whatchu playing now

It’s fun!

I'm cruising right along in Far Cry 3, having fun, getting detoured, the whole deal. The thing that gets me is that this game seems pretty well accomplished, pretty well designed, and yet, every character is written like an asshole or idiot. Kind of takes me out of the game a little, just as much as great writing in games draws me in.

Far cry 3 great at the time, but I resent it due to every big budget game after it copying its collectathon/openworld/sidequest galore/stealthkillOP design

Playing Persona 3 reload Rn. I love the game play, but the story is doing nothing for me. Think 5 and 4 were enough persona for me. Going to give Alan wake 2 a crack

also shooting myself in the head to gain super powers in P3R
(how well would a furry spinoff called Fursona sell?)
game systems have been streamlined in a lot of ways, and the dungeons are now v similar to P4
wonder if they've considered releasing The Answer from FES as DLC

there's talk of DLC so maybe? gameplay-wise The Answer is pretty dull tho imo, be nice if they did something different

Just getting finished on a replay of Cuphead, plus the DLC for the first time. Amazing visuals, but man did that bastard salt shaker push me to my furthest limit! After Bloodborne and Cuphead, I think it's time for something a little less stressful lol

I got sidetracked from my quest to clear the backlog by Octopath Traveler II, which took up the bulk of my January gaming-time. I've put like 80 hours into it, and I think I'm done. Which is not to say I've beaten it; I'm just done. Virtually every game loses my interest after such a length, no matter how good it is (and Octopath II is very good!).

The next game in my backlog was Hypnospace Outlaw. Pretty much the opposite of OT2 in many ways. And I think it might be my new favorite game? I think the best way to measure a game's is memorability. Hypnospace is short & (bitter)sweet, and very, very memorable. Not to mention funny as hell. Why did I sleep on this for so long (no pun intended)? I am fairly certain I will be thinking about the characters, situations, and absurd earworms in this game for the rest of my life.

Just realized that that's a completely different game from Hyper Light Drifter.

hypnospace outlaw was amazing. they were working on another game but looks like its still not out

So turns out Alan Wake 2 is actually an interesting big budget game like everyone was saying!

Love Hypnospace Outlaw. It’s by a different dev but there is Slayers X: Terminal Aftermath: Vengeance of the Slayer, which is a boomer shooter in the guise of being the game the infamous Zane was working on. I played the demo and it seems fun.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1931020/Slayers_X_Terminal_Aftermath_Vengance_of_the_Slayer/

Late to this one, but Subnautica.

Enough of you (and everyone) likes that one that when I finish far cry 3, and after I finish a newer game, that may be my next backlog game of choice.

Home Safety Hotline has a lot of Hypnospace energy. It's more of a Papers Please-like tbf. Contender for funniest game of the year.

Added HSH to my Steam wishlist, thanks for the tip polyphonic! I'll probably check out Slayers X at some point; I do enjoy a good boomer shooter. I also admire how the developer is 100% committed to the bit of being Zane.

The latest development in my gaming life: I bought one of those cheap retro emulator handhelds that looks like a shrunken Game Boy. It's nice to have a portable system that's truly portable; I can just pull it out of my jacket pocket and play a few mins of SMB 3 or Chrono Trigger whenever I have some down time. It can even play 32/64-bit era stuff, though it's not ideal on a 3.5-inch screen. Anybody else fuck with these?

I’ve got a lil Chinese thing like that loaded with all sorts of roms and mames

i have an anbernic rg353vs with the dual sticks. mainly use it for robotron 2084 tbh but it'll handle things up to n64 / ps1 era fine

Yeah, mine's the anbernic rg35xx. I didn't mention the brand/model before cuz I didn't want to feel like I was buzz marketing, and there's like a whole subculture of ppl devoted to buying these things every time a new one comes out. It's pretty dope though!

Steam deck + 3ds + psvita for me. Can't see a place where I'd ever need one of those with these three devices in my house

this did prompt me to check out banjo kazooie on it but the first 20 minutes send to be cut scenes and tutorial. and all the buttons are strongly labelled (the text uses the n64 mappings but the anbernic uses ps labels)

i think there's a dedicated retro thread, remember posting there when i got it

send - seems
strongly - wrongly

I felt like Far Cry 3 was building to something, but now I think I have a ton more game to play, which makes me less inclined to goof around and more inclined to just get it done.

So turns out Alan Wake 2 is actually an interesting big budget game like everyone was saying!

I decided to play AW1 on a lark and actually enjoyed it for what it was, though the combat got very samey and at times annoying, the immersion, writing and even soundtrack more than made up for it. Decided to play Control as well and that game is surprisingly fun as hell. Like an action platformer that takes place in the SCP Foundation with the aesthetics and anachronisms of Severance. Once this is done, I'm looking forward to finally diving into Alan Wake 2. I think having the backstory of those two previous games will be nice going into it.

Splitting time with TotK and Dave the Diver in the meantime. DS1 remaster bored me (coming from Elden Ring) and I might end up selling it.

I had just finished filing you under "good poster" and then I had to read your last sentence

To each their own. I'm loving Alan wake 2 haven completely forgotten the 1st which I played on release and never touching control. I think with that added context you'll find it a real treat. It's an absolutely stunning game too, especially if you have a decent PC to make the most of all the path tracing bells and whistles.

I played the Steam demo for Balatro. It's a poker roguelike, basically. I predict I will play this game a lot.

My bf got me Baldur's Gate for my birthday. Pray for me.

Ha. I've been wondering how the Souls games hit for the massive group of people who started with Elden Ring. I wonder if going in reverse order might work better.

I've been back doing invasions in Dark Souls 3 again, since I'm in one of those moods where all other games feel artificial and unappealing. And I can tell that there's been an influx of new players, probably trying it out while waiting for Elden Ring dlc.

I've also been contemplating starting a new Elden Ring character after not playing it for many months, I just can't decide on a build that seems fun.

Helldivers 2 is wildly fun. Thought it would be one of those "only good with friends" multiplayer experiences, but having a good time playing with randos as well. Helps that it's easy to accomplish objectives without verbal comms, can just turn voice chat off and have at it.

Got some kinks to workout, particularly in matchmaking, but it's Starship Troopers: The Game and they seem to have actually pulled it off.

Old-games-with-new-fan-translations likers, Linda³ Again has a basically complete translation (I haven't seen anything they missed yet but it isn't a 1.0 so YMMV)

I was pretty hyped to play this weird TG16-era (updated w voice and video for ps1) for quite some time, knowing very little other than "it's an RPG but it breaks a lot of the RPG rules" and I gotta tell you, this game got its hooks in me unlike anything else lately. It has 3 scenarios and I am closing in on finishing scenario 1 in, what, 10 hours? So not even a serious time commitment. You should play this

I missed the word game in there after the parentheses but you get it. I'm excited

i'm too tired and lazy to go through the effort to this kind of stuff anymore, but it warms my heart to see someone else putting in the work to play these obscure translations

i've been on a search action jag
haiku the robot: short homage to the metroid series. fast movement, no wasted time.
astalon: has the look of the msx games that inspired la-mulana, but this game is more based on legacy of the wizard, with different characters who can get past different obstacles. huge map. lots of bonus modes that i haven't done yet.
blasphemous: currently playing. The edgelord stuff turned me off at first, but i've figured out that it's doing it so hard that it becomes camp. This is a game where there is a room where a giant has six swords in his torso and he pulls one out to give to you, then you walk down one hallway and there's a monk with a second head on his chest who sends you on a quest. The game has the soulsborne difficulty of infrequent save spots and some cheap deaths, which aren't things I care for but I can put up with them.
souldiers: also currently playing. The game starts out hard, but then you get to a village where you can upgrade everything and it becomes much easier. Despite it being yet another game with soul in the title, this is more along the lines of metroid difficulty, where combat is mainly a diversion, than soulsborne difficulty.

Helldivers 2 is wildly fun. Thought it would be one of those "only good with friends" multiplayer experiences, but having a good time playing with randos as well. Helps that it's easy to accomplish objectives without verbal comms, can just turn voice chat off and have at it.

this game has really taken off. it's a lot of fun and the community achievement aspect is cool

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9STizATKjE

Ff2. The leveling system really put me off the first time I tried but it's really not much different from the traditional xp level up system. Far darker than ff1

Curious about Helldivers 2 hype but also concerned that it clearly brought out a bunch of fascists on Twitter to say how much they loved Starship Troopers unironically

Finally finished "Far Cry 3." The gameplay was fundamentally ... fine, but boy did the game emphasize what a difference good writing and characters makes. Which is to say, this game lacks those things. Again, what is here is competent, fine, but aspects of it were so silly or stupid that I was convinced I was heading for a twist, or fake-out, or some sort of reveal or surprise at the end. But nope, just kinda dumb. Which I found surprising, tbh, since it doesn't seem like it would have been that hard to add one in, even if it was something surfacy deep, like ... Jason was playing a video game all along or something, or Vaas (who is barely in this?) is actually your partner and you have been complicit in what you thought you were fighting against or some bullshit like that. Instead, this game literally just ends and that's it. Nothing to chew on at all. Which is doubly annoying, since I have several more of these games that I paid $5 for. "Far Cry 4," "Far Cry Primal," "Far Cry Blood Dragon," "Far Cry 5" (which I at least got for free). Oh well, I'm sure they're all competent, too.

What next, though? I need something other than one of these open world games. Maybe "God of War Ragnarok"?

I have 1600hrs played in apex. christ

on scenario c of linda³ and lemme tell ya

i like this game (but hoo boy scenario c is overwhelming!)

Looks cool!

Might check it out when I burn out on ff eventually. I've got some thoughts on ffx! It's the best worst best game! Really something special. My least favourite game play and story of any I've played, but also so unique in both aspects that I can't help respect it. Just finished off seymour for maybe the last time? Tides is not having an acid trip in the dream that he is. Tidus is the dream that will end dreaming at last.

I just realised why I love Final Fantasy and what links them all together besides being rpgs: they are all so unapologisingly maximalist. There's really nothing else like it

Also tidus's running animation is just adorable

*tidus is now having

"least favourite game play" what did you hate about it?
Ithink it's one of my fav of the FF battle systems, but it's been a long time since I actually played it so ...

The tedium, having to swap in characters for them to level. The games difficulty pacing is great if you do swap characters every round making sure you are spending 7 actions on an enemy that you could beat in one. If you don't go through this tedium, you're pretty likely to get slapped hard towards the end game unless you love grinding. I love that it focuses on weaknesses beyond the typical elemental stuff. I love the summons. I love Rikku's mechanics. I love that there are 7 genuinely unique characters who all have their use. But the tedium of swapping + the tedium of summons animation is a bit much.

Again, it's really unique and so even though it pisses me off and I think it's bad and annoying, I also think its great and I love it lol.

I'm the sort of person who has a team and sticks with it so I never switch out the characters. if there is a forced team change later on I get fucked over tho lol
e.g. playing Persona 3 atm and the dog and the kid and stupid junpei can fuck right off

That is correct

Fuckin' Stupei

How can ffx be your favourite and you don't switch out characters! But yeah, that's normally my strat.

cosign junpei hate