What game are you wasting time on?

[Catacombs]

I've got a CS:GO tournament at work, so I'm practicing somewhat.

Please provide updates as the tournament progresses.

 

[Azalin]

Finished Return of the Obra Dinn,an interesting indie game made by the guy who made Papers,Please.It's a deduction game with a very good artistic presentation that shows to indie developers how to use your limited resources.Solveing all the cases takes some skills and some guessing some times but it's enjoyable.Recommended

 

[Fedora Master]

I've been fiddling around with a - bear with me, I know what you're thinking right now - Early Access Open World Zombie Survival Crafting Soulslike game: Dysmantle.

But wait! It's actually not bad! The mechanics gel pretty well! You run around and smash shit to upgrade your gear to smash bigger shit to upgrade your gear... Simple gameplay loop that activates the lizard brain. In between you fight zombies and bosses by smacking them and dodge-rolling away. There's also a bonfire mechanics which was just straight up lifted from Dark Souls but you can later get items that prevent monsters from respawning. All in all its not too bad, as far as EAOWZSCSGs go.

 

[Jvegi]

Please provide updates as the tournament progresses.

Lost 4-16 on the first round the next one is in 10 days or so.

I'm playing Civ 6 with my gf/partner/whatever. It feels similar to civ4 in that I somehow know what to do, but it all turns into random experiments, regret, and wasted turns. The upside is that I can work out during her turns. We can also switch entertaining our kid, so she has constant attention and we have our game.

EDIT: And I've just killed Tor'Gal in SCS on hardcore with damage scaling.

 

[Caim]

Pretty big brain move to pick up a turn-based 4X game if you want to game but also have a kid to entertain.

 

[Machocruz]

Got back into Dying Light for the last three days of the Halloween event. Completed all of the main event quests, several normal bounties, plus was finally able to max out all three starting skill trees and get 4 levels into the Legend skill tree. At this point all my weapons do enough damage to rape any enemy in the game. Techland have done a hell of a job supporting this game through the years, aside from making one of the best AAA AND open world games of the last 10 years, imo. Will definitely be back for the Christmas event if they have it this year.

 

[Abu Antar]

I unistalled Arkham Knight. It's a decently crafted game, but there was too much Batmobile for my tastes, and the writing didn't grab me. Not that the previous games floored me in that regard. Combat is as we know, pop-a-moley, but fits Batman. When you get in the flow, and get a 100+combo, there is a feeling of satisfaction.

Since my last post, I beat Dungeon Encounters. Dungeon crawler on a shoestring budget that has no right to be as good as it is. Not a classic, but an 8/10. On surface level, it seems very simple, deceivingly so even. But all the systems in the game mesh well together.
Upgrades are mostly straight upgrades, but they feel impactful. The game uses the armour system from Divinity OS2, but does it better. It's more straightforward, but I don't love it. I prefer weknesses, resistances, etc. Exploration is solid, with several obtainable exploration skills, like seeing encounters, hidden tiles, teleport abilities of different kinds. There are also combat abilities to find in the dungeon, like status immunities, restorative abilities, etc. These can only be used a limited amount of times, before you have to restore them.
I would say that the quality of the game surprised me, but I had faith in Hiruyki Ito.

 

[lightbane]

It's only good for the driving and the landscape. Rest ain't such of a much. I finished the game but I will lose no sleep over not replaying it.

Yep, in the end I ditched it. It's too boring, the desert is simultaneously overcrowded and too empty, the upgrades are clear shit that barely raises your stats a few points and have minimal changes in gameplay, if at all, and it's repetitive. The plot I don't care for, so in the end I uninstalled it.

Rayman Legends turned out to be much more fun than I expected. Ori 1 is worth a replay as well.

 

[Maxie]

frankly it's rather silly how much better Tomb Raider Anniversary is than Tomb Raider Legend, mainly due to no incessant chatter between Lara and her sidekick wossnames
dino fight had no right to be this annoying though

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

I'm playing through Tyranny right now.
I'm not sure what to think of it. I like the sort of Greco-Roman inspired setting (not many setting like that, usually its just medieval Europe of some sort), but the combat is a real slog and there is way too much of it. The mechanics just aren't really good. Archers can still shoot at your healer even if you're face fucking them in melee, companions stop what they are doing and break formation to cast a buff on a character who doesn't need it, and everything just takes way too long.

The companions you get aren't great either. You have one real tank and he's disfavored only. And you need a bloody tank because of how many enemies they throw at you. Kills in Shadow is pretty useless because she's a stealth character in a game where stealth is an overall pointless mechanic, and Sirin is just meh overall. That means you're basically stuck with 4 useful companions, all of which you get early on.

 

[Denim Destroyer]

I have been playing through the Blue Planet mod for Freespace 2 right now which minus a few issues has been fun. I like the idea of having a named protagonist who has wingmates they build a relationship with during the campaign. While this isn't something I wish the original games had I don't think it would work with the tone Freespace and its sequel were going for. As this is the first Freespace mod I have played I cannot offer a comparison but I do hope other mods aren't crash prone as Blue Planet can be. Some missions have ended with multiple crashes with one in particular crashing seven times. I wish an update would come out to address technical issues.

As I cannot seem to progress through Blue Planet since the mission I am on right now crashes every time, I thought of picking up Ultima 5 again but I am currently in a bind where I need to get better gear but lack money which necessitates me to grind. Unlike Ultima 4 this shouldn't be too bad as the combat in the fifth game isn't completely terrible.

 

[Riskbreaker]

I've been playing Northern Journey, I'm not even sure how to describe the thing. Oneiric, drug-fuelled Hexen-like FPS? The combat is rough, enemies having erratic movement patterns and blending in with the environment seems to be a feature and not a bug. But the environments can be stunning, there's a lot of clever interconnectedness to their layouts, backtracking and "puzzles" aren't overbearing. And the whole thing is just so strange and unpredictable.

 

[YldrE]

Painfully slogging through Final Fantasy 7 on PS1.

I can't remember the last time I played a story-heavy game where the writing was so bad. The way other characters constantly enable the writer's pet is really sad, especially in supposedly confrontational dialogue. "Cloud, I know you're cool and dark and broody and mistarious, and it's your right to be cool and dark and broody and mistarious, but you better not be less awesome than usual during the mission. All right guys, let him be cool and dark and broody and mistarious in peace".

It was groundbreaking at the time I suppose, so it would be unfair to badmouth how tedious the mechanics are, but the writing is so impossibly poor it might as well be a 90s Sonic fanfic where the writers are taking for granted that their clown characters are actually super badass.

 

[samuraigaiden]

YldrE

There's a fan translation out there that's supposed to improve it. The original English text is absolute garbage when it's intelligible at all

 

[thesoup]

Recently finished Prey 2017 - far better than I expected. Phenomenal game. First half is stronger than the second one but still an enjoyable experience overall.

Also finished Elex - pretty good, but like with Prey, much better in the first half.

Currently playing Anachronox. The combat sections of the game are such a slog they make me want to kill myself. But everything else is very charming and enjoyable and mostly worth slogging through the shit combat. The combat wouldn't even be that bad if it was faster. Apparently you can speed it up by pressing "\". I don't think that worked on my game, but maybe it's because I don't use an english kb layout. I dunno.

 

[thesoup]

Painfully slogging through Final Fantasy 7 on PS1.

I can't remember the last time I played a story-heavy game where the writing was so bad. The way other characters constantly enable the writer's pet is really sad, especially in supposedly confrontational dialogue. "Cloud, I know you're cool and dark and broody and mistarious, and it's your right to be cool and dark and broody and mistarious, but you better not be less awesome than usual during the mission. All right guys, let him be cool and dark and broody and mistarious in peace".

It was groundbreaking at the time I suppose, so it would be unfair to badmouth how tedious the mechanics are, but the writing is so impossibly poor it might as well be a 90s Sonic fanfic where the writers are taking for granted that their clown characters are actually super badass.

I played ff7 for the first time around 2008 to see what the hype was about for the past decade. And oh boy, everything about that game was unbearably shit, from gameplay to writing to character models and especially the shitty MIDI that gave me headaches.

I suppose it was a game that was at the right place at the right time - it was everyone's first "rpg" when they were 10-14 and they have fond memories of it.

 

[I'm Big Into Anal]

last epoch

its good if you like TQ, T2, Grim Dawn and PoE

still in early access but nicely supported by the devs with frequent updates

still in the honeymoon period but 4/5 at this stage

 

[anvi]

I suppose it was a game that was at the right place at the right time - it was everyone's first "rpg" when they were 10-14 and they have fond memories of it.

It was also a console game so people who never saw Fallout, Baldurs Gate, Elder Scrolls, Ultimas, Underworlds, M&Ms, Eye of the Beholders, LoL, etc.

 

[Fedora Master]

Dysmantle came out of EA the other day and as I said before, despite the rather dated concept it plays fine. Im enjoying it.

 

[Corbin Dallas Multipass]

Painfully slogging through Final Fantasy 7 on PS1.

I can't remember the last time I played a story-heavy game where the writing was so bad. The way other characters constantly enable the writer's pet is really sad, especially in supposedly confrontational dialogue. "Cloud, I know you're cool and dark and broody and mistarious, and it's your right to be cool and dark and broody and mistarious, but you better not be less awesome than usual during the mission. All right guys, let him be cool and dark and broody and mistarious in peace".

It was groundbreaking at the time I suppose, so it would be unfair to badmouth how tedious the mechanics are, but the writing is so impossibly poor it might as well be a 90s Sonic fanfic where the writers are taking for granted that their clown characters are actually super badass.

I played ff7 for the first time around 2008 to see what the hype was about for the past decade. And oh boy, everything about that game was unbearably shit, from gameplay to writing to character models and especially the shitty MIDI that gave me headaches.

I suppose it was a game that was at the right place at the right time - it was everyone's first "rpg" when they were 10-14 and they have fond memories of it.

Yeah it was definitely a moment in time. Remember, we were coming off super nintendo for the most part, so while today the music and graphics are pretty rough, back then it was a hell of a jump. The world seemed so big, it felt so cinematic... and honestly we weren't paying that much attention to the terrible dialog and stories, we were already accustomed to that from pretty much every other console RPG.

Many people who owned consoles did also own PCs, so it's silly to say all those people never played a "real" pc rpg, but they certainly didn't have the same epic feel. Now, today, I'd rather play through fallout 2 or baldur's gate than go through FF7 again, those games certainly aged better.

 

[Don Peste]

Finished Batman Arkham Asylum, City and Origins in a row. Certainly it's good popamole. Fun, forgettable trash.
I just started Arkham Knight. It's more of the same, more refined maybe? Specially now 6 years after release, without all those ugly bugs and performance issues.
It looks great, I think it's the best-looking game I (personally) have ever played.

 

[Ezekiel]

The post-game stuff in Celeste is annoying. I collected the four B-side hearts needed to go to the center of the mountain, beat that level and am now a third of the way into chapter 9, which is this moon/space level with new mechanics. Already spent way more time on this game than I planned to. Might call it quits soon.

I knew something was fishy when I read "Maddy Thorson" in the credits. A born woman would never make a game this hard.

 

[deuxhero]

Playing Fallout 1.5. Just did Sedit quests and took a caravan to a new town, but when saving after a hard fight, the game crashed and corrupted the save. I have one right before the fight, but that was such a pain in the ass I've lost the will to play further for now.

 

[Bigg Boss]

Painfully slogging through Final Fantasy 7 on PS1.

I can't remember the last time I played a story-heavy game where the writing was so bad. The way other characters constantly enable the writer's pet is really sad, especially in supposedly confrontational dialogue. "Cloud, I know you're cool and dark and broody and mistarious, and it's your right to be cool and dark and broody and mistarious, but you better not be less awesome than usual during the mission. All right guys, let him be cool and dark and broody and mistarious in peace".

It was groundbreaking at the time I suppose, so it would be unfair to badmouth how tedious the mechanics are, but the writing is so impossibly poor it might as well be a 90s Sonic fanfic where the writers are taking for granted that their clown characters are actually super badass.

I played ff7 for the first time around 2008 to see what the hype was about for the past decade. And oh boy, everything about that game was unbearably shit, from gameplay to writing to character models and especially the shitty MIDI that gave me headaches.

I suppose it was a game that was at the right place at the right time - it was everyone's first "rpg" when they were 10-14 and they have fond memories of it.

Yeah it was definitely a moment in time. Remember, we were coming off super nintendo for the most part, so while today the music and graphics are pretty rough, back then it was a hell of a jump. The world seemed so big, it felt so cinematic... and honestly we weren't paying that much attention to the terrible dialog and stories, we were already accustomed to that from pretty much every other console RPG.

Many people who owned consoles did also own PCs, so it's silly to say all those people never played a "real" pc rpg, but they certainly didn't have the same epic feel. Now, today, I'd rather play through fallout 2 or baldur's gate than go through FF7 again, those games certainly aged better.

I already played Fallout by the time FF7 fanboys were claiming it was the best thing ever. I did need to buy a PSX because my PC needed a big upgrade and parents did not understand that back then. Long story short I got to play all the good games so Master Race bullshit does not apply.

 

[Endemic]

Less effort to get this working than most WinXP-era games