whatchu playing now

dragon's dogma was good fun, at its best early before everything becomes too easy, so i encourage you to not progress the story at all until you have been everywhere. one of the best and most unique things it has are the giant wandering monsters that really felt like epic fights, at least until my gang quickly got OP'd. helps if you resist the temptation of the broken pawns that are available early.

infinity wars + starbound

helps if you resist the temptation of the broken pawns that are available early.
― Roberto Spiralli, Thursday, April 24, 2014 4:29 PM

what are the broken pawns. i've just been using the free low level ones and trading them in every so often. groups of bandits on the roads are still kicking my butt

i got one real early with an ordinary woman's name, Karen i am fairly sure, and her owner had limited her level but she had maxed-out, late game rare gear and was a total powerhouse

whatever the fighter class is. i got another midway thru with a more forgettable fantasyish name, also a female fighter.

Dammit, Fract really _is_ like myst. I can't find the symbolic to detangle the tune I'm supposed to play to solve the final puzzle in one of the areas.

Final Fantasy - NES
Assassin's Creed IV - PC
Pac-Man Championship Edition DX - PC
Castlevania: Rond of Blood - T16
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night - PSX
Metal Gear Solid - PSX
Metal Gear Rising Revengeance - PC
Metal Gear Solid 2 - PC

you livin' the life, Adam, respect

finished saints row 4
tried diablo 3 again - meh so spammy
maybe back to metro 2033

"Finished" Portal and Fez, loved both. Seems like there's still aftergame stuff for me to do, which is cool.

I'm a good way into the first God of War, and I can't be sure but I think I might kinda hate it. The brutal waves of super tough enemies are awesome, and some of the puzzles are pretty good, but creating Indiana Jones-esque deathtraps with a shitty camera and sketchy controls was the fucking worst idea ever. I've wasted so much of my playtime on failing to kill everything onscreen within a set time before falling to my death or being crushed or sliced up by shit that I can barely see in front of me that it's kinda become a chore for me to continue. I might just be hating the PS2-ness of it, though.

I've been surprisingly digging a lot of arcade-y stuff that I've gotten cheap from PSN recently. Super Stardust and Wipeout took me a little while to get used to but they're amazing once I'm in the zone. Just got Retro/Grade, which I haven't played much but which has an awesome conceit (basically a rhythm game disguised as a shooter that runs in reverse). The Space Invaders update also seems like good value.

This weekend, I hit 50% completion and the 100 hour mark near-simultaneously on Just Cause 2. Clearing a few areas in the game has become such a reliably perfect way to decompress at the end of the day.

kotor + bg2

getting myself psyched + ready for pillars of eternity i guess

xps I played GoW 1 for the first time... a year ago? Maybe two? Felt some of the same frustrations as you, but I'm still planning to truck on through to the others at some point. I can see how it all would've been far more impressive back in 2006, but some of those levels and dungeons are awfully designed.

What build you going for in KOTOR, Mordy?

i guess soldier guardian. tbh i'm kinda more interested in my bg2 half-elf cleric/ranger build (so OP apparently it's ppl's fave for soloing the game). (thought about playing a wild mage too.)

Streets of Rage 3
Bare Knuckle III

So BKIII is the Japanese version of SOR3 and it is WAY easier. This does not mean it is easy though, it only means it is possible to get through stage 1 without using a continue. American version of Streets of Rage 3 is one of the more difficult games I've ever played.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7VWsJPJ19DA

That level with the bulldozer is all-time unfair.

all that and he's beat by a girder

i love the energy meter for 'wall'.

i guess i only played Streets of Rage 1 & 2.

man why doesn't axel just jump over the damn walls

sor3 is weird. it seems like it admits to tactics then it doesn't really.

I think after you get past the stage where you are fighting kangaroos and evil dominatrix clowns they just figured they could get away w that.

Played 2-player Hyperstone Heist for the Genesis last night. Got to Super Shredder and then we died and we were out of continues! The music in that game is incredible. Orchestrated speed metal.

i'm still playing bg2.

eu4 always with the eu4. genovese colonial empire.

wish i could get into eu. each time i load it up there are like 300 tutorials

if it helps you still won't know what the fuck is going on if you sit thru the tutorials

Sadly not as into Mirror's Edge as I'd hoped (hinges way too much on barely-disguised quick time events, which fuck that). Surprisingly way more into the first Metal Gear Solid than I expected (tough but mostly fair, cutscenes and dialogue that are reasonably well-written and not totally perfunctory, generous with the game saving, and the controls and camera, while occasionally obnoxious, are better than those on a lot of the PS2 games I've played). I still haven't been able to get past the first boss yet, though, so we'll see how long my admiration lasts.

is there some kind of amazing online tutorial that will teach me how to play?

there is a lot of user and wiki content so possibly but i'm not aware of anything myself. i think you just need to start playing it with the expectation that you won't know what you're doing for a long time. start with france: raise a big army and start some beef. you can go a long way with them without having to worry about some of the more arcane stuff for a while and you will pick up a good foundation in manpower/supply, tech advancement, diplomacy, religion. you can dip your toe into trade and colonies if you want but you'll still be able to do plenty without. and you'll have the immediate objective of unifying france to get your teeth into, which definitely helps the transition into the sandbox. you'll always have something to do with them and that is certainly not always the case elsewhere.

have any of you played crusader kings 2 and can you take the same approach there? tried to get into it but get caught up on figuring out how levies work and what a demesne is and somehow the game had me entering into an affair with my own wife

ftl

Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow
Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance

Aria of Sorrow is incredible. Are the GBA Metroids this good?

Harmony is cool too, if only because the lead character is dressed like anime Santa Claus.

I remember the GBA Metroid I played being awesome

this is gonna make me sound like a crazy person but i've gotten into watching lets-plays of EU4 and i don't even own a PC. they're weirdly soothing?

any you'd recommend? esp for newbs?

there's a youtuber by the name of shenryyr2 who i gather is some kind of god at it. he doesn't really do tutorials but a lot of the rhythm of it comes out via osmosis.

my general sense is it's just not a 'for newbs' game, you just kind of have to keep jumping in at the deep end until it clicks

jeez, just had a click around that guy's YT, he is nutso. if i had infinite hours i would watch the lot. but yeah, as a learning experience you probably already need a foundation to get anything from someone like this.

Aria of Sorrow is incredible. Are the GBA Metroids this good?

yeah he's also endearingly/annoyingly ignorant of actual history & geography

i just wanted some cool flowing graphics of a map shifting slowly over time while i did other shit.

xp

*checks england ca. 1650* "a republic? england went republic? wtf, that makes no sense"

was that cromwell? idk I'm too lazy to wiki at the minute

metro: last light
had no idea the wolfenstein remake is more then just "lol nostalgia", preview trailer got me intersted

xp yeah

just finished back to the future telltale game, it was pretty fun, but if it hadn't been for walking dead s1 i dunno if i would've had the patience. now i am trying to play sam & max penal zone and it is next-level inscrutable adv game :(

Did any of you happen to see this week's Steven Universe where Steven gets obssessed with this epic Pokemon/Final Fantasy-style Mini Golf RPG? Man, I would love for that to actually exist.

no but that sounds great. i also love the SU where garnet becomes transfixed with the meat beat mania arcade game

hah, that was great too!

ftl

Played a little "Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia" yesterday and holy crap am I addicted to these Castlevania games...

i beat the normal game. i need to continue, obviously.

games with similar cryptic quests: environmental station alpha did a similar thing with an optional post-game quest. Both games tiny spoiler: it had parts of a code written on the walls too. And ESA has an area directly inspired by La Mulana. Axiom Verge 1 also has a small well-hidden quest. Tunic and Fez are other ones.

finally playing case of the golden idol and yeah this is the sort of thing i like

yeah it's great

'little kitty big city' is fun so far. sort of like 'untitled goose game'

oh i got to the point in animal well where it just fully becomes fez-style ultra-cryptic codes and i think that's enough for me.

it was pretty good up until that point, though finding the last few eggs was a bit too tedious. it was really really good for a bit but that didn't really last long enough and now i'm slightly underwhelmed.

i really love the la mulana type of cryptic puzzle but not the fez type, in short

i like both style of puzzle.
I still need to find 7 eggs. i solved one of the big puzzles without looking at hints, which i was proud of the one with the symbol pillars. i think I've found 4 rabbits, which seem to do nothingness. haven't looked at any big discussions of the game yet.

finished case of the golden idol, good stuff, glad they're making a second game, i will be there day 1

next up in my 'well-regarded indie games that snuck by me' queue is void stranger

i finished obra dinn earlier this month. started it years ago but got stuck. looked up some general game tips and that was enough. great game, 10/10.

I tried a little bit of Animal Well last night, the lack of hand-holding is not sitting well with me so far.

I've also been playing Hexcells, soothing ambient Minesweeper-like but without ever needing to guess. I'm not as gaga about it as this guy but it's nice.

hexcells does rule, i have dumped many many hours into it

Tametsi is, I think, better, though Hexcells Infinite is good because a) it's actually (practically) infinite, and b) it's the right length for "about ten minutes", whereas for Tametsi it might take you ten minutes of scribbling to lock down the first move (not often!)

I beat the second phase of animal well then looked up spoilers.

Around half of phase 3 is doable by a single player -- but the other ones aren't. One can't be done on steam deck because you need to shake the window of the game. another wants your computer to have a printer connected, but there's a very hidden alternative way to get the code. Phase 4, involving the poster, is completely impossible solo. I wish they had put in clues for harder parts of phase 3, then put all of the ridiculous stuff in its own restricted area.

I was right that Fez and Tunic were inspirations as there are codes to turn your character into the characters from those games. (These are just for fun and aren't a part of any other puzzle.)

All in all I loved the game.

High praise for Lorelei and the Laser Eyes: https://www.polygon.com/reviews/24156442/lorelei-and-the-laser-eyes-review-steam-pc-nintendo-switch

saw that one the ohter day, looks cool

Cryptmaster also looks cool whatever it is - word game based first-person dungeon crawler?

cryptmaster has a steam demo which i have now completed. seems like a good laugh

Animal Well question: I've gotten the flute and I'm gearing up to do the m disc shrine but I don't know how to fast travel. I've seen the code online and I've input it while holding down the whistle button but nothing happens. I've played the song right next to the fish and all.

You need to hold the direction you want and tap the button. Wasn't what I was expecting either.

Thanks! Would never have figured that out myself.

I just realized that Hexcells is a horror game.

Like.. existential?

I'm terrified of clicking the wrong cell, and I physically react every time I do!

i was enjoying case of the golden idol but it has a pretty serious save bug on switch, in that if you exit the game it doesn't save your progress. you click continue game and it drops you back into the first level. i googled and their workaround is a button combo that allows you to skip levels to get back to the level you were on, but that doesn't help if you were near the end of one of the more detailed levels (as i was) because you have to decide whether to redo all the work or just skip it. anyways, fun game and i'll just deal with it but it seems like a big problem that the developer should fix

I hit that bug on Idol too. It wiped my entire save. I never went back after that despite really enjoying it.