whatchu playing now

Guess I’m starting Stray tonight!

I liked just puttering around as a cat but I guess at this point it probably does need the injection of something else to keep it interesting.

Yeah 100% agree, as soon as it started trying to move my attention from "hey I'm a cute cat doing cat stuff" to "right, you should unlock the mysteries of this post-apocalypse world" or whatever, I put it down and haven't felt very motivated to go back to it.

I'm also a bit disappointed that the tone is generally dark and creepy and has layers of medium peril etc. My cat-adoring 5 year old would absolutely love this if it was just the realistic cat simulation bits in a chill environment, but he's a sensitive little dude and he definitely wouldn't be ok with some of the more tense moments (which seem to come pretty frequently really).

yeah at a certain point the aesthetic starts to look like it's fucking Doom. still playing because the mechanics are fun enough but the end better be me back in the upper world frolicking with my cat buds.

Still haven't bought it, but based on what I know about it this game seems ideal for DLC, especially an expanded sandbox (litter box?) where you get to do more cat stuff and go on more cat missions.

After a few false starts with it over the years, I had a lot of down time this past week while on vacation and decided to give Divinity: Original Sin 2 another go. Those first few hours are rough, not knowing the mechanics and having next to no gear makes the early game a steep climb, but once you’re over the hump it really is fantastic. So many different ways to approach a situation, allows for a lot of creativity (and re-playability). There’s real depth in character builds, skill choices, and the synergy you can create with your party make-up. Can see myself running through it again trying different approaches if I don’t hit burnout by the end.

I bounced off Stray after it made me do a bunch of boring puzzles. I have a cute cat at home already so that's not really enough to keep me going.

I don't play games at all, but I do watch youtubers with my daughter sometimes. We watched someone play Stray over the weekend. We both really liked it, so I decided to check and see if anyone on ilx was talking about it. I guess you are!

I've reached the cross of Citizen Sleeper arms I'm really loving it.

*credits, and

Dicey Dungeons Is good. Not as good as Slay the Spire, which seems to be the model.

I picked this up a few weeks ago and finally got around to playing it and for me it actually has MORE legs than STS, specifically because it doesn't feel like it'll completely swallow my life.

I will say that playing as the Witch is hard af.

did i say power wash simulator in here? because i beat that lol. good game to play while you're watching something or waiting for something

Such as waiting for myself to get my life together??

I mean I'm always trying to do that and I enjoyed the game!! So yes!!

Finally been playing through Spider-man, and it's pretty thin stuff. The swinging around part is the best, the story/game/writing itself is pretty mediocre. In some ways it feels like the sort of game that would come with a system to show off its features, or the sort of movie you play to show off a new TV. It's fun, it's fine, but I'm not sure it's much better than any of those Batman games.

i'm not much of a videogame consumer activist -- whatever that means. one version is when players feel really entitled. "WHY CAN'T I STORE MY INVENTORY IN A REMOTE BOX?!", "WHERE IS THE BOSS RUSH MODE?!", "IT'S BEEN 5 YEARS, WHERE IS THE NEW CONTENT??" (I reserve that last complaint for Stars of the Lid)

i do have to say, though, if you have a switch, buyer beware on the new indie game Cursed to Golf, which is a rogue-lite. 18 holes, if you die (go over par on any hole) you go back to the beginning. there are "Ace cards" you can play with abilities, bosses...it's pretty great. it's gotten good reviews so far, and as soon as i read about it i knew i'd probably get it because it's right up my alley.

unfortunately, it crashed every single time on the first boss, after the 4th hole. After the 7th attempt/crash in a row, I gave up and waited for the patch. The patch came out today and purportedly fixes the first boss crash.

Unfortunately, while that patch was being delayed by nintendo, some of the people who have been able to get past the first boss crash realized that the third boss (presumably after the 12th hole I'd guess) has an even worse crashing problem. the top scores in the entire world are for hole 13 - I don't think anyone on Switch has been able to get past it without a crash, for a week now.

when the patch went out today, the notes casually mentioned that they noticed this third boss crash after the first boss crash problem, and had submitted a new "hot fix" to Nintendo to fix it, which should go out net week.

it's not a huge deal because the game is so difficult (for me) that i doubt i'll get to the third boss before the patch comes out. but it seems super weird to me to have 2 gigantic, game ending crashes on the Switch that presumably would have been caught if someone had attempted to beat the game using a Nintendo Switch before it was released on Nintendo Switch

(the pc version seems to be fine, fwiw)

at the same time, indie developer, yada yada. i'm so glad i'm not involved in anything to do with development or testing, seems like a stressball

thats a nice game idea, at least. but yeah switch ports of games not developed specifically targeting switch are the wild west

clustertruck has a switch port and i think that game is pretty much unplayable without mouselook (great game though)

As I understand it there is something about coding for the Switch that is particularly troublesome, which is why there are so many Switch delays and bug patches above and beyond what all consoles face.

unless you are talking about companies trying to squish down AAA games to fit into the Switch I haven't read anything about that? in fact the endless torrent of cheap games released every week would suggest that it's in fact too easy for anyone to code for it.

Played through a significant portion of Tunic but I got to a boss I couldn't beat, Boss Ravager I think was its name. Taking a break from it.

Disco Elysium. I did the first day following what I think was the main quest, and on the second day I just fucked around a bunch. Seems to blow Planescape Torment out of the water --wisdom and charisma you say? how about we go with 24 conversation attributes instead
Based on my responses, at the end of the first day the game decided I was a moralist, but no, I just wanted to solve a mystery. I went with Communist to make things more interesting. It's interesting that in the path I went through, moralist and ultraliberal were advocated by reasonable characters, and fascist and communist had very negative characters speak on their behalf.

i've always been curious about the yakuza games so i'm playing the one that's free on ps+ this month and ... does it continue to be 95% cut scenes or do you eventually get to do more than run from one cut scene to another?

dunno which one you're playing but they usually open up into a more open experience with lots of side quests, side content, etc after the first couple story chapters

if it's the newest one (like a dragon) then that one is just straight up an actual JRPG and not a beat-em-up like the previous ones so it might be more cutscene heavy idk i haven't played it yet

There are a million of those games, I think I bought "Yakuza 0" when it was super cheap, since people said it was as good or better a place to start as any. But I haven't played yet. I don't even know the tone of the game yet, since clips seem to veer from serious RPG to silly. Same thing with the "Hitman" games, too. I guess I'll find out some time.

unless you are talking about companies trying to squish down AAA games to fit into the Switch I haven't read anything about that?

I think AAA games take more work, but I think indies often have to work extra, too, right? Like "Cult of the Lamb," though maybe there were problems on all systems.

switch is far less powerful than ps5 and xbsx and modern pc and possibly even ps4 and x1 iirc. i know we have to consider everything we do for switch first and foremost for new content (cos thats the one that'll turn into a fireball if we get too fancy) and those are our platforms anyway. i can ask tmrw.

switch is quite a bit less powerful than a ps4

I have no idea why I’m guessing at unfounded speculation but I guess we’re doing that until will comes back with actual industry experience but…

I don’t see Switch patches as any more frequent than other platforms, maybe less, unless you mean all the additional content in Animal Crossing or w/e

I think a lot of indie devs use Unity or Unreal engines, and that means tweaking things for performance when you port to Switch, but it’s otherwise similar. Input methods need tweaking but are abstracted and just need implemented and tested

I think it’s a less-powerful platform that needs performance tweaking, has fewer people buying indie games compared to (I believe, in order) PC/xbox/PS4,5 and Nintendo’s store is less hype-focused so it’s downstream from others

i was under the impression that indie games sell way better on switch than the other consoles but maybe it's just the ones that nintendo assists in marketing

i'm enjoying yakuza dragon though it is more of a series of silly and interconnected toys and a reasonably okay television drama than a game

what is a game if not a series of silly and interconnected toys

Has anyone played Cult of the Lamb yet? I'm intrigued by it but don't know if it'll be quite my thing.

Finished Stray in several small Sunday afternoon sessions. I know people (including me) were unsure about its switch to "not just a cat simulator" but overall I loved it. None of the play-style switches were too taxing and I'm a bit of a sucker for post-apocalyptic dystopian stories. I know someone above was talking about it being a bit dark for their kid, and it does go fairly dark, but an older kid wouldn't have any issues.

finished Xeno 3 (80 hours!) just in time for Soul Hackers 2, the JRPG nonsense train doesn't stop for fools like me wheeeeeeeeeeeee

nice, i'm excited to play it but i havent played 1 so i want to do that first since i figure it'll be hard to go back to a more primitive version of the series after

catch me in 2024 lol

err i was talking about xenoblade there but soul hackers seems cool too

Has anyone played Cult of the Lamb yet?

i've played about 5 hours! i like it a lot so far, but i almost always like games like that, so i'm not sure useful i'm being. i think the main innovation is the non-fighting / village-building half of the game. i haven't gotten far enough for the village-building to be strategic, yet. so far i'm still building out basic buildings, and there's an upgrade/tech tree which is kind of daunting (i am getting exhausted by modern games, so ymmv).

the fighting part of the game is good, i. it is challenging but i haven't run into any massive problems yet (again, i'm early on). no bugs/crashes, but i'm playing on steam/mac.

I'm always least interested in the fighting parts. Just let me build a weird cult! But getting somewhat obsessed by Hades has encouraged me to give fight-heavy games more of a chance.

Just let me build a weird cult!

oh! this may actually be useful: have you played Cultist Simulator? don't be put off by the "simulator" part (which to me often indicates that it's a really half-assed game based on a gimmick), it was actually quite good. i think i stopped playing only because elden ring came out.

in Cult of the Lamb, the "cult" stuff is very simplified and gamified and cutiefied. it makes sense - people like to see bright graphics and cartoony versions of death and despair, especially when you're going to be in that world for several hours at a time. so in Cult of the Lamb, even when you gather up your cult people in your shrine and deliver a sermon (which they love) and do a blood sacrifice, it's still kind of funny and cute, and the decisions you make on Doctrine just boil down to gameplay/strategy decisions (will killing your own people give you a bonus over here, or a less negative penalty over there?). again, it's all for the better for an action roguelite! it's making me want to play it right now.

Cultist Simulator, on the other hand, has a waaaaaay different feel and is a lot more like being in a cult. you start out with nothing, no friends, no job, nothing (reminds me of my life!!!!) but a couple tarot-like cards you can lay down on your table. the table in front of you is essentially your whole world, in this game (is this game my life!??!!). i just googled three different ways to try to remember the term for games/rules that you learn by playing, rather than by reading/being told/tutorials. i cannot find it. google has gotten worse. in Cultist Simulator, you learn by playing, and figuring out how it works is a lot of the game. This is the opposite of Cult of the Lamb, which, at hour 5, still feels like I'm nearing the end of a very long hand-held (but fun!) tutorial sequence, with the next quest in a big checkbox on the side of the screen. it's nice to have some purpose! Cultist Simulator has very little of that. you will lay down a card, and it makes something happen. sometimes. there are a lot of countdown timers in Simulator. there are also a lot of tasks that amount to crafting quests -- you need to convert an acolyte to something, but first you need 2 of this and 3 of that, and you only have 1 of this and 1 of that. now i'm making Simulator sound bad. it's not! it's good! it got a little too stressful for me, i think, with the countdown timers, but it definitely feels much, much more like "let me build a weird cult!"

cultist of the lamb simulator: good

I did play Cultist Simulator, and ended up sinking a fair few hours into it - there was a lot to like there but I found the time-based mechanic pretty unsatisfying. And then later I learnt that the guy got kicked out of Fallen London/Failbetter games because he was an abuser (or at least a creep, I don't remember the exact details). So prob not going back to it.

xp you can name your acolytes in cult of the lamb, and they gradually get older. you have to make meals for them, you farm for them, you assign them to farm, knock down trees, gather stone. they will vomit and throw-up. you will pickup their excrement (or suffer penalties) and use them as fertilizer. they get older. they die, and if you don't make a hole for the body, it negatively affects the cult. it's probably better to kill them in a lighthearted human sacrifice ritual first. my first acolyte was named Birdie, after my beloved dog that is getting older. i assigned her a dog form (out of about 5 options to start), which opened up the option to "pet" Birdie (in the game), unlike the other forms you can give your acolytes. I thought that was great. Then Birdie (in the game) got older and was about to die. she moved slower than the other cultists and wore white. but my next tutorial quest was to sacrifice a member of the cult, and i was just following instructions. it added up to the most emotionally gripping part of the game, for sure.

so that's also a way to build a weird cult! i guess it's possible to build all sorts of weird cults

I found the time-based mechanic pretty unsatisfying.

yeah, i definitely think i would have played much longer without it. countdown timers, for me, are very stressful.

they will vomit and throw-up. you will pickup their excrement (or suffer penalties) and use them as fertilizer. they get older. they die, and if you don't make a hole for the body, it negatively affects the cult. it's probably better to kill them in a lighthearted human sacrifice ritual first.

lol, this sounds great. I do worry about becoming too emotionally attached, though - probably better not to name any acolytes after beloved pets, eep.

Whenever I see clips of Cult of the Lamb I keep thinking of Pocket God.

i might head back into the lamb cult now. i remember reading complaints that the game wasn't long enough, and i thought "this is the game for me"

out of all the different opinions or personal tastes that one can have about videogames, the one i sympathize with the very least is "this game should be longer!"

i should just make up that i have an advanced degree in game design, slick back my hair as tight as possible so it pulls the eyebrows up a bit toward the crown of my head, then walk in there like glengarry ross, pound their desks and shake the displays:

_always leave them wanting more_

OTM - also why I'm impressed with sequels that are longer but not also too long - Portal 2 is my reference there, more of the same stuff plus new stuff but never "oh god this bit again"

Some games I don't want to end, some games are really well balanced, some games drag. I recently hit a point in the Spider-man game where I'm like, jeez, get on with it. It's hard not to recognize filler as filler when a game tasks you with doing the same thing the same way, again and again.

played the first few hours of Soul Hackers 2, it's fine but clearly had a lower budget and feels a bit like babies first SMT game for Persona people. no press turn! also makes no sense that it is not on Switch, it's more like a PS3 or Vita JRPG than anything else - I mean I just finished Xenoblade 3 and that was wayyyyyyy more complex in every dept than this.