What are you playing?

[Frick]

A few hours into Avowed and I'm sure this will be another game I will quite like while most others considers it a big steaming pile of meh. But it does sort of make me want to play The Outer Worlds again.

NG+ in Starfield is interesting but that star born spaceship! weird piece of crap you can't upgrade or modify but has fast acceleration & plenty of storage.... solution?
Hijack another ship & customize it asap.

I just got Frontier and rebuilt it severly.

 

[nomdeplume]

 

[Frick]

Ohhh no lockpicking mini game in Avowed, good.

 

[Ruru]

Currently just testing out different games on Steam Deck, but I played Saints Row 2 last night and I'll continue my progress soon. Too lazy to start a new game so I'm continuing my old save from years ago (finished it on X360 like 10 years ago but there's a lot what I don't remember of the game).

 

[Pumper]

Started Robocop yesterday, which I got for 3.75€. Pretty fun so far, though the performance is not all that great for how it looks, not to mention how terrible the facial animation and lip sync are.

 

[Ruru]

Started Robocop yesterday, which I got for 3.75€. Pretty fun so far, though the performance is not all that great for how it looks, not to mention how terrible the facial animation and lip sync are.

My friend played that not that long ago on PS5 and looked pretty decent game. Not bad price.

 

[Apocalypsee]

Another game from my childhood off my to-finish list, Super Mario Land. Impressive that this game was build for OG Gameboy with its very limited hardware but its so much fun! And great job for those people who made the color palette for this game to make it more bearable (OG Gameboy only have 4 shades of green)

 

[The N]

God of War 2018.
Because I started in 2024 but couldn't make further, so started again from the beginning. I actually finished the main story and beaten all the Valkyries except the Queen, which turned out a hard challenge for me. Still working on it... Random Screenshot taken.

 

[ShiBDiB]

Broken Arrow - Really brings me back to the World In Conflict days with the multiplayer (much more approachable than WARNO)

WoW Classic - Panda pre-patch

Dwarf Fortress - Hadn't played it consistently in a very very long time and got real into it again

Palworld - The GF loves it and it's our current game we play together now that we moved into a new apartment. It's actually sorta good now.

 

[Frick]

WoW Classic - Panda pre-patch

I am tempted to get back there, but I'd have to level an Orc all the way up (for RP reasons).

Anyway 11 hours in Awoved now and it feels like I've barely started. I read a lot of people think the story is nothing, but I find it much more compelling than something like Baldur's Gate 3. I really like how I'm a ... sort of defined character, as opposed to any character, which means the writing will be better. And I really like my rifle. My rifle is my life.

An example of that writing: I've felt sort of bad for every single human I've killed so far.

 

[skizzo]

Recently went through Dead of Darkness which is a great survival horror game in a 2D format, and pixel art at that. It has some nice detailed portraits of all the various characters when dialog/cut scenes happen and they do change based on context of the convo. Nice touch

Currently playing through Ori and the Will of the Wisps. I actually never completed the first one. Played it for a while but didn't resonate with me too much. Decided to roll the dice on this sequel and it is better so far in my opinion. I'm enjoying it far more and plan on completing it. Artwork and presentation is very eye catching.

 

[nomdeplume]

Attempted obliterating at least one cheater in FH5 and took a tense action packed holiday screenshot.

 

[wNotyarD]

Decided to give the Game Pass Ultimate 3-month trial (which I got with my SD X1E laptop) a go. First things first, xCloud sucks, and for whatever reason the X1E can only use xCloud in the Xbox App. Now, getting on-topic:

Playing locally-installed Persona 3 Reload through GP on my desktop. And boy, are the graphics crisp, to the point I'd call'em crunchy. Also, the localization into Brazilian Portuguese is very good. It has some badly translated wording, but much of the localization is amazing to the point it gets myself laughing out loud.

 

[harm9963]

God of War 2018.
Because I started in 2024 but couldn't make further, so started again from the beginning. I actually finished the main story and beaten all the Valkyries except the Queen, which turned out a hard challenge for me. Still working on it... Random Screenshot taken.

View attachment 406433

I gave up on as well , finish the main story .

 

[Apocalypsee]

Finally finished Expedition 33. God this game is painful, in terms of gameplay I mean, I still stand if you hate turn-based game and QTE steer away from it. I just play for the story, as for the ending

Spoiler

I forced Alicia go back home, stop living in paintings, a fake lie, I felt like after that is revealed everything is just in a painting it just falls flat and don't feel like exploring to see other stuff.

What I think of this game? The production value of this game is amazing, the story, the music, the environment, the voice acting (I use French voice) is just incredible. Reason why I use French voice because the lipsync looks weird with English voice to me. The details in cutscene is great, the eye movement when the actor is panicked looks very realistic, I like that the cutscene now renders real time with just extra post processing so when you change the outfit and hair style it reflects in cutscene as well. Overall I like this game but I won't be replaying this game because I mentioned it in first paragraph. The core gameplay of this game just isn't my forte.


A lot of spoiler near the end so I can't show screenshot so have this ending credit.

 

[The N]

I gave up on as well , finish the main story .

Man, it's really challenging. Although I learned her moves and able to dimished her health around 70% 2-3 times but couldn't killed her in the end. Reminds me of Sekiro.

 

[KrazyT]

Just finished Castlevania II - Simon's Quest (from the Castlevania Anniversary Collection on PC).
Played so long time ago when it was released, but never finished.
Finished in '96 (around) where emulators began to spread.
As you already knows, it's almost impossible to finish it without a soluce.
The game is short and easy, but the clues are impossible to find out.
With a proper soluce, it's a matter of 3 maybe 4 hours.
I really like (and really miss) the Nes vibes on old action games.
It was great to destroy werewolves, flyng skulls, medusas, and others creatures of the night while walking trought dark forest, swamps, cemetary ...
Of course the music, well ... a cult classic !
It's a divisive game, but there lots of reasons to like it as I do.

I love the choice of colors during the game. Limited, but gives a very nice and strange atmosphere.

Almost looks like the original Castlevania, but it plays faster and easier. Dying isn't punishing as you restart where you die.

Come on Simon, Count Dracula is right next screen. Note the 2 first dungeons are the most difficult (filled with fake walls and traps), but the 3 last are piece of cake.
And the last mini-one is just the house of Dracula, where bringing his body parts revives him.

 

[Princess Garnet]

Finally finished Expedition 33. God this game is painful, in terms of gameplay I mean, I still stand if you hate turn-based game and QTE steer away from it.

Oh, I had the impression you just didn't like the dodging because it was too difficult.

If I realized your hesitation was because you didn't like the turn based part, then I never would have suggested that you try and continue because... it's a turn based game, so it simply wouldn't have been a good match for you.

It sounds like this game was for you, what many other modern JRPGs for me. That is, I tend to like the worlds, the visuals, the styles, and the vibes of many other JRPGs, but the combat part of gameplay (which is rarely turn based outside 2D/indie style JRPGs) always prevents me from finishing (or even starting). So I can imagine how difficult it was for you to press on, but at the same time, if you stuck with it to the end, it does speak to how good the rest is.

And yeah, "rug pulls" that change the premise of the story are typically divisive. I personally didn't mind the one in this game.

 

[JIWIL]

I love turned based games but can't stand QTE's. Stopped playing COE33 after a couple hours (maybe an hour into the Expedition)... they're just too annoying. I'd still buy the game again even knowing that I wouldn't play it, just to support them. I'll probably watch someone play it. I don't do that very often but there are some games that I really want to see but just can't play *cough Witcher 1+2 cough*.

Played a few hours of Persona 5 X -- the absolute worst controller implementation I've ever encountered.

Currently on the last mission of Horizon:FW -- I learned my lesson in the first installment and have ignored all the optional content (arena, hunting grounds, collectibles, some random mech striker? minigame, etc). The story is still really overbearing and judgemental, full of plot/logic holes, the mocap grossly pantomime, and the acting - I finally just muted speech. The visuals (and to a lesser extent, combat) make up for it though.

No screenshots unfortunately, because I have no idea how to take a screenie in HDR and have it look normal.

 

[Princess Garnet]

Which QTEs did you have an issue with?

Formally, there's only one type of QTE present in the game and those are the literal QTEs for prompts during attacks. All these do is result in more damage and/or extend the attack (but one character has a single attack which is outright canceled if you fail). You can disable the QTEs in the options, although this results in the attacks doing their base damage value as though you failed any inputs.

Informally, there's also the dodging during attacks (though these are not literal QTEs). Arguably, even these can be "ignored"... (meaning, don't try to dodge and let yourself be hit), and use states to survive. It's possible to beat the game this way as people have defeated Simon without dodging or parrying at all (and without one shot cheese), and he's by far the hardest optional boss in the game, so you can definitely play the entirety of the regular game and entirely neglect the QTEs and even the dodging (and will have to skip some of the earlier optional bosses and return to them later, but this is true early game even if you try to dodge and aren't perfect at it, so... barely much changes). Playing it this way would make the strategy/stat part more important.

 

[JIWIL]

It's more of an OCD issue. As much as I'd love to ignore it, I can't.

 

[Apocalypsee]

Oh, I had the impression you just didn't like the dodging because it was too difficult.

If I realized your hesitation was because you didn't like the turn based part, then I never would have suggested that you try and continue because... it's a turn based game, so it simply wouldn't have been a good match for you.

It sounds like this game was for you, what many other modern JRPGs for me. That is, I tend to like the worlds, the visuals, the styles, and the vibes of many other JRPGs, but the combat part of gameplay (which is rarely turn based outside 2D/indie style JRPGs) always prevents me from finishing (or even starting). So I can imagine how difficult it was for you to press on, but at the same time, if you stuck with it to the end, it does speak to how good the rest is.

And yeah, "rug pulls" that change the premise of the story are typically divisive. I personally didn't mind the one in this game.

Dodging/parrying and the other stuff like jump and counterattack, it can get quite overwhelming at times and sometime enemy can counterattack after you attack and that throw me off guard. The right combination of pictos and builds your character wisely is the key. The one thing I hate about turn-base is when you enter combat, it enters a different 'arena' from the place you started it, and if the fight is prolonged because I suffer and finished, I forgot where I am going or where I came from and that really annoys me. I got lost in red forest for half an hour or so mainly because of it.

I'm in for the story, and the music is so good, the menu music is my phone ringtone now, but I cut the opening piano. Thats how much I like the music in the game. I also enjoyed the world building; the different environment is so mesmerizing I took the time viewing each 'world' because I love the details the put in it, different enemy design, different music, etc. I don't usually do this but yes this is that good to soldier on, to me at least. Even when I the fan of Witcher 3 I can't play Witcher 1 and 2, I got far with Witcher 1 about 10+ hours but got stuck somewhere that I didn't find any solution. Now this kind of game will benefit from a remaster or complete overhaul.

 

[JIWIL]

Yeah, I tried to play Witcher 1 about half dozen times over more than a decade, probably put 50+ hours into it. Sometimes I would hit a game-ending, repeatable crash -- once I just hit my jank limit -- I even made it about halfway through only to realize I was on the wrong path because I said the wrong thing to that Crimson Flame knight guy who's name I can't remember 20 hours earlier queue headdesk moment.

Totally agree, even though I know I may get mailbombs for this, but Witcher 1 Remaster/Remake/Rewhatever is one of my most anticipated releases.

 

[Veseleil]

Even when I the fan of Witcher 3 I can't play Witcher 1 and 2

QTE is a dealbreaker for me as well. Tried to play W2E once, just no way, gtfo. I also hate press&hold the button mechanics in games with the same passion. If I've pressed a damn key, I did it for a damn reason, not because I've sat on the keyboard, mouse, or a gamepad ffs, instant feedback with no artificial delays or begone.

 

[Sithaer]

Yeah, I tried to play Witcher 1 about half dozen times over more than a decade, probably put 50+ hours into it. Sometimes I would hit a game-ending, repeatable crash -- once I just hit my jank limit -- I even made it about halfway through only to realize I was on the wrong path because I said the wrong thing to that Crimson Flame knight guy who's name I can't remember 20 hours earlier queue headdesk moment.

Totally agree, even though I know I may get mailbombs for this, but Witcher 1 Remaster/Remake/Rewhatever is one of my most anticipated releases.

I'm also one of those ppl who played the Witcher serie backwards.
After finishing W3 Goty I've went for W1 and damn that felt like a pain in the ass so I've looked around and found the Rise of the White Wolf mod which made the game at least tolerable with a number of quality of life changes to it and thats how I've finished the game.
W2 was fine on its own to me so I've only installed some graphics mods with an ENB profile on top. 'I've had a RX 570 at the time so I couldn't push things too far..'

Still I'm curious to see how W1 remake will end up and if its decent then I might actually play it again with that version cause W1 wasn't a bad game it was just very dated gameplay mechanics wise.

QTE is a dealbreaker for me as well. Tried to play W2E once, just no way, gtfo. I also hate press&hold the button mechanics in games with the same passion. If I've pressed a damn key, I did it for a damn reason, not because I've sat on the keyboard, mouse, or a gamepad ffs, instant feedback with no artificial delays or begone.

I'm kind of torn on QTE-s, some are fine and I don't mind them but certain QTE-s are seriously annoying to the point of ruining my fun with a game so ye it depends on the implementation and whatnot.
Some games actually do have a setting for that thing you've mentioned like if you want it to be 1 button press or hold, usually I leave it on default but in Expedition 33's case I've actually went the lazy way and turned them on auto cause I just can't be bothered since I'm mainly playing the game for its story anyway and having to deal with all of those QTE and whatever else in each fight was exhausting to me in a game like this.