bought or salvaged from the enemy, and the results of each battle have an impact on the next. Losing or drawing is a possibility, and fleeing the field to fight another day is sometimes preferable to sacrificing more men. This is just the sort of slow-burn battlefield experience I've been looking for, with fights often going on for an hour. I have 36 regiments between 3 corps. The first corp has the finest equipment such as imported British rifles and French cannon, the second is comprised of shock troops, and the third is an expendable skavenslave horde build to drain the enemy's limited ammunition.

Apparently there was some egregious level scaling bullshit during the initial release which has since been solved. Gives me hope Fantasy General II might be better off as well.

 

[Citizen]

Drakan 2: The Ancient Gates. Fun, but kinda lacks the magic of the first game. Maybe just due to the washed out PS2 graphics? IDK. Combat is better than the first game tho, parries are great.

 

[cosmicray]

Nier: Automata. Ending B done. I think I need a bit of a break before going into C. Because I'm gonna grind the shit out of it. At least most of the quests(I think) were done.
Half Life: Opposing Force. Wasn't going to play(especially right after completing HL), but decided why not.Haven't played before and heard only good opinions about it. And I wanted to go back to Black Mesa anyway. Halfway through probably. Aside from stupid elevator bug, the game is great.

 

[octavius]

I have been trying out a few games to decide my next RPG to tackle, and I do believe I've found it:

Dragon Wars
So far it is amazing, with some fun opportunities to use skills, nice writing in the paragraph book, and what appears to be several paths to get out of the first area. The automap is nice, but has very little detail and functionality, so I'm also drawing maps as I go.

The combat falls in the middle of the blobber pack, I guess. I was pleasantly surprised to see that making use of buffing/debuffing spells can turn a hopeless battle into a close (or even resounding) victory. Of the classic blobbers I've played extensively/finished, I'd rank the combat in DW higher than that in The Bard's Tale 1-3 and Might & Magic 3, but lower than the combat in M&M 1 or Wizardry 1-3+5. Time will tell, of course.

Dragon Wars is the classic blobber that comes closest to the Fallout style of CRPG, but it comes at the cost of poor encounter design and all loot being hand placed.

The Amiga version is the superior version IMO.

 

[newtmonkey]

octavius

It reminded me most of Wasteland combined with Bard's Tale 3, so in comparison with those two the encounter design so far is decent
I considered playing the Amiga version on my FPGA Amiga on CRT for maximum old school feel, but it's just too convenient to play the DOS version sadly.

 

[Nifft Batuff]

RE3.
This one:

not the corridor shooter version.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Two posts on prestigious Page 600.

I've recently been revisiting Spelunky. I was all over the original (Spelunky Classic as it's known today) back in 2009 to the point of exhaustion, and while I was pleased with Spelunky getting a 'proper' retail release in 2013 I really didn't have it in me to play it again to any length. Until now.

And now I can finally put into proper words what it's like playing Spelunky HD vs the original. The HD-version has more options and more graphical details (I love how the entrance cave gets filled with scribblings and empty bottles) but the faults introduced in the newer version ultimately tip the balance to the original. The original was fast-paced and never lagged, while the HD version seems to run at ~95% of the speed and suffers from the occasional lag spikes at the worst of times. This could be a framerate cap issue for our retarded console brethren. I personally don't like the overly cartoonish art style, and the music is unfitting.

What really clinches it for me however, is the greater difficulty added, particularly the wall of difficulty that starts with the temple.

There are new monsters in Spelunky which add more gameplay, and until one reaches the temple levels the monsters are balanced and thought-out, but one ominous-looking gameplay change is that you can't goomba stomp large monsters anymore. That change, plus just two of the new critters introduced in the temple add too much weight and the gameplay sinks to the bottom.

In Spelunky Classic the Mummy was the most dangerous non-boss enemy. This guy:

It's big, slow, has a devastating ranged attack but it also dropped the scepter, which was a literal "I Win!"-weapon of the game.

In Spelunky HD the Mummy no longer drops the scepter, that item has been given to another monster. Meet asshole No. 1:

Anubis not only floats around menacingly, but he also uses the scepter against you. 9 times out of 10 the best course of action is to run away, as circumstances are rarely in the player's favor to take him on. (There's also an upgraded version of him later on, but I haven't even reached that far to encounter him.)

Then there's asshole No. 2:

Croc Man here has a really nifty defense mechanism: He teleports away the instance he's about to take any damage. This saves him against virtually anything, making it almost impossible to kill him. Avoiding him is the saner option.

And a final note on the magma man, which upgrades him to full asshole-status:

Every note states that he does harm other monsters when he touches them. He doesn't, I've seen this myself. In addition it seems the devs increased the chances of them spawning from magma pools, and that they live longer than in the classic version. This makes them extremly dangerous.

Combine this with the usual array of traps, monsters and random fuckery that only Spelunky can deliver, and the temple is a certified deathtrap. Before I could usually last a cool 30 seconds in the temple without running into difficulties, now it's uncommon that I even survive 20. I haven't even tried to reach the Hell levels yet, and all things considered I see no reason to make that attempt.

EDIT: Text updated, see new post below.

 

[DraQ]

Homeworld 1 (Classic)

I like its art direction, graphics (for a 1999 game they're good even today, especially compared to "artistic pixelated" trash that devs do), the soundtrack and the variety of missions and many possibilities to finish each one.

The story didn't really grab me

I dislike the awful camera with which I constantly have to fight

The solution is to redo the whole mission hoping it won't happen again (most of the time it does not happen, but it can), which I will not do now. Maybe never.

I do not like this game as much as I do Homeworld 2 (Classic)

and frankly the possibility of it bugging again despite what I may or may not do makes me not want to even try it. So, if someone has a save-file for mission 11 and is willing to share, I'd be very glad to have it, I play through Steam. If not, then that's it I guess, I might just watch videos of the remaining missions or something. Otherwise it's a solid 8/10 game.

Spoiler

 

[someone else]

Civ 5 for the first time, tutorial is more than an hour, mostly the same as previous Civs, but no more SOD.

 

[Slimu]

Pathfinder: Kingmaker for the first time, with all the DLCs installed. I've played only ~30h and I'm hooked on it, it's great!

Castlevania: Lords of Shadow - Ultimate Edition, I'm at the second chapter from the last DLC, not a great game, but serviceable. Because I finished Sekiro before playing this, the combat seems easy and also bland because you have only one weapon (the whip).

while True: learn() - a puzzle game about machine learning,. It's an easy programming game. I played it more as a break from Zachtronics, while waiting for some tasks to finish.

Globesweeper: Hex Puzzler - a good puzzle game similar to Hexcells. The main difference is that the cells are projected on a sphere. I'm at the middle of the game and I think that only on one puzzle I had to guess one cell, but maybe I wasn't paying enough attention.

 

[Jvegi]

Still going strong with ToEE. Just exited Moathouse and apparently Co8 adds a lot of new content in their "no new content" version.
The game gets better and better, I'm slowly getting used to the UI ( the "h" button brings actual descriptions of spells, even from the wheel during combat, that's nice to now). Someone should do a write-up, or an hour long video essey on that UI, it's amazing how it's both messed up and perfectly fine, at the same time. My main gripe at the moment is the lack of space on the keybord to add hotkeys. Most of the keys are either occupied or cannot be used.

And it looks so nice. Those animations really bring everything to life.

 

[octavius]

Completed the user made map Empire of the World for HoMM 3.

This a huge map with lots to explore and many big battles; it took me a week to finish. You will eventually face heroes with 99 in all stats, so you need to be thorough.

At first I thought the map was too linear, but it opened up after a while and there are lots of different places to go. It still is a static map with all enemies safely behind border guards, though.
I really liked that you could have more than just one hero following a set path, and instead develop several heroes, since you get enough money for two armies (Castle and Rampart). I also like that there's only a minimum of storyfaggotry, which is good, especially when in this case the map maker is not very good at grammar.
Another nice touch is that it takes a long while to get spells like Blind, View Earth and some others, and Dimension Door and Fly are unavailable unless you can defeat 25K or so Black Dragons.

My secondary in command barely defeated The Emperor's apprentice. He was hiding inside his castle, so I didn't realize he had 99 in all stats, while my best heroes had about 80. Berserk, Blind and Disrupting Ray were the key spells. I could have reduced losses by spamming Resurrection.

Maximus faces The Emperor (this map was made right after the movie Gladiator):

Highly recommended, this is easily one of the Top 5 user made maps for HoMM 3 I've played.

 

[Azalin]

Finished Yakuza Kiwami 2,the next remake in the Yakuza saga.This one has a new engine so graphics are improved and some QOL changes are introduced like being able to walk into most shops and buildings without a loading screen,story and characters are better than Kiwami 1.The main beat em up gameplay though tales a hit since there are no longer various fighting styles but just one,they try to make up for it by adding some move from the three styles and adding some coop heat actions but in the end it doesn't feel as good as before.I didn't enjoy the two main sidequests/minigames since one is the cabaret minigame from Yo without any real changes and the Majima Construction rts felt clunky.The Majima mini campaign was too short and felt like a wasted opportunity,the only thing it accomplished it to give some closure to the Makoto?Majima storyline from Y0(why didn't you choose the girl when you had the chance Majima?Why?Why?Why?


All in all a good game,better than Kiwami 1 but not as good as Y0. Recommended