whatchu playing now

I haven't played 1 since it launched, but 2 is definitely a much more refined experience.

Thanks abanana for the Magneticscrolls heads up

Inscryption, which seems pretty great so far, but I think I've only just scratched its surface

finished Superliminal, fun puzzle game. presentation heavily influenced by Portal but the mechanics made it feel enough like its own thing.
playing Carto now, another puzzle game but a lot more simple, more of a chillout game with nice atmosphere & music.

Carto totally sounds like my vibe. Will wishlist it

Carto was more of a "casual" game than I expected.

inscryption is so goddamn good

haven't started it yet but it's probably the first game i bought new in years (i think the last one was BOTW) on the strength of the gamejam it was based on (sacrifices must be made, free on itchio). just want to carve a good chunk of time to spend with it.......

Damn, that looks great. I loved The Hex, too (and I did like Pony Island but was bad at it).

Windows only atm, though ;_;

is it just me or is it deliberately invoking The 7th Guest?

Picross 6 baby. But seriously - I really need to stop, it's compulsively addictive

Played If On A Winter's Night, Four Travellers last night. It's short but pretty. The puzzles are not difficult so it all ends up being a bit of a walkthrough. It's free on Steam though so if you have a spare couple of hours..

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1603980/If_On_A_Winters_Night_Four_Travelers/

inscryption is excellent but i should caution anyone curious that it's not really the same thing as the sort of deckbuilder roguelikes that are endlessly replayable (slay the spire etc.), it's drawing on those but going in a very different direction. it didn't really come across as a bait & switch or anything to me given the dev's history but i've seen people very put off when they discover that it isn't aiming for the same thing as slay the spire etc.

Not that I've played that many new games this year, but The Forgotten City is now in my top spot for GOTY. It's soooo good and has thoroughly colonized my brain

i just went to check what it is and it was on my wishlist already whoops

there are too many games to remember let alone play

"a mixture that seems to be placed in the middle of the trio of wonders composed of Skyrim, Myst and the little known Shadow of Memories by Konami." SOOOOOLD

Far Cry 6. Not the deepest game, has some fun bits

Shadow of Memories call-out? goddamn i'm in

Hahah, I'd never heard of Shadow of Memories before, the PS2 era really is its own trove of forgotten treasure, huh?

Enjoying Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous so far. I got the first one, Kingmaker, free with a Humble Monthly thing after a lot of the initial launch problems had been heavily patched and found it to be pretty polished and satisfying as far as party-based, statty D&D type rpgs go

I am somewhat regretting choosing to be an Arcane Rider and having this big horse following me round people's mansions all the time

xp On the one hand absolutely positively the best non-Nintendo console ever. On the other hand, scientists so preoccupied with whether or not they could recreate the FFVIII ballroom scene in real time, they didn't stop to think if they should...

only one mention of days gone itt, wasn't even nominated for C&P 2019, i feel like i didn't know anything about this game on its release even though it was apparently heavily advertised.

i've been consistently surprised? delighted? by the dialogue and narrative decisions at points in this game. the setting itself is nothing super special but the voice direction and acting is spot on (when it wants to be), and there's a couple of genuinely neat story twists (including one that's subtly "built in" to the ux), i am really enjoying this game!

also, forza horizon 5 is a maximalist absurd joy.

and back 4 blood is satisfying/exactly what it needs to be

jackbox 8 is good but doesn't (yet?) hit the highs for me of previous packs.

i started fucking with Green Hell and i liked it but gotta dive back in at some point. interesting survivor game.

(looking at my lists to see what i haven't talked about yet. i've been playing a lot lately!)

humankind feels like a solid civ vi competitor, but after finishing one campaign i haven't had the urge to go back. i should when im done with all that other stuff above.

i started the somnium files bc those spike chunsoft games are a guilty pleasure, but i didn't have the stomach for it. might go back might not.

i got stuck 5 minutes into cruelty squad, i hate getting stuck 5 minutes into anything so i didn't go back >:(

oh and loop hero is decent!

i wanna play forza horizon 5 badly but also want to wait and play it on a Next-Gen console even though 4 looked and ran great on my pc. car games feel like they demand new hardware as part of the experience

in my circle days gone mostly got dunked on for being the n+1th gritty open world checklist game of the generation as well as the n+1th zombie survival game. and also for having a main character named Deacon St. John

i can tell ya that FH5 runs pretty much the same as FH4 on my pc, and both ran far better than a lot of non-car stuff does! (my pc is... 1 year old? but only ("only") a 1660 TI in there so it's not like i'm tracing rays or flopping a lot of gigs here)

and re: days gone, i have a lot of patience for variations on a tired theme, and i gotta say a lot of moments in this one really feel like they just do a way better job than i expected. it's an extremely assured and surprisingly subtle character story handled with a maturity and grace i wouldn't expect from a game with... yeah, a guy named deacon st. john

played a bit of FH5 earlier, not into driving games at all but even I can tell how well made it is. also first time I've noticed how effortless everything is made to feel with the new fast hard drives, no loading screens or wasted time, just 4K dopamine hit after hit poured into the eyes.

i didn't think i was into car games until i first tried forza horizon, the open world checklist/collect-a-thon formula really really works for that type of game, much more than action/adventure/rpg type games imo

pretty obvious in retrospect though that the genre thats about traversal rather than discrete points of interest would make the best open world games

I wish Horizon had more collision objects. Everything is so easy to drive through. I'm practically swimming through an offroad area while my Lambo does one drift after another through the cabbage patch or whatever to keep my multiplier ... it's just so inane. Meanwhile, the announcer is patting you on the back and calling you a genius. Then it's back to the big wheel to get another free car!!

Back 4 Blood has been my regular looter shooter lately. It's surprisingly playable in short bursts which helps a lot. I like the card system.

Thought you were talking about horizon zero dawn for a second

thats whats good about it though, its an arcade racer, not a sim

I think it's pretty extreme even among arcade racers but ymmv!

i am playing metroid dread now and loving it.

and i recently admitted to myself that i will, i will buy the steam deck thing when it comes out. it is the perfect solution for my situation, at least.

Doing my annual dive into Project Ozone, which is an absolutely balmy Minecraft modpack that for some reason I get the itch to scratch when Christmas starts to approach.

Was playing Wolfenstein New Order, but it's been a few weeks, because I think I forgot I was even playing it. Last thing I remember I was fighting Nazis on the moon, which is about as smart as the game gets.

I'm higher on Forza H5 now that I've actually played it lol

i've never played any racing games beyond mario kart. is there one that's good for me if i don't really care about realism or being good at racing but just want to drive cool cars around in interesting/beautiful environments?

the game you are looking for is forza horizon 5 imo! (if it feels too simm-y, which i don't think it will, you can set controls to "arcade", but "standard" is imo still more fun for a not-frequent car driving game person)

agreed

thanks but i should have clarified: something i can play on PS4 or (i'm guessing not) switch

Burnout Paradise Remastered is a good PS4/Switch bet. For Switch, I've head good things about Cruis'n Blast.

yeah unfortunately this is the one and only space where microsoft has the best-in-genre game as an exclusive. i don't even know if anyone else is making open world racing games.

oh hah i didnt know burnout paradise had a port, that works i guess

i was gonna mention burnout as well. that's way more on the arcade side, but it's extremely fun.

Well tonight I *was* supposed to be playing San Andreas Definitive edition. boy Rockstar really screwed this launcher up didn't they.