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What game are you wasting time on?

baturinsky

Arcane
Joined
Apr 21, 2013
Messages
5,526
Location
Russia
I love all DS-es, especially DS2. But I'm not quite into Elden Ring. In part, because I often have a bug with enemies becoming invisible. Closing browser and other memory-consuming apps while I play helps, but only to extent.
 

baturinsky

Arcane
Joined
Apr 21, 2013
Messages
5,526
Location
Russia
Crysis 2. Just beat the first one and I really liked it, but this seems like massive decline all around. I knew going in it was a different beast and I can stomach a console-y linear setpiece shooter, but this game hasn't done anything to distinguish itself yet. Hopefully it improves.

Don't get your hopes up. Crysis -> Crysis 2 is one of the worst examples of decline I can think of in that genre.
Dunno, I like Crysis 2 the most. At least it has sane costume controls.
 

fork

Guest
I tried so hard to get into Elden Ring for a good few hours. I really couldn't. Game feels like you are in some kind of dream. Story is almost nonexistent, there are very few npc's with cryptic monologues and that's all about them. Basicly everything attack you on sight.
Combat is very impressive, animations, enemy design is interesting, many attacks that you have to act accordingly, etc. Too bad there are no instant reset - there's a long loading screen after death. Game feels like a hack'n'slash with advanced moves and empty, open 3D world.
Game just didn't mesmerize me. Guess I'm just not a "souls game" fan, there are a lot of people that adore this game, but too bad that's just not me.

Dark Souls is way better than this turd. Might give that one a try if you haven't already.

Have you even read his post? He would have had the same gripes with Dark Souls too, minus the open world.

I have, but he writes in his final sentence "Guess I'm just not a "souls game" fan, there are a lot of people that adore this game, but too bad that's just not me."
I felt the need to point out that Elden Ring is nothing like Dark Souls. In fact, the former feels like a parody of the latter and I hated it, whereas I love Dark Souls.
 

baturinsky

Arcane
Joined
Apr 21, 2013
Messages
5,526
Location
Russia
Btw, I could not figure DS2 initially too. Most important thing about it when you play on PC is to toggle off "double click to power attack" in options. Because it gives annoying lag to every attack, making combat way less enjoyable.
 

Sigourn

uooh afficionado
Joined
Feb 6, 2016
Messages
5,624
I enjoyed the Ashes 2063 Doom TC so much that i'm replaying it, this time on Survival difficulty (though I wonder why this one has less enemies than Arcade... hmmm).
Then I'll play the add-on, and afterwards the sequel.

So I'm playing Ashes: Afterglow now. My impression is... not so good.

I think the game was much stronger in the earlier episode, when it was a linear shooter. Non-linear exploration of a level is great, but I'd rather not have huge open sections and intersection of levels if ultimately there's a "proper" way to go on about unlocking stuff and such. I'm definitely wasting much more time on this game than I did on the first one, and this is precisely the thing I was enjoying about Doom and Ashes 2063.
 

curds

Magister
Joined
Nov 24, 2019
Messages
1,098
Completed Risen. I rate it 6.5 out of 10.

Nothing special, but it's a pretty solid open world action RPG. I even liked Chapter 4, which I had read many bad things about. Chapter 3 was shit, though.

Melee combat system is pretty fun. Exploration is nice. Final "boss" battle was pretty lame. Not much else to say about it.

Now tossing up whether to purchase Risen 2 or have another crack at Gothic 3.
 

samuraigaiden

Arcane
Joined
Dec 28, 2018
Messages
1,954
Location
Harare
RPG Wokedex
I beat Jade Empire. It's not completely shit, but it stinks in a lot of places.

I like the story. It's a ghost story, lots of talking to dead people and acting as a link between them and the living. I like this sort of thing.

Combat, however, is completely garbage. I beat every boss in the game using by and large the same strategy. Given that there is no defense stat and even the weakest enemy can break your guard, early on I decided to just ignore the health stat and dump all my points into focus and mind. Quickly I had a focus pool large enough to kill bosses while staying in focus mode at all times. It's just retarded.

I wouldn't recommend this game to anyone who wants to play an RPG. I can see it appealing more to Adventure game fans.
 

Chippy

Arcane
Patron
Joined
May 5, 2018
Messages
6,037
Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Currently replaying Syndicate. I'd forgotten how glorious these old games are. Will move onto Syndicate Wars which I rate :5/5: despite everyone saying it wasn't as good as the first one.

It isn't. Still a fun game though.

What I (and a few others) will want you to do, is hold off on Syndicate Wars for a bit and move into the American Revolt-data disk for Syndicate instead, once you're done with the original. We want to know how you fare.

Post all the details. We will read them. We will rate them. :D

Ok, that was as tough as I remember (Atlantic Accelerator). So anyone who says nostalgia is a postive feeling felt through rose tinted glasses can fuck off. On the one hand I doubt many these days could play thorough Syndicate if they just re-released it with better graphics, but it was as fun as I remember.

  • You've got missions where you need to escort other squishy agents and you can't just keep your agents in a group because enemy agents swarm from every direction. So you have to split them up and control them individually and cover line of sight around buildings while planning where the guy you're escorting is so he doesn't get caught in the crossfire. I think that mission was Venezuela and even though the game doesn't have cover it was fun.
  • Then you've got missions where you need to get into a base, but can only do it with a vehicle. Or you need to get a vehicle to a doctor, who will then (amazingly) get into the vehicle and drive to a destination while you need to protect him. Which means getting into you own vehicle and tailing him. This is 1993. Bethesda didn't really manage NPCs doing stuff until Skyrim.
  • I didn't use certain weapons like the sniper rifle. It was just too weak, and I never got why a single enemy agent was so powerful with a minigun. But I suppose they had to account for you equipping flamers and waiting around the corner of a building for agents to run into a screaming death.
After the initial WTF? moment with the Atlantic Accelerator, I remembered to equip lasers and take out the rush of enemies. You can do that without using shields. That ended up being a fun mission. The 360 targetting was a bit off - like if an enemy was between 90 and 180 degrees the flamer wouldn't hit them. Not sure if that's a Dos Box thing.

But yeah. They really don't make them like they used to. On to Syndicate Wars.
 
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arekks

Novice
Joined
May 1, 2022
Messages
43
I've been playing the Mega Man Zero/ZX Legacy Collection

I've always wanted to play these games. I'm not a huge MM fan in general but the fast gameplay and the saber had a lot of appeal to me. I think I bounced off it as a kid because of the difficulty, shameful as it is to admit.

Right now I've finished every game except ZX Advent.

So. The Zero games are sick and imo every entry is better than the last. At first it's frustrating, and I found the best way was to scrape through towards the end then restart and try to do a better run... given the ranking system and the short length of each game it seems set up with this in mind.

When you know what you're doing, you can dash through stages cutting and blasting enemies like a ninja. The blaster also shouldn't be underestimated, since charged shots can kill basic enemies at a distance, and strong enemies can be more easily dispatched by for eg. mixing a charged shot with a dash cut. It's simple but there's a real rhythm to it.

I'm not a fan of the elemental system. It's a MM staple but I don't like it in any of these games. You equip the correct elemental chip to counter the boss and suddenly you bypass the challenge of the boss almost entirely. That's it. By the fourth game, the system was neutered to the point of being a non-issue, so I guess Inti Creates knew it sucked too.

I don't like subtanks either. You find them hidden in a couple of levels (or in cyber elves allegedly, but I never used those since they affect ranking). How difficult the game is is largely dependent on how many of these things you get... I think they're just too big of an advantage for an optional thing that often requires returning to a level with a later ability.

Most of the bosses are great to fight and learn, but there are a few with moves that seem to be down to luck. Also, the first game has by far the hardest end boss, which makes the subsequent final bosses seem a bit weak (especially Zero 2's).

And as you might expect, many levels rely heavily on pits and insta-death surfaces. It can feel a little cheap at times, especially given the limited view that the game allows, and it makes me wish effort had been put in to extend the view to the full width of a 16:9 display.

My favourite game of the series was 4. The level design was stronger and generally had less annoying BS than previous games sometimes did. The elemental system nerf meant that I had to actually engage with the bosses. There's a system that involves changing the weather for a level into an easy or normal difficulty state, which is a fun way to give people an easy mode if they need it imo. There are no real stinker levels like the Sunken Library from MMZ3 or the Crystal Cave from MMZ2.

All in all I'm happy I finally played these games. It really can't be overstated how satisfying the saber feels... the various animations for enemies being sliced in two are incredibly satisfying. Oh, and the port is good. It's not an emulation, there's no input lag that I noticed. They should have added an option to instantly restart a level though. Actually that's my #1 gripe with these games. It's so frustrating to want to restart a level but have to instead reload and skip through some scenes.

Anyway... two more games. Fewer words.

ZX is okay. It's a worse version of Zero in a Metroidvania style world that exists solely to waste your time. The lava level is genuinely some garbage tier game design and the final level feels very much like something they had to rush... Nobody should care about the story in these games but even by those standards this is very poorly told. Oh, the player has multiple forms with different moves but you will only use two of these forms unless the game demands otherwise.

ZX Advent so far is another mediocre game but they took the saber away from you and replaced it with a weird lock-on projectile attack that you will NEVER use. They did add some more forms based off animal-like bosses rather than humanoids, which sounds cool but in reality they're of very limited utility and only serve to clutter the menu you have to navigate whenever you want to switch form.

I wouldn't recommend the latter two but the collection is easily worth it for the Zero games. I'm glad that Inti Creates is still around and making some of the best platformers ever (Curse of the Moon 2 and Blaster Master Zero 2 are amazing fyi) and Capcom should call them up and fork over the cash for a new Zero game of some sort

Crysis 2. Just beat the first one and I really liked it, but this seems like massive decline all around. I knew going in it was a different beast and I can stomach a console-y linear setpiece shooter, but this game hasn't done anything to distinguish itself yet. Hopefully it improves.

Don't get your hopes up. Crysis -> Crysis 2 is one of the worst examples of decline I can think of in that genre.
Dunno, I like Crysis 2 the most. At least it has sane costume controls.

Crysis 2 is game where you almost exclusively fight unflinching bullet sponge enemies through some of the most contarded level design conceivable. It's shit. Crysis 3 is even worse.

I guess if you're playing Crysis 1 on a controller that's hard tho... *shrugs has never played Crysis on a controller*
 

CthuluIsSpy

Arcane
Joined
Dec 26, 2014
Messages
7,940
Location
On the internet, writing shit posts.
Playing Gladius during its free weekend period.
It's ok, but it is not worth the whole price tag.

They do the same shit that Paradox does where they nickle and dime you for content, but unlike Paradox games you don't get that much for the price.
 

mediocrepoet

Philosoraptor in Residence
Patron
Joined
Sep 30, 2009
Messages
11,474
Location
Combatfag: Gold box / Pathfinder
Codex 2012 Codex+ Now Streaming! MCA Project: Eternity Divinity: Original Sin 2
I tried that janky Dark Alliance game since it's leaving PC Game Pass soon and I was morbidly curious. :0/5:
The jank is whatever (it's pretty bad), but what really struck me is just how not fun it was. I didn't think it was worth the bandwidth to download. It definitely wasn't worth the time I played it for, and I would've been seriously angry if I would've spent money on it.

It felt like taking some free mobile or flash game and doing a bunch of advertising in order to try and get people to treat it like a AAA and pay for it. Wasn't it full price at release before they started reducing the price over time?

Anyway, it's dog shit. Avoid, even if it's free.
 

Ninjerk

Arcane
Joined
Jul 10, 2013
Messages
14,323
I tried that janky Dark Alliance game since it's leaving PC Game Pass soon and I was morbidly curious. :0/5:
The jank is whatever (it's pretty bad), but what really struck me is just how not fun it was. I didn't think it was worth the bandwidth to download. It definitely wasn't worth the time I played it for, and I would've been seriously angry if I would've spent money on it.

It felt like taking some free mobile or flash game and doing a bunch of advertising in order to try and get people to treat it like a AAA and pay for it. Wasn't it full price at release before they started reducing the price over time?

Anyway, it's dog shit. Avoid, even if it's free.
Now play Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel
 

CyberWhale

Arcane
Glory to Ukraine
Joined
Mar 26, 2013
Messages
6,058
Location
Fortress of Solitude
Have you even read his post? He would have had the same gripes with Dark Souls too, minus the open world.

I didn't play DS1 so I wouldn't know, but I kinda feel bad for not getting Elden Ring and it's hype. For me it's an empty, strange in a japanese way mix with Fighting Force, Mortal Kombat (that not so much tbh) and Diablo.

All Souls games are like that, the only difference is that the previous games are more tightly designed, slightly less twitchy and have a better sense of progression. If you are expecting elaborate dialogs and non-combat solutions to specific obstacles, you are looking in the wrong place. Your description fits the bill, and people recommending Dark Souls 1 due to its higher quality obviously got negative marks in Reading Comprehension 101.
 
Joined
Jan 7, 2012
Messages
14,151
I tried that janky Dark Alliance game since it's leaving PC Game Pass soon and I was morbidly curious. :0/5:
The jank is whatever (it's pretty bad), but what really struck me is just how not fun it was. I didn't think it was worth the bandwidth to download. It definitely wasn't worth the time I played it for, and I would've been seriously angry if I would've spent money on it.

It felt like taking some free mobile or flash game and doing a bunch of advertising in order to try and get people to treat it like a AAA and pay for it. Wasn't it full price at release before they started reducing the price over time?

Anyway, it's dog shit. Avoid, even if it's free.

Are you talking about the original Dark Alliance or the new one? I heard the original was OK and was planning to try it out sometime.
 

mediocrepoet

Philosoraptor in Residence
Patron
Joined
Sep 30, 2009
Messages
11,474
Location
Combatfag: Gold box / Pathfinder
Codex 2012 Codex+ Now Streaming! MCA Project: Eternity Divinity: Original Sin 2
I tried that janky Dark Alliance game since it's leaving PC Game Pass soon and I was morbidly curious. :0/5:
The jank is whatever (it's pretty bad), but what really struck me is just how not fun it was. I didn't think it was worth the bandwidth to download. It definitely wasn't worth the time I played it for, and I would've been seriously angry if I would've spent money on it.

It felt like taking some free mobile or flash game and doing a bunch of advertising in order to try and get people to treat it like a AAA and pay for it. Wasn't it full price at release before they started reducing the price over time?

Anyway, it's dog shit. Avoid, even if it's free.

Are you talking about the original Dark Alliance or the new one? I heard the original was OK and was planning to try it out sometime.

The new one by Tuque games.

The original is decent, not sure how it held up though.
 

Ghulgothas

Arcane
Joined
Feb 22, 2020
Messages
1,598
Location
So Below
My resolution for this American Summer is to play through some of the Squad-Tactics/TRPGS/MilSims/Autism Enablers this place holds sacrosanct, starting with Silent Storm.

Fun stuff, I will admit that as someone who'd only really played both Nu-XCOMs before touching this that the Point Bank, Fire Mode and Stance System took a few hours to integrate into muscle memory. There's also some inherent jank with audio mixing and sightlines; several fireplaces are so loud I thought the buildings containing them were on fire and the Wehrmacht have mastered the art of blending in among the corpses of their fallen comrades. Hasn't stopped me from enjoying my time with it, though I'm beginning to wonder if it's possible to mod a save mid-campaign; the Swiss Factory with those walking refrigerators and my incompetent engineer are making me rethink some things. Guess I'll save that for the Axis run.

I think Steam updated the listing for S2 and S3 sometime after I bought them, rolling the latter into the former as part of their Gold Edition, no idea how to access Sentinels from that but I'm assuming it'll unlock after I beat the first campaign.

Wondering if I oughtta begin with Jagged Alliance or Jagged Alliance 2 after that, the two look worlds apart.
 

Ninjerk

Arcane
Joined
Jul 10, 2013
Messages
14,323
My resolution for this American Summer is to play through some of the Squad-Tactics/TRPGS/MilSims/Autism Enablers this place holds sacrosanct, starting with Silent Storm.

Fun stuff, I will admit that as someone who'd only really played both Nu-XCOMs before touching this that the Point Bank, Fire Mode and Stance System took a few hours to integrate into muscle memory. There's also some inherent jank with audio mixing and sightlines; several fireplaces are so loud I thought the buildings containing them were on fire and the Wehrmacht have mastered the art of blending in among the corpses of their fallen comrades. Hasn't stopped me from enjoying my time with it, though I'm beginning to wonder if it's possible to mod a save mid-campaign; the Swiss Factory with those walking refrigerators and my incompetent engineer are making me rethink some things. Guess I'll save that for the Axis run.

I think Steam updated the listing for S2 and S3 sometime after I bought them, rolling the latter into the former as part of their Gold Edition, no idea how to access Sentinels from that but I'm assuming it'll unlock after I beat the first campaign.

Wondering if I oughtta begin with Jagged Alliance or Jagged Alliance 2 after that, the two look worlds apart.
I never played any of JA before 2. For antiquarian purposes you could play those and then vanilla JA2, but make sure to experience the 1.13 fan patch of JA2. It is pure autism in its most blissful form.
 

Utfärd

Guest
YEAAH.png


For the first time in my life I actually beat the buffed Harran's Pass fight. 18 Imperial Guard strongmen vs 1 praetor? Should've brought more men. :lol:


dabuild.png


Build was meant to be hammer block but I was drunk when I made the character, in Teron I was wondering why my THC was so low, in Maadoran I finally realised I'd been playing hammer dude while having pumped axe skill in character creation by mistake. Somehow synergy still made it viable. Anyhow, decided to go with axes then and soldier on, and lo and behold, blessing in disguise. Gotta say, the axe is way stronger than it's perpetuated to be. Now I'm gonna push forward and see Meru. Plan is to use the Grifter background to circumvent the smartsy talker skill check and get access to the star room so I can use Dariusz' helmet. No idea if it'll work yet but I'm about to find out.
 

Morpheus Kitami

Liturgist
Joined
May 14, 2020
Messages
2,476
My resolution for this American Summer is to play through some of the Squad-Tactics/TRPGS/MilSims/Autism Enablers this place holds sacrosanct, starting with Silent Storm.

Fun stuff, I will admit that as someone who'd only really played both Nu-XCOMs before touching this that the Point Bank, Fire Mode and Stance System took a few hours to integrate into muscle memory. There's also some inherent jank with audio mixing and sightlines; several fireplaces are so loud I thought the buildings containing them were on fire and the Wehrmacht have mastered the art of blending in among the corpses of their fallen comrades. Hasn't stopped me from enjoying my time with it, though I'm beginning to wonder if it's possible to mod a save mid-campaign; the Swiss Factory with those walking refrigerators and my incompetent engineer are making me rethink some things. Guess I'll save that for the Axis run.

I think Steam updated the listing for S2 and S3 sometime after I bought them, rolling the latter into the former as part of their Gold Edition, no idea how to access Sentinels from that but I'm assuming it'll unlock after I beat the first campaign.

Wondering if I oughtta begin with Jagged Alliance or Jagged Alliance 2 after that, the two look worlds apart.
My advice would be to play JA2, then Deadly Games, and if you liked the latter, the original. The original's approach to time and the map is slightly awkward and doesn't really function as a great introduction to the series.
 

Bigg Boss

Arcane
Joined
Sep 23, 2012
Messages
7,528
I bought Total War: Warhammer for 15 bucks. I don't feel the need to buy the DLC or upgrade to 2 and 3. I am annoyed I did not nab the game for free on Epic but I would have to boot Epic for that to work too so it evens out.
 

jackofshadows

Magister
Joined
Oct 21, 2019
Messages
4,488
For the first time in my life I actually beat the buffed Harran's Pass fight.
Remind me please why "buffed"? I took a look at my screenshot
and I don't remember any "unbuffed"/different versions of this fight. Although ^ might be still from the EA so it could be different in other ways anyway.[/quote]
 
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Sigourn

uooh afficionado
Joined
Feb 6, 2016
Messages
5,624
I'm enjoying Ashes: Afterglow, much, much, much more now. And I have to say it is one of the best looking games I've ever played. Sure, some edges may be a bit rough (I find the 3rd person look very goofy, and I wish the skies looked more detailed in the night maps), but other than that it is mindblowing. I really don't want to post pictures because I don't want to spoil the experience.

The best way to describe how this game looks is CHARACTER. A lot of love went into it. I don't exaggerate when I say this feels like how Fallout would look like if it had been an early 90s shooter. Short of 50's aesthetic (which, pardon me, I find frankly overrated after playing Ashes), it is everything that makes Fallout Fallout: gritty, gory, atmospheric, and when needed, funny.
 

Zenithsan

Educated
Joined
Dec 6, 2021
Messages
144
I finally organized my game room to have all the consoles connected at the same time, so I'm playing a lot of PS games.

My biggest discovery was the Choro Q saga. Racing games with rpg elements and really well-designed tracks. For example, you can complete a track with default parts, or use aquatic or flying parts to take alternative routes. Changing the tires or tuning your car for certain terrains really makes the difference. And all of this is bought with currency that you win in races, so you can grind the first course to build the ultimate car if you want.

The second game in the Ps2 series was made by another company and is another kind of beast, really unique game. Big open world with no restraints, quests, you have a team of cars, secrets, minigames, etc. Also, you have a few radio stations with awesome jazz and chill music, and in the jap version even a talk radio! Wish that was dubbed.


9d2657b655759e7f4cfe031b7900fca5.jpg


64997.jpg

b65ea90efb2c3096c771608285222a70.gif
 

smaug

Secular Koranism with Israeli Characteristics
Patron
Dumbfuck
Joined
Feb 20, 2019
Messages
6,438
Location
Texas
Insert Title Here
I started Fallout: New Vegas (more like a test play rather than an actual dedicated playthrough, we’ll see).

It’s so hard to play. Everything is completely different compared to F1/2. There’s so much shite everywhere, and it’s triggering me. Music, graphics, and gameplay. Playing with JAawyer’s patch.

WHERE IS GIFTED AT, HUH?
 

Spukrian

Savant
Joined
May 28, 2016
Messages
667
Location
Lost Continent of Mu
I'm replaying the Dishonored games, just finished the first game on Very Hard and started Knife of Dunwall on Master Assassin. I've played Dishonered on Normal and Hard before but somehow Very Hard feels easier, I must've gotten good at stealth.

Being discovered by guards in Knife of Dunwall on Master Assassin often leads to my immediate death, nice!
 

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