Video Games: Doing Archaeology With A Shotgun

[Channel4s-JonSnow]

7 minutes ago, KiDisaster said:

WoW is completely free to play up to level 20 now (has been for a few years actually) so it's free for anyone who's willing to play it for a bit. 

I agree with you about Hearthstone's business model. It's about as fair as a CCG can ever really be. I do think reducing the crafting cost of legendary cards a bit (or just increasing the dust you get from disenchanting) would be a good idea though.

Oh I didn't know that about WoW, although its not really the sort of game you'd just play until lvl 20.. bit like a drug dealer giving you just a little bit of crack.

You might be right about the cost of legendary cards, although I very rarely see that many in the mid ranking games, theres usually only a couple that tend to affect the game or are really necessary. Something like Dr Boom or Big Game Hunter crop up a lot. But seeing as you can seemingly get really far with a Facehunter deck or a Secretadin deck right now without spending anything, I'm not that worried about Legendary cards

 

[Werthead]

Obsidian and Paradox are collaborating on a new RPG, Tyranny. It's about you playing as a servant of the Dark Lord after evil wins and conquers the world.

Looks interesting.

[Kalbear]

Stellaris looks incredibly cool. HoI/CK in space? 

 

[Fez]

3 hours ago, Werthead said:

Obsidian and Paradox are collaborating on a new RPG, Tyranny. It's about you playing as a servant of the Dark Lord after evil wins and conquers the world.

Looks interesting.

Always excited about a new Obsidian game. I didn't love Pillars, but I still somehow spent 65 hours playing it.

[Sullen]

18 hours ago, Kalbear said:

Stellaris looks incredibly cool. HoI/CK in space? 

 

CK2 is too character-focused, if anything, Stellaris will be more like EU or Victoria, as far as comparisons to other GS Paradox titles go.

Tyranny looks like it'll be interesting... I thought the Molyneux-induced fad of obsession with karma systems was gone, but as long as Obsidian does a good job, which I am sure they will do, I'm happy.

EDIT: Still disappointed that the Paradox-Obsidian collaboration wasn't for a World of Darkness game, as was theorized before they revealed Tyranny.

[Werthead]

Quote

EDIT: Still disappointed that the Paradox-Obsidian collaboration wasn't for a World of Darkness game, as was theorized before they revealed Tyranny.

Tyranny looks like it's been in development since at least Pillars was finished, if not somewhat before (maybe as early as the Paradox-Obsidian announcement, which was a good couple of months before Pillars was released). The WoD announcement was only four or five months ago. So there is still scope for an Obsidian WoD game. I believe a few of the Vampire: Bloodlines team are still at Obsidian.

[Fez]

Skyshine's Bedlam just had a pretty massive update that overhauled most of the game. The biggest change is that its now a standard turn-based tactical game, each unit gets two AP and can move and attack. Also, resources are now automatically rewarded after battles instead of needing to picked up by units. The campaign is still a rogue-like, but they added more objectives (including more set battles against elites) and more events with choices to affect threat level (which affects battle difficulty). They also added some more dozers to unlock and more starting customization options. And a whole bunch of smaller quality-of-life changes.

I commend the devs for sticking with this game and really trying to turn it into something people want to play; rather than just dropping it and moving on. They've done a lot of work for free (obviously with the hope it'll boost sales though, of course) and seem to have genuinely paid attention to what people were saying about the game. Its nice to see that level of commitment and responsiveness from devs.

And the game is better now. The problem is, instead of being unnecessarily frustrating, its just kind of shallow. Without having to deal with the two AP per team restrictions, the lack of variety in combat really comes through. Units have no special active abilities (some do have passive ones) and the only major tactical decision is whether to do a two AP attack (full damage) or one AP attack (60% damage) so the unit can also move. And the combat is on a flat grid with limited cover. There's no combos, flanking damage, or any advanced mechanics beyond cover. Except one, the dozer special abilities; which are the only ways to do something other than just regular attacks. I think the devs recognized this, and they dramatically reduced the power cell cost of those abilities so you'll use them more. Its not enough though. For the game to really shine, they also need to start adding abilities; and that's probably just too much work to ask of them.

Also, there's still not enough sense of progression. The only unlocks for completing runs are more dozers. I really wish there were other things, but then I've always preferred rogue-lites over rogue-likes. On the other hand, with the extra events and the game being easier allowing me to see more of them, I can finally start to enjoy the pretty neat lore the game's got. Plus its always had a cool art style.

[Stannis Eats No Peaches]

I played Undertale a few weeks ago and really enjoyed it, but was rather underwhelmed by the neutral ending I wound up with.

Just finished a true pacifist run and was absolutely floored by all the stuff I missed out on. I don't have the heart to do a genocide run.

So yeah, fantastic game. Play Undertale. Now.

[The Drunkard]

48 minutes ago, Stannis Eats No Peaches said:

I played Undertale a few weeks ago and really enjoyed it, but was rather underwhelmed by the neutral ending I wound up with.

Just finished a true pacifist run and was absolutely floored by all the stuff I missed out on. I don't have the heart to do a genocide run.

So yeah, fantastic game. Play Undertale. Now.

Yeah, I really enjoyed it for such a simple game. 

I tried doing a genocide run after getting the true pacifist ending, and although I stopped at Undyne (couldn't handle it), it seemed radically different in tone. The snowy village had been abandoned prior to arriving there (and you can loot the shops), most of the characters you meet are afraid of you, Sans despises you, etc. And from watching videos of the end, you learn stuff about Chara+Asriel that you otherwise wouldn't.

[Sullen]

Finally managed a successful run of Dungeon of the Endless.

I suck at the tower defence aspect of the game, I'm way too conservative with my resources which often ends up fucking me over. Fun game, but I seriously need to get better at it.

[RumHam]

I know we've got some big Dark Souls fan's so I figured I'd pass this on. Personally I'm not going to bother because I have a backlog already and have been enjoying The Division. 

http://kotaku.com/dark-souls-3-can-be-played-right-now-on-xbox-one-using-1766717126

[Muttering Bill]

9 hours ago, RumHam said:

I know we've got some big Dark Souls fan's so I figured I'd pass this on. Personally I'm not going to bother because I have a backlog already and have been enjoying The Division. 

http://kotaku.com/dark-souls-3-can-be-played-right-now-on-xbox-one-using-1766717126

I can't open that link now, but I'm assuming that it's about downloading it from the Japanese store.  I don't really see the point either.  I've got enough to do that I can wait another 3 weeks for its proper release.  And a version that I can understand.

Been enjoying Senran Kagura Estival Versus.  Picked up the Uncharted collection while it was on sale last week (I don't remember it being so short, finished the first one in just over 6 hours).  And Dead or Alive Xtreme 3 should be arriving tomorrow.

[KiDisaster]

11 hours ago, RumHam said:

I know we've got some big Dark Souls fan's so I figured I'd pass this on. Personally I'm not going to bother because I have a backlog already and have been enjoying The Division. 

http://kotaku.com/dark-souls-3-can-be-played-right-now-on-xbox-one-using-1766717126

And of course, gamers are losing their collective shits on social media and demanding that Namco/From release the game early for the rest of us.

1 hour ago, Muttering Bill said:

I can't open that link now, but I'm assuming that it's about downloading it from the Japanese store.  I don't really see the point either.  I've got enough to do that I can wait another 3 weeks for its proper release.  And a version that I can understand.

You can run it in English on the Xbone as I understand it. I've got one but I'll be waiting on release. 

[Turinqui-Calima]

On 3/23/2016 at 10:46 PM, Stannis Eats No Peaches said:

I played Undertale a few weeks ago and really enjoyed it, but was rather underwhelmed by the neutral ending I wound up with.

Just finished a true pacifist run and was absolutely floored by all the stuff I missed out on. I don't have the heart to do a genocide run.

So yeah, fantastic game. Play Undertale. Now.

Is there a specific point I need to get to for it to get to 'fantastic'? I got a bit into the game and although I enjoyed it I didn't feel the urge to play more, so I just kind of abandoned it. I did the little village with the two skeletons and think I quit just after that.

ETA: I'm playing pacifist.

[GallowKnight]

I went back and finished up Shadowrun Returns. It is definitely the weakest of Harbrained Schemes's Shadowrun games, but it's still good game and I had a lot of fun with it.

Next up is giving Dragonfall a proper playthrough

[Fez]

5 hours ago, KiDisaster said:

And of course, gamers are losing their collective shits on social media and demanding that Namco/From release the game early for the rest of us.

You can run it in English on the Xbone as I understand it. I've got one but I'll be waiting on release. 

Probably for the best to wait, at least for people who'll be playing on PC. Seems like a bunch of reviewers with the PC version have encountered all sorts of major problems (like the game crashing every time you leave a bonfire unless you sit for 10-20 seconds after closing the menus before getting up; unless you're the knight class for some reason, they can get up immediately) that the version they have supposedly has the day one patch. So maybe best to wait a while and let From figure out those issues.

[Stannis Eats No Peaches]

23 minutes ago, Turinqui-Calima said:

Is there a specific point I need to get to for it to get to 'fantastic'? I got a bit into the game and although I enjoyed it I didn't feel the urge to play more, so I just kind of abandoned it. I did the little village with the two skeletons and think I quit just after that.

ETA: I'm playing pacifist.

I'd recommend playing neutral (kill at least one thing, but not everything) and then replaying as pacifist like I did. It's not very long.

As for a specific point, I'd say it was the humour along the way as well as realising how different the game is depending on how you play it, but you'd definitely have to play it to the end to get the full effect.

ETA: I can see where Kal is coming from about the genocide run. From what I've read it sounds intense, but I really don't have the heart for it.

[Kalbear]

19 minutes ago, Turinqui-Calima said:

Is there a specific point I need to get to for it to get to 'fantastic'? I got a bit into the game and although I enjoyed it I didn't feel the urge to play more, so I just kind of abandoned it. I did the little village with the two skeletons and think I quit just after that.

ETA: I'm playing pacifist.

I think past Sans and Papyrus is where it started grabbing me. That stuff was cute but not insanely awesome; the next fights with Undyne and then Mettaton are where it becomes a lot more interesting. 

Really, though, the game didn't become fantastic to me until after I got to see the Genocide stuff. That's when it really grabbed me. Before that it was fun, and had some really innovative game 4th wall breaking, but it wasn't remarkable. 

[KiDisaster]

17 minutes ago, Fez said:

Probably for the best to wait, at least for people who'll be playing on PC. Seems like a bunch of reviewers with the PC version have encountered all sorts of major problems (like the game crashing every time you leave a bonfire unless you sit for 10-20 seconds after closing the menus before getting up; unless you're the knight class for some reason, they can get up immediately) that the version they have supposedly has the day one patch. So maybe best to wait a while and let From figure out those issues.

Yup. I also saw that the game runs at about 2-3fps in fullscreen mode and is only playable in windowed. Apparently that might just be a GSync issue, but I have a GSync monitor so I'll be watching out for it. I really hope it's fixed by the time the actual release date comes around. It looks so goddamn good. 

[Jace, Extat]

Giving (gave? Not sure if I'll boot it up again) ESO another shot.

I've always liked the Kajitt 'cause they're basically a race of meth-heads, but never really played as them because they looked/were animated bad.

So it makes a bit of sense that the only thing I like about ESO is the way the Kajitt's tails wag, it's pretty cute.

Oh, and the Isles are admittedly gorgeous.