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  1. The controls are really weird, I keep pressing the Touchpad for map and calling my horse with the wrong D-Pad button (thanks AC Odyssey). The gunplay doesn’t feel like it’s evolved since the OG RDR. It’s so incredibly clunky having to click in and out of cover and move up to the next position, felt like the analog stick was stuck in treacle. I’ve only had a few gunfights but every one has been a chore so far because of it, you just feel like just staying in one cover position so you don’t have to keep moving. I really didn’t think I’d be saying this but the R* game it most reminds me of is LA Noire. Early on there’s a cabin you have to search and I was just going around hugging walls and inspecting/picking up objects like LA Noire, you can do this with almost every richly detailed interior too. The quality of the writing, cinematics and atmosphere created though is truly phenomenal. The opening feels like you’re in and the attention to detail of the world and environmental design is astounding. I’ve been overwhelmed already with everything there is to do, I sat down and played Dominos at the camp for 40 minutes last night. I haven’t even discovered a lot of the side activities either, it has all been so bewildering that I haven’t quite got a handle on it. I’ve been a little disappointed with the ‘talk to strangers’ thing too as a lot of people in the only town I’ve been in have only had the ‘Greet, Antagonise, pull weapon’ commands which don’t really seem nuanced. I have had a couple of cool stranger interactions outside of the town though. Overall though, it’s just intoxicating and I can’t wait to dive back in and properly get used to my surroundings and all the different systems at play. The gunplay is easily my biggest grievance and if I don’t get used to it or it improves I feel it’s going to massively drag the game down in terms of enjoyment for me.
  2. mmmark

    Far Cry 6

    Full disclosure I’ve only played 30 minutes of actual gameplay as my eyelids weighed about 500lb. I really like the style of it and opening. Once you’re set free to play you’re pleasantly set up for revenge. The next gen (playing on XSX) has proper elevated this game from past entries. It looks gorgeous but most impressive of all is the draw distance, amount of vegetation and that it is all crisp and clear to boot. Gameplay is how you’d expect from a far cry, or any half decent fps really. The machete is nice and lethal for stealth plays. I’ll be making good use of that. It was real fun to have my own personal alligator run alongside me. I look forward to diving back in.
  3. Nag

    Evil West

    Booted this up for the first time today just for a look see... played for a couple of hours and completed four levels. For those not in the know it's a Steam punk (I guess) take on Westerns mixed with Vampires which I thought was going to be much more shooter orientated than it is... it's actually much closer to the newer God of War games than Gears of War, shit, you even open and smash chests the same way as Kratos does. So there's a definite leaning towards melee combat over ranged but there's Guns involved obviously being a Western. These work on a cool down rather than relying on ammo drops and are mainly used for hitting exposed weak points with the rifle or chip damage for the pistol then there's the sawn off which is great for obliterating shields... all standard stuff for anyone who's played a third person adventure game anytime recently. So far in terms of levels it feels very old school with very linear levels designed to funnel you from one encounter to the next. As for looks it's been a very mixed bag so far, actual game play looks ok, I'm not sure if it's a design choice or what but there's a really weird glow with everything... fire sources are ridiculously bright and this isn't even an hdr enabled game and then you have the cutscenes which everything just looks muddy and crushed to fuck... I'm not sure whats going on there. Funnily though the pictures I'll post look a damn sight better then they do on a tv.🤷‍♂️ So a bit of a mixed bag... plays fine, looks a little ropey.
  4. I’ve played about 3 hours or more of the campaign which I believe is about half way. It’s alright but it’s like a ‘best of’ of the series. Think of it as a Now That’s What I Call CoD! Track listing includes: A swimming bit. A sniper bit. A gunner in the skies bit. All the hits dating back many years. The story and overall attitude of the game is awful I’ll say that. Dude bros with guns. No one is likeable or too much different for anyone else. The game is very linear as to how you can tackle each short segment. Be a few metres away from where it wants to be and you’re killed. I look forward to multi once the campaign is done with.
  5. Well this pretty much came out of nowhere. Like, I didn’t even realise it was out. I remember it being announced, but not much after that. The original Tales game was one of the best things Telltale came out with (Walking Dead peaked after their first season, and by the end was crap). I’m not an expert of the franchise, I’ve only finished 1 and 2, and some of the DLC. But that didn’t stop me from having a great time with Tales. So, now we have the sequel. Though it’s “episodic”, it plays out as one big game, giving you a break between episodes. I’ve just finished Episode 1. And so far, it’s off to a good start. The dialogue has been amusing enough. The story, which switches between 3 playable characters, seems solid enough. There’s zero puzzles, so you’re mostly down to making dialogue choices, and occasionally wandering around the area to trigger the next set piece. There’s a fair few Quick Time Events, but they’re easy enough. One review said that the hacking mini game is laughably easy. It is indeed, and makes you wonder what the point of them even is. It warns you “failure has repercussions”. But honestly, you’d have to put your controller on the floor, to fail them. The IGN review said the final episode is a train wreck, and almost ruins the game completely. We will see how that plays out. But so far, yeah, this seems decent enough.
  6. HandsomeDead

    Fallout 4

    Sam wants meaningful feedback so I'll try and give some here. It certainly is a follow up to Fallout 3 in that it is still that at it's core. You have a big, dilapidated open world for you to rummage through, explore and have your own little story. It's that stuff again. But the introduction to this game makes it difficult to like. Your character and equipment just aren't up to snuff when you start off. I died a ridiculous amount on my first proper task, and even when I found a craftier way of completing the mission unforeseen things would happen and I'd have to go again. I just felt like the game was slapping my hand every time I tried something which didn't happen nearly as much in Fallout 3. I also got attacked by a high level glowing Ghoul when I was minding my own business just after I'd talked to a merchant and was killed instantly... while on the main road just outside the starting area. They have improved the shooting but it seems at the moment that V.A.T.S isn't as good so I'm unsure how to play it now. In F3 since the shooting was so shit I only ever used it as cover fire while V.A.T.S charged up then I'd go for a full attack but that doesn't seem to work as well here. During the mission mentioned previously I feel like it wanted me to go full CoD since enemies were lobbing grenades and molotovs like confetti and I just couldn't do anything about it. I just ran off. Maybe it gets better as more unlocks become available but I don't remember being this frustrated during the intro of the previous Fallout games. They had their issues but not like this. It feels really slap dash and unconsidered. But I think the game looks fine. It's the least of my worries.
  7. spatular

    Overwatch

    cheers for the games Duck! it's early days, and a bit all over the place, but i quite like what i've played of this so far. i worry i'll get annoyed with the aiming in the long run. needs more auto aim imo.
  8. Looked for a “played” page for this, but didn’t see one. So here goes. I just completed the main story for this, and really enjoyed it. The Yakuza series has always been my favourite, with its excellent combat, and tone that goes all over the place (serious one minute, utterly insane the next). Judgment was pretty good for the most part, only really spoiled by the clunky stealth sections, and exceptionally tedious “tailing” missions, where you have to follow a person round for ages without being spotted. I’ll always remember one part of that game, where you have to tail someone for what feels like 5 minutes at least. Only for it to then immediately follow that up with another, equally long one. Fucking tedious pretty much summed that part up. Thankfully, that’s been stripped back quite a bit for Lost Judgment. There’s not much tailing, and even less stealth, which remains awful. Though they’ve put in a few platforming/climbing sections, which are a bit shite. In as much if you fall, you have to repeat an entire section. Combat wise, I much prefer it to the RPG style of Like A Dragon. I am going to give that another shot on PS5 at some point, but the unfair difficulty spikes really ruined that game for me. It’s more of a serious game than Yakuza, by that I mean there’s not really any zany side missions. Yakuza chucks things from adult baby clubs, to god knows what else. In comparison, things are a bit more serious in LJ. Though with a story involving bullying, suicide and murder, it’s probably to be expected. There’s an entirely seperate section where Yagumi investigates various different clubs in the local school. I’ve done some of them, but a lot are locked out to me, and I’m not entirely sure why. It says i need to raise my Appeal. How do I do that? Not a bloody clue. Google to the rescue, then. I’ve got the “Kaito Files” DLC to play next, then I’ll have a crack at some of the other side missions. I’ve already sank 20+ hours into it, and though it’s not on the same level as Yakuza, it’s still a lot of fun. I gather that because of some issue with the Japanese voice actor for Yagumi, there won’t be any more Judgement games. Which is a shame if so, as it’s always a joy to piss about in Kamurocho.
  9. I’m about two hours into this on the Switch. I’ve been playing the main game, haven’t tried the visual novel prequel thing yet. But I’ll probably play them concurrently. The game takes a few twists and turns early on, but nothing overly dramatic. So far, typical jrpg opening (as jrpg stories go). The combat is quite unique though. Enemies have elemental types and during battles there is an elemental field, which, depending on the elemental spells used causes certain elements to get stronger and the opposite type weaker. For example blue and red (water and fire) are opposites. If you use a blue elemental spell, the blue area of the elemental field (this is shown on the screen) will grow larger, and blue spells will become stronger and red spells weaker. One interesting tactic connected to this is when fighting enemies of different element types, their spells can antagonise each other, which can affect the order in which you might want to take them down. In addition to that, when you do a normal attack, you can choose between weak, medium and strong. Weak attacks have high accuracy and strong attacks low accuracy. Every hit that connects raises the accuracy of subsequent attacks. It’s up to you how you choose to string combos together. There’s more to combat than that but those are just a couple of interesting points.
  10. I have very mixed feelings about this. I love the feeling of adventure, of not knowing what's down the road and if you'll be able survive. It's brilliant when you do overcome the odds and press on after a tough battle. The combat system is great with loads of customisation on offer, you're even encouraged to change class altogether. The Pawn system works really well, being able to hire and fire helpers and changing the composition of your group entirely as the situation demands. Despite all the good bits, the game so far has felt as though i'm playing the middle portion of an RPG where i'm clearing up fluff quests just to pad out the leveling process. There's been no gravitas or urgency to the quests so it's difficult to differentiate between the story and side quests. Things like not having fast travel I can understand why they left out even though it's annoying to have to walk to the same places over and over. I'm surprised more games don't use the MMO style flight paths to get around. You still get to where you're going quicker but you have to travel to a specific place, rather than just magically teleporting everywhere. It's a happy medium between the two. There's other things which are pretty minor and affect my enjoyment more than they probably should. For instance, why did they overlook mini-map markers for people who have something to say? It's incredibly frustrating having to run around looking for colored speech bubbles above NPCs heads. Likewise with the Pawns. As good as the system is it grates when in combat and you're unable to issue commands for something as simple as a weapon buff - the option just doesn't exist. Most of the time you just have to wait for them to apply the correct buff which is very frustrating against the larger enemies. For all it's issues, there are times when this incredible game shines through, and that's what makes it worth playing. I just wish it was more consistent.
  11. Been playing a lot of this the past week, the openmw version (which is an open source re-implementation of the game engine to run better on modern systems, with more modern visual tweaks while still being the same old ass game). It's a game I've a ton of half hearted attempts at getting into but this is more of a proper attempt, primarily cause I figured out how to install openmw on steam deck and get save syncing working between it and pc using something called syncthing. If people are interested there's guides out there to get openmw working on deck, you want that, you don't want vanilla cause it won't run as good or play as well. I did try to see if there was a thread to bump but seems there isn't, so I mean the effort was made there. Maybe it exists but I can't find it 🤷‍♂️ Anyway, it's cool. It's very interactive in the way Bethesda games usually are but moreso in some ways and less so in others if you compare it to their modern output. Everything is dice-rolley as fuck. Even casting a spell can fail if you aren't properly learned in its school of thought, even if you have the spell 'learned'. Getting around doing quests means following actual directions relative to specific cities and locations on the map, one quest in particular is given to you as a series of sermons from a church which follows the teachings of 'Vivec', who is like Morrowind's JC figure, telling you to go to specific locations like caves beneath vivec city or a big wall made out of the remains of deceased dark elves and give offerings. You have to figure that shit out yourself, it's up to you, and it's a cool approach which demands you actually spend time reading books of lore and listening to what people say to even know what the hell a 'ghostgate' even is or why you probably shouldn't press beyond it cause it's a bit shit on the other side. Anyway, this will be the time I beat Morrowind. The really wordy bits where you spend ages reading actual novella length backstories of a Dark Elf queen and demigods tearing things apart and putting them back together are pretty well suited to deck gaming, tho in general the whole game is tbh. It's got an immersive sim quality to the way you can figure out some stuff, like it doesn't have a fast travel system, not really, so getting from Pelegiad to Balmora is a bit of a pain but there are some workarounds like this involving alteration and special potions There's others which require you to invest a bit of time into the game's systems, like being able to use telekinesis to open booby-trapped doors from across the room, or use the same skill to pickpocket someone really far away without having to take risks out in the open. Right now my khajit is a neophyte in a lot of this stuff and all his potions have the fun secondary effect of causing temporary status decreases, so a little bit of poison to go along with the buff, but my more recent potions have less of that in it. It's clunky and difficult but a lot of the quests and skills force you to invest the time to interrogate the RPG clockwork which allows you to do lots of interesting stuff, while at the same time improving your understanding of the world itself and its history. It's not quite botw cause you don't have a physics engine but finding different interactions is still a lot more interesting here than in Oblivion imo which while it had tons of physics interactions they did not improve the gameplay which was mostly just action based. I never played enough Skyrim to really have an informed take on it but I didn't get into it in any of my attempts (X360, PC and PCVR). Besides Morrowind it is probably my biggest gaming blindspot, but unlike Morrowind I'm not as likely to address it I think cause I kinda know what it is but MW still has lots of fun unknown stuff for me cause even now it feels pretty unique and worth playing, even 20 years on Quest wise it's being mostly ascending to apprentice-hood in the thieves guild and mages guild, at the same time as trying to decide which of the three houses suits me best (decided Hlallu cause they about money) and deciding if I want to do a fighter's guild quest where someone is asking me to kill fellow guild mates, if there's any consequences to it or whatever. All my stats are heavily speech and money focused, which is a probably weird way to play the game. But the way you are supposed to do things anyway is cram points in your misc skills to get the most level ups rather than just focus on your base 10 stats. So figuring out the mysteries of conjuration, illusion, alteration and mysticism is what I'm into, too magicka starved to go into the deep end of some higher level magicks or destruction tho
  12. Hendo

    Outer Wilds

    So this is an odd one. Because the game tells you nothing at all going in, I think it's important to know what the set-up is, but some people might feel it's a spoiler, so I'll hide the conceit behind a spoiler tag. I'm enjoying what I've played so far although the controls are a bit fiddly. It's a fantastic idea that you rarely see in games (and the medium is well suited to it) so I hope it does well for them. Epic Store exclusive for now, I believe. Also on Game Pass on Xbox.
  13. radiofloyd

    Elden Ring

    Played an hour, on PC. The game defaulted to High graphical settings, so I left it at that. I chose the Vagabond class. So far, so Dark Souls. Looking forward to losing my life to this game. The opening cinematic is very cool. One of my Steam friends has already played this for 8 hours.:.
  14. Started this off on Thursday, put around 10 hours into it so far. I don’t want to spoil any of the story so I’ll keep details as vague as possible. But it’s safe to say that the game really doesn’t pull any punches at the beginning. You're put into Protagonist Amicia’s comfortable shoes almost straight away and after a brief tour around her parents Estate things start to slowly unravel. After the events at her homestead she ends up on the run with her estranged Brother Hugo. From here you travel around differing Medieval French environs trying to keep your brother safe and find a sanctuary to escape to horrors of the outside world along with meeting others who’re in just as desperate a situation as you are. In in terms of gameplay, it’s very much a stealth game mixed with light puzzle elements and a little bit of ‘the floor is lava’ thrown in for good measure. The first few chapters were quite basic really with serviceable stealth you’ve seen in countless other games - hiding in bushes, throwing objects to distract the guards and all that jazz. Things do get a little more difficult with a variety of potions thrown in that you can use against Guards along with lots of fire puzzles with the rats which then intersect with then Guards at some points to make things a little more complicated. It’s still all stuff you’ve seen before though, there’s nothing new in it at all in gameplay terms aside from the rats. The rats are incredibly cool and are easily the most distinctive part of the game but with fire sources abundant they’re never all that threatening to get through. The setting is incredible distinctive too. The grounded Medieval setting doesn’t get done an awful lot and there really aren’t too many comparisons to make, the only other games I can come up with is Vermintide and parts of The Witcher too. It it is a game that thrives on melancholy. Chapter after Chapter features tons of horrific scenes like a battlefield filled with dead soldiers or a hillside of dead pigs, it’s difficult to explain but it does well to create a constant feeling of misery, death and decay and it never really lets up, it is relentlessly miserable with only slight moments of brevity here and there. I do like it so far and I am incredibly Intrigued to see where the story goes next but I don’t love it. The stealth gameplay is often frustrating, not knowing when you’ve been spotted by enemies or not and the check pointing is poor, often putting you back at the start of an area. The voice acting is a bit wooden and I haven’t exactly wholly warmed to the characters. For a AA game from a somewhat unknown studio though it is pretty incredible what they’ve achieved with this. The Rats are a fantastic enemy that hasn’t really been done before, the graphics and lighting in particular is phenomenal and the setting feels incredibly fresh. It’s surprisingly long too, I thought it’d be finished at this far into the game but I’m not sure I’m even half way through. Lots of pics:
  15. I'm pretty sure the venn diagram of this forum and this particular game is just two completely separate circles situated three miles from one another. However, I'm nothing if not weird in my game choices, so let's talk about it anyway. This is Animal Crossing meets Kingdom Hearts as far as I'm concerned. The Magic Kingdom has been taken over by a weird darkness (which also has the side effect of making famous Disney characters lose their memories), and it's up to you to cast out the darkness, visit different characters and restore Disney to its former glory. You do this by completing various tasks , whether that's finding Goofy's fishing rod, setting up Scrooge McDuck's store signs (more on him in a minute) or simply by planting and harvesting different crops. So. Mr McDuck. The Scottish, money-swimming capitalist. He's Tom Nook. Buying/upgrading stores or buying clothes and decorations all goes through him. And his prices are just as disgraceful as Animal Crossing's awful banker. I've paid him to make a little store for Goofy (and subsequently upgrade said store). I've paid him to build his own store, and then spent MORE money in there. And it seems he exists solely to leech from my wallet. At least he's true to character, I suppose. It seems to have a lot more focus than AC right now. While I've never played it, my understanding of AC is that you don't really have a specific goal list where you can change your tasks and set new ones. This has an actual focussed goal list. And while that might mean the end game could end up a bit pointless, Disney have almost a century's worth of content to draw from, so they should have no trouble keeping it interesting. The music is just so. Fucking. Charming. From symphonic takes on Let It Go and How Far I'll Go to the simple When You Wish Upon A Star, there's an awesome little tracklist that rotates, and it gives the game this unique personality that's incredibly sedate. Graphics are... functional. They do the job, but they definitely aren't made to impress. There's tons of character, though. Especially in the Disney character models. My biggest negative, and something that keeps niggling is that the controls feel really loose. It's almost as though your avatar is on a slight delay whenever you press buttons. There's no combat and nothing that needs a huge amount of reaction time, but it's just a little distracting when it looks and feels like you're floating slightly above the floor, rather than actually walking on it. After doing my first batch of goals, I've chosen to go to the Moana-themed level. I've stopped it there, because I started last night when Oscar was in bed and I want him to see it, but it's seemed to worm into my brain already, and I definitely want to see more of what it has to offer.
  16. Put just over an hour into this. First things first, it’s way more traditional narrative focused than the last From action RPGs. Loads of cut scenes and it defaults to Japanese voices but I switched it to English because evidently I’m some kind of monster. If I can switch it back, I’ll give it a try. Combat feels superficially similar to Souls but really very different. It’s all about parrying and timing, whereas a lot of Souls you can cheese quite easily. I can’t imagine anyone’s ultra sensitive about spoilers from an hour in, but just to be sure: So far it feels great to play, very smooth and satisfying when you pull the combat off properly.
  17. Quoting the kickstarter - "Darkest Dungeon is a challenging gothic roguelike RPG about the psychological stresses of adventuring. Descend at your peril!" Anyway, it was funded for over $300,000 in March 2014, spent a year on Early Access and eventually released in January this year. It's due out on PS4 later in the summer. It got good reviews and and has a "very positive" Steam user rating with around 15,000 votes. I've played it for an hour so far, it's cool. The game is structured like Sunless Sea in that you have a base, a safe haven, where you can buy provisions, recruit new members, take on quests etc etc. You can only set out with a party of four each time, but you can have way more than four people hired. One of the things you can do in the base camp or "hamlet" is assign people to certain activities which will reduce stress (like dread in Sunless Sea). If someone is assigned to an activity, you can't take them with you on your next trip. I'm not going to drone on about the mechanics in the game, but it is pretty similar to Sunless Sea really. Combat is turn based. Your party stands in formation and different characters have a preferred position...it's not what it sounds like. Both yours and the enemies position will affect the range of your attacks. That's all I can say about it so far. I did the introductory quest.
  18. DANGERMAN

    Dishonored 2

    Still spelt wrong Bit of an odd one so far. The intro isn't great, I won't spoil it but it's so rushed. Basically it's the bare minimum to justify another game and it's dealt with within about 4 minutes. There's a couple of people you're supposed to feel something towards, but you've literally just met them, you didn't catch their name, and really, ultimately, couldn't give a fuck I can't remember at what point the first game told you about the benefits/consequences of killing people or knocking them out, but I've played 40 minutes, kind of might have killed a few people, and I don't know if it matters. They deserved it, but am I spreading plague, will I face some big consequence later in the game, I've no idea That said, you get to the game part and it's good. I fucked up the combat a couple of times, because you're robbed of your powers there's been a couple of times I've had no idea there were other guards around and so I've tried stealthing someone to sleep and ended up alerting 3 other guards, There's a weird inertia to the movement too, I think it was in the first game too, it takes some getting used to, but I think it will ultimately give the game some character and identity. I might regret it but I'm playing as Corvo, He doesn't shut up, again, I can't remember the first game that well but I don't remember him talking that much. You can play as Emily, and I think the game would like you to play as her, maybe I'll restart it and play as her at some point. Looks good, I'm managing to run it on ultra on my 970 at above 40fps (non-pc players stop reading before this bit, yeah), so I'll probably drop it down to very high and see what happens, either way I can't say I'm seeing the performance problems others have complained about
  19. Ok, so this is awesome. i grew up with the Turtles in the ‘90s. Spent a small fortune on the arcade games. Loved Turtles In Time, which was the second SNES game I ever played. Scrolling beat em ups remain my favourite genre. So I was always going to be all over this. Thankfully, it was totally worth the wait. It looks fantastic, you can tell a lot of love has gone into this. The combat is satisfying, with each character having slightly different moves. If you play through Story mode, you gradually unlock more stuff, such as extra health and lives, and abilities. Each level has 3 challenges, ranging from do-able (kill 3 enemies with a specific move), to “not bloody likely” (don’t get hit once). There’s secrets to find, which help to level up a bit faster. The soundtrack is pretty catchy, and I love that the voice cast for the original series is more or less present and correct. I’ve played a few online sessions, and the net code seems pretty stable, even with 6 players, though that can be a bit chaotic. Fairly easy to get into an online game as well, which is good. Trophy wise, most of them are alright, though there’s a few pretty tough ones. Not sure I’ll manage the Platinum. But I’ll definitely have a fair few online sessions. It’s been scoring pretty high with reviews. And it’s totally justifiable, as it’s so much fun to play.
  20. DANGERMAN

    Cat Quest 2

    I really liked the original Cat Quest. It's an action RPG that takes place on a pretty small map. It gates you by having huge spikes in enemy levels, so if you wander in to the level 15 area at level 6 you're going to get very fucked up. It worked though, despite retreading a lot of old ground it keeps feeding you more, keeps you on the train, and it's not long before you're wrecking previously unkillable enemies The second one is effectively more of the same. This time there's co-op, you can play as a dog too. In single player you can switch between the two with the other character being controlled by the AI. It works, the a.i. is invulnerable so it can deal damage while you back away from enemies to dodge their signposted attacks. It kind of suffers from 2 problems, the first is that it's more of the same. The combat works the same, the progression more or less works the same (I no longer have to stick to landmass). The gear system works the same too, you can find repeats of the same items that will level it up, or you can pay to level it up. This obviously can make a huge difference along with your level as to how much damage you give and take. It's not something you have to be thinking about all the time but it does help The most obvious difference between the two games, and something I'm not sure is either a problem or a benefit, the map is now significantly larger. It still works the same way, going in to certain areas is suicide, but it's more gradual now, there's more space to spend your time in during the lower levels. Equally though it can mean trecking around is a bit more of a slog, when you're hunting for side quests or ticking off the explorable caves, the end game is going to be slower Ultimately if it has a problem it's that it's more of the same. Given that it's now a much bigger and longer game that's probably magnified, but it's still good fun and I'd still recommend it, it's simple, a bit mindless, but that's kind of what I want at the minute
  21. edited the title cause no need for two threads for two weird Russian games hardly anyone will play I started this. I don't expect this to be a popular thread, but it's a game I've wanted to try for a long time. Premise is hard to explain cause it just throws you in and your character knows more about the world than you do. Basically there is a plague, and there is a mystery. After a long prologue you're in a town and you have to solve the mystery of what's going on, I think, while also not dying. You've got health and thirst and hunger and a lot of other survival mechanics to manage. You have a sort of notoriety mechanic which affects your influence with people in the town. It's basically some sort of hardcore immersive sim Shenmue thing except if you are not in the right place at a certain time you will permanently miss out on certain stuff. So far I've spent most of my time trying to find the one friendly person in the town who doesn't hate me while rummaging through bins for a few stale peanuts so I don't pass out. Parts of it remind me of what BloodBorne, story wise. It's very weird and unforgiving. Kind of a bit of a David Lynch fever dream at parts. Anyway this game is free on game pass so there's no harm in trying even if you hate it. Game seems really hard, like you're destined to just fail the first playthrough.
  22. This ain't Banjo... It's been a long, long time since I played an N64 game. There are certain things you forget, that are distinct to that console. "Jank" I believe is the modern term. I don't remember the platforming being as weird as it is here? Perhaps because I was used to how the platform worked regarding 3D jump mechanics at the time. Fast forward to now and it is jarring to say the least. Jumping is precise and quite unforgiving. Ironically, you cast no shadow to judge if you will land on the platform you are aiming for. There was an infuriating little jump early on, along the way to acquiring the Asson that brought out a little frustration. Later exemplified in areas involving death traps and (early game) one-hit KO lava. You have a dodge mechanic. But it doesn't work as smoothly as you might expect, coming into this from the perspective of modern From Soft titles etc The remaster gives us camera control with the second stick. It is both an improvement and not. Nowhere is this better demonstrated than in the swimming mechanics. The first time I swam in this game. I tapped the action button, as standard and promptly drowned when I couldn't right myself. Later, I discovered the problem and it's solution. You don't use the action button to swim... You use both sticks. Forward on the left stick to move and steer with the right stick. If it sounds like tank controls, it basically is. But being in the water, it does become intuitive quicker. Ultimately my first session went on for about an hour and a half. Collecting four Dark Souls. The second weapon in the Asson and 66 Cadeaux. Quite intrigued to continue at this point.
  23. I've put around 12 hours into this since starting it Tuesday morning. I'm mainly going to focus on the additions and changes to the formula since Origins as I feel like there's many posts of mine already extolling the virtues of that game. Exploration mode is one of the major new additions. It lets you strip away a lot of quest markers and gives you clues as to a place/person etc. you have to find, so instead of just pointing you towards your target and placing a marker down for you it'll say 'South of Mount Apollo', 'West of Athens', 'near Fort Marmaris' or something like that and you'll have to use your own deductions to find your way there, sometimes having to speak to someone who will then point you in the direction of your destination or having to investigate an area to find where a certain person of interest went next. As soon as you get close to your destination it'll pop up with 'you're close, use Icarus - fucking eagle - to find target' which takes away a bit of the mystery but it still remains more satisfying and engaging to play this way, I was sceptical and didn't think I'd bother with it but it's the intended way to play the game and I can't recommend it enough, just helps immerse you in the world that little bit more. They've also added a dialogue tree to almost every conversation you can engage in. Almost straight away the game starts you off engaged in conversation and you have to choose your responses for the first time ever in an AC game - which as a long time fan I was genuinely exhilarated about. On the surface of it it's a small detail but having that ability to pick your own choices deeply enhances your engagement to certain quest-lines and conversations, instead of sitting passively by and waiting for a conversation to be over so you can get on with the quest at hand you feel more proactive and engaged every step of the way so when you finish the conversation. It also means you've got more agency to make your own choices, I've had one mission where I saved some villagers from some enemy soldiers and they thanked me by giving me their life savings in Gold - you can either take it or tell them to keep their money and go on your way. There was another mission where some villagers stole some supplies from a Spartan caravan, I found them in a cave and could've slaughtered the lot of them but I decided to let them live and went back to my Spartan soldier quest giver only to end up empty handed, save for a 'Sparta thanks you' as a reward. Certain quests that have you finding select treasure you can lie about and say you found nothing, pocketing the trinket yourself and things like this. Granted, none of this is new in the RPG-sphere but it feels very new and fresh when implemented so superbly in an AC game. The new romance options are sure to delight too, so far I've only managed to sleep with one lady but I had to work to get her to that point! Complimenting the new dialogue tree is a brand new quest structure which I've not really seen before in an AC game. It kind of makes everything meld into one, even the main story quests aren't given particular gravitas at all, they're just on your quest menu and have you doing small tasks which will eventually add up to something bigger later on, they can also run into a variety of side quests and overlap. Again, other RPGs have done this before so it isn't anything special per se but to see them overlap to such an expert degree that it feels incredibly organic is a real triumph. Origins had a similar idea but everything still felt a little disjointed at times but here everything feels seamless. Full fat Naval Combat returns from AC4. In Origins there were brief sections of Naval combat but most of your time on the seas was spent in rafts and basic sail boats. Within the first 5 hours of this you're given your own boat and free reign to go wherever you'd like on the high seas complete with Naval missions like sinking x number of ships and being able to board enemy ships and slaughter their crew - just like you could in AC4. Another return from AC4 are the sea shanty's, which just are a delight and help add to the tranquillity when you're sailing around on the open seas. I don't yet know whether other AC4 naval options like hunting down legendary ships, taking over Naval forts etc. are going to be in the game but I hope they are. You can also fully upgrade your ship by picking up supplies floating in the sea and sinking ships. Making it stronger and stronger by upgrading the Hull, archer capacity, adding new weapons like a flaming pot and things like that. Along your travels you can recruit lieutenants who work on the ship and give various perks to you and your crew along the way. The Phylakes system in Origins - where certain actions would make a strong enemy hunt you down throughout the world - has been expanded into the new 'mercenary' system which acts quite similarly to the Nemesis system in the Middle-Earth games. You start off on the bottom tier and work your way up hunting down - and being hunted - by stronger mercenaries eventually working your way up to the top. I really liked the Phylakes in Origins and I like the system again in this, it definitely feels more fleshed out this time around and the incentives for working your way up the leaderboard to be a legendary mercenary make the whole system more compelling. Without giving anything away about the story, it is already quite a bit better than Origins’ so far. Whilst I did like Origins’ freeform mission structure (and the way you could pick and choose which targets you want to take down and when) the story feels much more focused in this - at the moment anyway - with a lot of cutscenes, flashbacks and interesting, intriguing characters who you can’t quite tell their motivations. The dialogue tree plays its hand in the story missions too with you being able to make key decisions about whether you want to let a certain person live or die and the narrative shifting based on your decision, I’m sure there will be many more like this as the game goes on as well. This helps keep you invested in Alexios/Kassandra’s story quite a bit more, and it took me a good minute or two to make my first key decision and was an unusually emotional for an AC game. The combat and upgrade system is largely the same as Origins but you seem to be a bit more limited in the abilities you can equip at any one time which means you can’t just spam special attacks over and over until an enemy is defeated. If you liked the combat system in Origins you’ll like it here, it is still very satisfying to take down a difficult enemy and the new abilities help you feel like more of a badass, especially the Spartan Kick which feels amazing to kick some high level fort boss off a cliff. The ability tree itself seems to be much more toned down compared to Origins as well with far less clutter and superfluity, you can only equip 4 melee and 4 ranged abilities at one time as well which helps you not get overpowered too quickly in the game. The Greek setting itself I haven’t found quite as fascinating to explore as Egypt so far. Egypt felt so distinct and different in its art styles and environment whereas this can feel at times like a lot of other RPGs with European settings. Nevertheless, it is still incredibly beautiful and walking through a town and watching the inhabitants go about their daily routines or seeing the sun go down over the Mediterranean is spellbinding, it is still such an incredibly easy game to get utterly lost in. I’m sure once I experience more of the Aegean Islands and Athens things will begin to feel more distinctly Greek. Safe to say I’m besotted with it so far, it's maybe got a little less of the evocative magic that made Egypt feel so vivid and memorable in Origins but it makes up for it in pretty much every other way. I’d put it on the same level as Witcher 3 so far and it’s probably one of the best RPGs I’ve ever played.
  24. Maryokutai

    Chorus

    I thought this was intriguing since its initial reveal (back when we all thought it was called Chorvs) so I picked it up recently and played through most of it during my holiday break. I'm one and a half steps away from finishing it, so this might be as good a time as any to make a topic about it. Haven't seen anyone mention it here so it'll probably be a dead topic, but I absolutely love the game and feel like I owe it to the developers to at least put something about it on the web. I'm not too experienced with this whole space opera genre and I think the last somewhat comparable game I played was Strike Suit Zero. But this genuinely feels like a bold new step for these kind of games. It's not a linear, mission-driven game, which is what I expected, but it's designed like an RPG almost. You visit a certain amount of areas that function as hubs for main and sidequests, three of them medium-sized, the rest a bit smaller. Because space is large and dark exploration is very streamlined: a button press reveals items and money pickups scattered across the world and holding the button unlocks points of interests on your map, i.e. the aforementioned sidequests, for example. Completing those usually rewards you with new weapons and equipment, hence why I say this very much feels like an RPG. But just like the size of its world, the stuff you find doesn't overwhelm you. I completed every sidequests I came across and still only have six different laser weapons, for example. Rather, everything you have fulfills a certain function, so mix-and matching for the best combination is key here. While it does seem like putting on extra hull energy is a good thing, getting hit in Chorus usually means you already made a mistake. So I went to max out my energy meter and recovery instead, to be able to use more special moves. And it's here where you can see just how forward-thinking this game is designed. Usually dogfighting games are 50% shooting at enemies and 50% turning your ship/plane around to find an enemy to shoot. Chorus just gives you all the power you need to reduce that downtime to almost zero and it's just wonderfully executed. Those special moves I mentioned (called Rites in the game) are the key here, particularly the first two: one allows you to instantly teleport behind and enemy in your line of sight to flank them but the most important tool is the so-called Drift. By holding a button, you can freely turn around your ship in any direction while maintaining your current trajectory. So instead of flying straight at a stationary target to destroy a turret and then rinse and repeat until all of them are gone, you can just plot a course alongside them, drift at 90° and shoot them all in one fell swoop. And that's just the tip of the iceberg. I'll put a poorly played little clip at the end of this post just to show it off, but the feature is so flexible it's really the one thing that turned this game from a very good game into an excellent one. Story-wise it's a modern take on the Dancing with the Wolves formula, but the lore is rather interesting and the two main characters - the pilot, who has a special gift (lore explanation for the usage of her "Rites") and her sentient ship. The ship in particular is really well realised, floating somewhat between the robotic AI of something like HAL and the basically human-like portrayal of the concept in Cortana. It's a very unorthodox pairing but really well realised. I particularly enjoyed how both characters responded to stuff happening during the action scenes, with the ship being surprisingly blood-thirsty or how both of them finish each other sentences the stronger their bond grows. Definitely low-key blown away by this. The excellent gameplay, interesting lore and overall tone and atmosphere (somewhat channeling Remedy at times) just make for a superb combination. I'd probably have to nitpick to find stuff I didn't like, like dialogue being cut off way too often when random encounters spawn (should have looked into that Uncharted 4 tech) or how there can be a tad too much flying around in the beginning and towards the end (think Wind Waker, but at lightspeed) but other than that this is just great. Anyway, here's the simple drift clip to conclude: And for the record, and despite being the only one here still playing on last-gen, this runs absolutely fine on Xbox One and probably on PS4 as well. But I'll definitely go back to it when I have a new system to see just how much it improves by running at 60fps.
  25. Played 2 hours of this so far and have got through the Prologue/tutorial section pretty much - the section which Journo's played through during the tutorial. So far I'm incredibly impressed with it I have to say, way more than I was with RotTR and probably around the same as TR 2013 - although admittedly my memory of that is a little hazy by now. The first thing I noticed was how goddamn gorgeous this game looks, this is the first game in the series that I've not played in 720p/900p at 30 on consoles and goddamn what a different experience playing on PC - granted it will still look pretty great in almost 4K 30 on Xbox X but at 1440p/60 with everything set to Ultra boy does it shine ?. I thought RotTR had a distinctly last-gen look to it and here whilst there's still a few rough looking textures here and there the whole engine and graphics as a whole looks much improved. I think the lighting is the most impressive though, going through caves, water and a small Mexican town, the way everything was lit was just astonishingly beautiful. It's a shame that so much of the early story has already been revealed by previews and trailers, but the beginning is pretty spectacular. You start out after the shit has hit the fan then go back before it hit the fan to find out what the hell went on (although I knew this already thanks to previews). And it's pretty damn fantastic, lots of slow exposition through a beautiful Mexican town where you can just take in the scenery, music and vibe of the place as you slowly make your way through and investigate followed by some light tutorial stuff and a tomb (yes an actual tomb this early!) which was great fun followed by a nice light puzzle room. After this things go bananas in a typically TR kind of way and lots of mad shit happens which involves you gunning down lots of dudes and running away from collapsing buildings/mountains. I just like the somewhat slow build up this time around, it feels a bit more organic in some ways than having you thrown in at the deep end for the 3rd time in 3 games and let's you appreciate the bombast when it does come all the more. The things they do with the characters already has me way more intrigued than I was for the entirety of RotTR which helps an awful lot too I just hope it continues to bring home the drama. I guess in terms of mechanics, controls and gunplay you know what to expect if you played the previous two games, although I will say I think the new rappel manoeuvre and the way you can now stalk enemies from shrubbery-covered walls is really cool and feels such a good fit for the Jungle environs. I have had some technical issues though. The photo mode is borked for me, everytime I access it the camera does a weird juddery motion and then as soon as I quit the mode everything is ok again, I have also had some huge framerate dips when hanging from ledges which is odd as its been a solid 60 everywhere else so I've had to turn off a few of the superfluous graphical effects and that seems to of remedied it. But yeah, so far I'm way more impressed than I expected to be with it and I can't wait to dig into it again tomorrow night. Some pics:
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