What game are you wasting time on?

[Citizen]

Finished main game of Trine 2 and liked it a lot, but it's insane how much better the goblin expansion is. Better puzzles, trickier placement of secrets, more varied environments... Big incline

 

[ERYFKRAD]

I just got into Erannorth Reborn because it's a sandbox adventure deckbuilder thingy. I got hooked so I bought the expansions after playing ~4h today. It feels more ambitious than most games, while keeping complexity properly scoped to character builds and factions.

The downside is that it's windows only so I have to play over Parsec from my mac.

I've played a bunch more and it's miles ahead of any other deckbuilder. It has both "arcade" mode like any deckbuilder, and a sandbox/infinite mode. The event system was revamped with the last expansion and it's like a card-driven CRPG now. You can point-buy your stats and perks. Each class/race/faction combo has its own card mechanics, and there are tens of them. From the events you can recruit unique allies or collect special loot that changes your whole playstyle. So even within the same class you can make several viable builds that are unique.

For example, I have played a vampire necromancer focused on DoTs and draining health. Then I found a lair that gave me a thrall every turn and respecced into spamming disposable summons while leeching them for health. Next game I started with an Ifrit Paladin that was building its own company, where a healer kept alive several guards that'd defend and retaliate every turn while I sat back and casted light arrows. In the last one tonight I was a Fey Monk that could do, every turn, two flurries of 6 blows that would down any boss without high physical defense.

10/10 lads.

Spoiler

Edit: Also ask me how to edit the savefile to unlock all classes without grinding.

Does it have a barbarian class

 

[Ezekiel]

Sly 2. I talked a little about it in the screenshot thread. Pretty nice. I didn't mention the sound design, though. It's weird. On the one hand, it's a PS2 game with full surround sound, Dolby Pro Logic II. You have to set Windows to stereo, the PS2 emulator to stereo, but the receiver to Dolby Surround, which splits the 2.0 track (called Surround in the game) between the front and surrounds. The sound effects pan to your sides as they are supposed to. Except for your own character. For some reason, maybe to show off, they decided to matrix your footsteps and jumps and things like that to the surrounds. I could see that maybe (but probably not) working in a first person view game, but in third person, going from your left to your right, it's just weird. Dialogue comes from the front, thankfully. I've played many games in which the dialogue is often inaudible under the music and sound effects. This isn't one of them.

 

[Harry Easter]

Sly 2. I talked a little about it in the screenshot thread. Pretty nice. I didn't mention the sound design, though. It's weird. On the one hand, it's a PS2 game with full surround sound, Dolby Pro Logic II. You have to set Windows to stereo, the PS2 emulator to stereo, but the receiver to Dolby Surround, which splits the 2.0 track (called Surround in the game) between the front and surrounds. The sound effects pan to your sides as they are supposed to. Except for your own character. For some reason, maybe to show off, they decided to matrix your footsteps and jumps and things like that to the surrounds. I could see that maybe (but probably not) working in a first person view game, but in third person, going from your left to your right, it's just weird. Dialogue comes from the front, thankfully. I've played many games in which the dialogue is often inaudible under the music and sound effects. This isn't one of them.

How's the voice acting holding up? I only heard samples of his turtle buddy and it made my skin crawl.

 

[Ezekiel]

Sly 2. I talked a little about it in the screenshot thread. Pretty nice. I didn't mention the sound design, though. It's weird. On the one hand, it's a PS2 game with full surround sound, Dolby Pro Logic II. You have to set Windows to stereo, the PS2 emulator to stereo, but the receiver to Dolby Surround, which splits the 2.0 track (called Surround in the game) between the front and surrounds. The sound effects pan to your sides as they are supposed to. Except for your own character. For some reason, maybe to show off, they decided to matrix your footsteps and jumps and things like that to the surrounds. I could see that maybe (but probably not) working in a first person view game, but in third person, going from your left to your right, it's just weird. Dialogue comes from the front, thankfully. I've played many games in which the dialogue is often inaudible under the music and sound effects. This isn't one of them.

How's the voice acting holding up? I only heard samples of his turtle buddy and it made my skin crawl.

The two other playable characters (the turtle and hippo) are both badly acted (but I don't really care). The rest of the cast is fine, though I haven't really paid too much attention to the talent.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Having finished Rayman Legends, I decided to do a marathon of the series, so I started Rayman 1 today, the only part of the series that I haven't finished. I played it only briefly as a kid.

HOLY SHIT THIS GAME IS BRUTAL

 

[Citizen]

Play the fan remake

 

[Ivan]

Yakuza 7: Like A Dragon


Just wrapped up the main story in Yakuza (7):Like A Dragon. Wow. This has surpassed Yakuza 0 in my opinion. By and large this is due to Ichiban as being a much more emotive protagonist. Unlike Kiryu, Ichiban wears his heart on his sleeves and the performance (played with Japanese audio) is fantastic. The devs did a great job with the cutscenes too, when the drama comes to the end, every player's performance and VO is totally on point. Yakuza has always done a good job of escalating the stakes at the end, but I believe this is the best they've done on a technical level, not just thematic.

Combat: You will get through it a lost easier than in the traditional combat games. You can easily spam your screen clearing AOE attacks, then chug mana potions. The base game is easy, save for 2 difficulty spikes, but you won't get there until like 50 hours.

Side Content: As good as it's ever been, featuring comedic hijinks, and touching, loving mini stories.

Exploration: The devs did a neat job of encouraging you to roam around, there are audio cues that play whenever you pass by a POI, when activated it cues some party banter. This grows as your party does, thankfully you don't need to have party member A for them to contribute to the banter. Very nice addition, definitely want this carried forward.

Budget: I would like to see more of the budget put into the audio design and the animations. By hour 60, you start to notice the "threateningly holding" animation, or whenever you have a drink, it cues the same audio of ice moving in a glass. I'm happy with the graphical fidelity of the game (i.e. it doesn't bother me that it's mostly hit, some very big misses but I don't care).

Party: It's amazing how well the JRPG formula fits Yakuza, the devs know how to create characters you will give a damn about. Now not only will you like them, but they're in your team and you get to know them much deeper than in the previous games. Sure, it would be nice to have some more dialogue CHOICES, but what's there is great even though it adheres to the JRPG tropes of following a base script with little player input to change relationships.

Annoyances: having to go to location X to change your class gets tedious, the game re-uses locations for "dungeons" that are just there for grinding, not much else TBH

TLDR: I loved it. Ichiban is a great protagonist, your companions are an awesome bunch. Have to agree that this is the best genre change I've seen in gaming for an established franchise.

Thanks Vic, one of the best Xmas gifts I've ever enjoyed

 

[Ivan]

Having finished Rayman Legends, I decided to do a marathon of the series, so I started Rayman 1 today, the only part of the series that I haven't finished. I played it only briefly as a kid.

HOLY SHIT THIS GAME IS BRUTAL

you playing the fan remake that came out last year?

 

[Jvegi]

Began another attempt at M&M game. The 7th this time.

This is the first time, after 20 years, I've managed to figure out whose turn it was in a fight. That light border is invisible if you don't know it's there.

I'm getting a grasp of the basics. I forsee great times.

 

[Gregz]

M&M VII is my favorite in the series.

 

[Kem0sabe]

This week I finished Ace combat 7 and ryse son of Rome. Ace combat was a lot of fun, but ryse was a big let down considering the production values involved, but this being gamepass, only thing lost was a few hours of my time.

Next on the list will be hellblade and the falconer.

 

[zapotec]

After the eye of the beholder series, i am doing a 2nd attempt at Ravenloft: Sthrad's Possession.
It's very hard for now, i guess i'll have to use the cluebook

 

[Hag]

Having finished Rayman Legends, I decided to do a marathon of the series, so I started Rayman 1 today, the only part of the series that I haven't finished. I played it only briefly as a kid.

HOLY SHIT THIS GAME IS BRUTAL

You may want to "cheat" and have a look at levels maps, just to have an idea of what is in stock and how many cages are in each level. This is how it was played back in the days, I still have the battered old magazine with all the levels and hints from 1996 or something.
The game is indeed brutal but somehow really enjoyable. Most sequences have a precise timing, once you know it you won't fail again.

Play the fan remake

Don't. It's not as tight and clever. Compared to the original it's more of a giant mess.

 

[Hag]

Tried Baba is You.
Actually, Baba is the first game I ever refund on Steam. The idea is really good but the execution is bland and boring. I felt like a monkey that has to push buttons in a certain order, never rewarding, always tiresome. A terrible waste of a great mechanism.

 

[CryptRat]

No.

 

[Hag]

No.

Very well, you have convinced me. I therefore reconsider my critical statement and hereafter declare Baba is You to be the greatest gift to mankind since salted butter.

That's a shame it is as fun as unclogging a sink drain though. And even less rewarding.

 

[NerevarineKing]

I'm currently playing Ys 9: Monstrum Nox. It's basically the same formula as Ys 8, but it takes place in one large city. They added a ton of 3D movement abilities that let you climb around all over the city and look for secrets. Ys 8 did have much more environmental variety though as most of the dungeons in 9 so far have been sewers and underground passages. Overall I'm having a good amount of fun with it and I haven't really been disappointed with the Ys series so far. (Then again, I also haven't played 5 which seems to get a lot of shit.)

 

[Unkillable Cat]

After the eye of the beholder series, i am doing a 2nd attempt at Ravenloft: Sthrad's Possession.
It's very hard for now, i guess i'll have to use the cluebook

Maybe this can help.

 

[Abu Antar]

I've been progressing through Demons Age, despite the game doing its best to stop me. Saves are starting to get corrupted. I constantly have to battle with that. Deleting or overwriting saves, or creating new ones. It's actually more challenging than the game itself.

 

[Ivan]

More backlog: Pilgrims (Amanita Design)


A fantastic little point-n-click adventure that I had been holding off since I had heard that it was a "small" scale project, not one of their more full fledged titles. While it is quite short (I see most folks finishing it one run ~under an hour), it's also Amanita's most replayable title. You quickly gain access to a world map made up ten or so locations. You pick up items, figure out uses for them in other locations, recruit companions by solving some of these puzzles, then you experiment and learn that each companion can use items unique in certain locations. The replayability comes by way of solving puzzles using different items/or characters. Each of them results in a unique animation that is always charming/cute. For example, there's one where you need to get a bear to leave its cave so you can loot it. You can use booze (any character), or you can use a broom (character specific) to shoo it away. The games gives you clues if you want to figure out all of the solutions. You can't save scum, so you will have to replay the game to see them all. Thankfully the game is short enough that once you're done with it, you can beat it that much faster, and even find shortcuts/sequence breaks along the way.

TLDR: a thoughtful mini-point-n-click adventure with the trademark Amanita charm and smarts. It's such a tight package, I can't find much to complain about. Completely forgot to mention that the sound is also very strong. Cutesy voice effects and more of the excellent Amanita. Floex ambient music.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

I've been progressing through Demons Age

Why do you inflict this upon yourself?

 

[Abu Antar]

I've been progressing through Demons Age

Why do you inflict this upon yourself?

Morbid curiosity.

Since Realms Beyond seems to be in limbo, I wanted to see what Bigmoon did with the assets they were fighting for.

 

[NerevarineKing]

Since I last posted, Ys 9 has opened up with some large outdoor areas that make full use of the added 3D movement abilities. Depending on how things go this could be the best Ys game and a strong GOTY contender for me. My biggest complaint is that I'm playing on Hard and there's been basically no challenge so far. Then again, I started with Oath in Felghana, which has a Normal mode that's harder than most Ys games' Hard mode.

 

[Starwars]

After Cyberpunk 2077, I was still in the mood for cyberpunk stuff so I ended up replaying Shadowrun Dragonfall and now Hong Kong. Dragonfall is still just really good. Took that sorta "bite-size" RPG formula and ran with it. It's just pleasant, easy and fairly fun to play and digest with how it's structured, and with very entertaining story and writing. I really like Hong Kong as well but they did kinda screw the pacing a bit.
Still very enjoyable though and it's just fun to see how they managed to make the crazy setting work. Like the "folklore touch" with the Yama Kings and how it all plays into the Walled City. It's just cool in an extremely nerdy and silly way.

And as always, playing Old World early access. Though, was just getting ready to try out this week's build but unfortunately it seems to be a bit broken.