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Video Games: A Far Cry From E3


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1 hour ago, Altherion said:

Yes, if you lose either the Gauss rifle or its ammo, you don't get it back. There's supposedly a tiny probability of buying another one at planets which have a former Star League presence, but I've never seen one. In the mission you are talking about, I reloaded once because I lost it. That said, even if you lose the rifle and the double heat sinks, that particular Highlander is still way better than any other (it has more free tonnage).

The APC mission (like several of the other campaign ones) is not that difficult once you understand what it is asking of you, but it requires some rather precise choreography as well as the proper lance. First, you need a mech fast enough to make it to the top of the mountain and destroy the lone APC dropped off there. Unlike all of the other APCs, it's not very heavily armored... but you have very little time to reach it. I used a Shadowhawk which did nothing but sprint up until it killed that APC. The Star League Highlander went part of the way up, partly to provide a distraction and partly to deal with the two APCs that are coming down. The other mech responsible for dealing with those two was an Orion (with a pilot who had Bulwark) which also drew fire from the mechs between the mountain and the building.

My final mech for this mission was a Battlemaster and while it is not enough to destroy the two APCs coming from the side of the building in time, there is a trick here: both APCs need to come down the same ramp and if you position your mech on that ramp, they can't get through. As far as I can tell, they will simply stand there and you can destroy them at your leisure. One other thing to keep in mind is that just as you think you're winning, there's another APC dropped pretty close to your base... and this one comes along with an SRM carrier (or maybe LRM -- I don't remember, but it has a whole lot of missiles). I think you can block the ramp again, but make sure to kill the carrier quickly: the mechs you face don't do much damage, but this thing surely does.

Finally, the turrets aren't terribly powerful... but they make a great distraction. I believe the enemy tries to eliminate the low-armor threats first so they'll usually prefer the turrets allowing you to finish them off in peace.

I manged to finish that mission with little damage, but no way could I make it up the hill to save the wounded soldiers. That was just a bonus anyway.

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I tried to get into the Star Wars: Old Republic for the second time, this time progressing with an Imperial Agent up to lvl 30-ish after briefly attempting playing as a Jedi Knight first.

I'm finally giving up on it. The writing, the characters and the plot are all interesting, but they are spread too thin among tens of hours of tedious, repetitive, mind-numbing MMO gameplay. Any challenge is removed from the game by your party members, which (when set to the default healer preset) mean that losing any PVE fight intended for your level is literally impossible. Since I'm not interested in the PvP side, I think I'm done with the MMO genre as a whole - Old Republic was the only one which I found even remotely interesting.

I'm getting back into the Assassin's Creed series instead. I started playing III, since I never actually finished it, and I'm enjoying it so far. I never really got the online backlash against the series got over the last couple of years, especially I get the feeling that the developers are actual history buffs who put in a lot of love into them. Sure, the icon hunt and the map-clearing can get tedious, but most of that is completely optional.

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9 minutes ago, Gorn said:

I tried to get into the Star Wars: Old Republic for the second time, this time progressing with an Imperial Agent up to lvl 30-ish after briefly attempting playing as a Jedi Knight first.

I'm finally giving up on it. The writing, the characters and the plot are all interesting, but they are spread too thin among tens of hours of tedious, repetitive, mind-numbing MMO gameplay. Any challenge is removed from the game by your party members, which (when set to the default healer preset) mean that losing any PVE fight intended for your level is literally impossible. Since I'm not interested in the PvP side, I think I'm done with the MMO genre as a whole - Old Republic was the only one which I found even remotely interesting.

I'm getting back into the Assassin's Creed series instead. I started playing III, since I never actually finished it, and I'm enjoying it so far. I never really got the online backlash against the series got over the last couple of years, especially I get the feeling that the developers are actual history buffs who put in a lot of love into them. Sure, the icon hunt and the map-clearing can get tedious, but most of that is completely optional.

SWTOR was vastly different from a gameplay standpoint on release.  The companions each had a defined role.  Healer, Ranged DPS, Melee DPS, Ranged Tank, Melee Tank.  In order to be a high enough level to move on from a planet you needed to do the class story AND the planetary story.  The Flashpoints didn’t have a god mode robot to walk you through them and see the story, you needed a group.  (I still think instead of the generic robot, they should just let you form a team of all your companions.)

The game has been massively shortened to allow people to see the story.  But it’s still an MMO and if that’s not your thing, it’s not your thing.

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17 hours ago, Fez said:

Battletech has really turned into a grind for me. It's not a bad game, but I do think its a flawed one (lack of mission variety, lack of usefulness of light/mediums later in the game, lack of characters or writing) and a disappointment considering how great the Shadowrun games were. I'm gonna finish it off, I looked it up and I have 3 missions left, but I'll be glad to be done with the game.

I think it's a very good game that needs first a bit more clarification and explanation at the start of the game WTF is going on, then it needs a smoother mid-game period (I've seen a lot of people just give up when the difficulty spikes massively around Sinon) and more variety in the missions. I saw someone suggest a nemesis-style system where you can piss off opposing mercenary factions if you keep fighting them and that'd be kind of cool. Maybe a bit more customisability for your mechs as well.

I also think it's too long. As a 25-odd hour game, it'd be fine, but as a 40-50 hour game (longer than all three Shadowrun games played back-to-back) it's a bit too monotonous.

The good news is that HBS have a fantastic track record for after-sales support, so I'll be happy to see what they bring to the table in the form of patches, expansions and sequels, not to mention the inevitable Enhanced Edition/Director's Cut.

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23 hours ago, Corvinus said:

I manged to finish that mission with little damage, but no way could I make it up the hill to save the wounded soldiers. That was just a bonus anyway.

Come now, the guy asking you to save his wounded soldiers is one of the rare people in the game who actually has some voice acting. It feels rude to ignore him. :)

More seriously, yes, the story missions are a lot easier if you ignore the bonus objectives. The ammo dump mission is another great example of this.

7 hours ago, Werthead said:

I also think it's too long. As a 25-odd hour game, it'd be fine, but as a 40-50 hour game (longer than all three Shadowrun games played back-to-back) it's a bit too monotonous.

They had a mixed audience for this and it shows. If you look at the Kickstarter, their original goal was the skirmish mode which is open ended -- the campaign was a subsequent development that they wanted to do given enough funding (which they got). If you enjoy the procedurally generated content and hunting for better mechs and weapons, you can easily spend 50+ hours on that alone. Of course, the downside is that if you find the non-story missions repetitive and just want to do the campaign, you can't do that for lack of mechs, money and pilot experience.

I personally liked it a lot with the caveat that this is the buggiest HBS game I've ever played. I guess it wants to talk to some online server or something because every once in a while, I finish a mission only to realize that I can neither save the game nor advance time nor even quit through the in-game menu -- the only thing I can do is kill it with Task Manager and that seems to wipe out several recent saves. If the bugs were fixed and there were more story elements (more missions, dialogue, voice acting, etc.), this would be a great game, but even as it stands, it's a pretty good one.

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On 5/22/2018 at 11:01 AM, Altherion said:

Yes, if you lose either the Gauss rifle or its ammo, you don't get it back. There's supposedly a tiny probability of buying another one at planets which have a former Star League presence, but I've never seen one. In the mission you are talking about, I reloaded once because I lost it. That said, even if you lose the rifle and the double heat sinks, that particular Highlander is still way better than any other (it has more free tonnage).

The APC mission (like several of the other campaign ones) is not that difficult once you understand what it is asking of you, but it requires some rather precise choreography as well as the proper lance. First, you need a mech fast enough to make it to the top of the mountain and destroy the lone APC dropped off there. Unlike all of the other APCs, it's not very heavily armored... but you have very little time to reach it. I used a Shadowhawk which did nothing but sprint up until it killed that APC. The Star League Highlander went part of the way up, partly to provide a distraction and partly to deal with the two APCs that are coming down. The other mech responsible for dealing with those two was an Orion (with a pilot who had Bulwark) which also drew fire from the mechs between the mountain and the building.

My final mech for this mission was a Battlemaster and while it is not enough to destroy the two APCs coming from the side of the building in time, there is a trick here: both APCs need to come down the same ramp and if you position your mech on that ramp, they can't get through. As far as I can tell, they will simply stand there and you can destroy them at your leisure. One other thing to keep in mind is that just as you think you're winning, there's another APC dropped pretty close to your base... and this one comes along with an SRM carrier (or maybe LRM -- I don't remember, but it has a whole lot of missiles). I think you can block the ramp again, but make sure to kill the carrier quickly: the mechs you face don't do much damage, but this thing surely does.

Finally, the turrets aren't terribly powerful... but they make a great distraction. I believe the enemy tries to eliminate the low-armor threats first so they'll usually prefer the turrets allowing you to finish them off in peace.

Just finished this mission using a slightly different tactic. I just parked a mech (Assaults in my case) on the front and side entrance of the base (with bulwark). The APCs couldn't get through, I then stomped the shit out of them! The hint for me was the road lines that leads to the base. I took a chance that I might be able to block them, and it seemed to work. The third mech was roaming and stomping as well, first on the front and then on the side entrance.

Then I had a 5 jump jet, max armor Dragon with 20LRM sprint up and save the barrack. It was pretty tight as it got hit from the back a few time, but the max armour helped alot! And i think if the 20 LRM didn't kill the APC, the objective would've failed.

17 hours ago, Werthead said:

 Maybe a bit more customisability for your mechs as well.

That's probably the one thing I don't have a problem with! I think overall the customisability is pretty well done, but with some tweak it could be an even better system. I think overall LRMs are a bit too powerful, Melee a bit too risky and Ballistics a bit too heavy. It's really hard to beat a Small/Medium laser boat in terms of pure damage output. I find myself constantly going for lots of Med Laser instead of PPC or Large laser. I pretty much ignore ballistic weapons now because they are too heavy and can't compare to a Laser boat or SRM boat for DPS (although it does have the advantage of hitting only one thing and exposing armour quicker).

Melee is what disappoints me the most. I came across a few melee and DFA mods that i tried out. But I found myself constantly flanked with back exposed. Considering the melee damage isn't all that much higher (even with mods) than what i can achieve with weapons, it was such a needless risk. Also, it seems like there is a short window where you can melee and still use Brace. But I am not sure if it's a bug? I wish they'd uncouple melee from move, or at least allow another move or brace afterwards. It's extremely annoying when you are right next to them and the melee option won't allow you to move behind them like it would if it was slightly further away :/

Also wish DFA hit one part of the mech, like melee, but I think it hits two different parts, one per leg? Which makes it an awful attack considering the risk to your own mech (and not to mention back exposed with no brace). Atleast if it hit one part, you could almost guarantee that a part of the mech was gonna get blown and it would feel like the risk was worth it!

I would like some more diverse mods though. The double heat sink idea is excellent and I wish I could get more somewhere.

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2 hours ago, The Winged Shadow said:

That's probably the one thing I don't have a problem with! I think overall the customisability is pretty well done, but with some tweak it could be an even better system. I think overall LRMs are a bit too powerful, Melee a bit too risky and Ballistics a bit too heavy. It's really hard to beat a Small/Medium laser boat in terms of pure damage output. I find myself constantly going for lots of Med Laser instead of PPC or Large laser. I pretty much ignore ballistic weapons now because they are too heavy and can't compare to a Laser boat or SRM boat for DPS (although it does have the advantage of hitting only one thing and exposing armour quicker).

Melee is what disappoints me the most. I came across a few melee and DFA mods that i tried out. But I found myself constantly flanked with back exposed. Considering the melee damage isn't all that much higher (even with mods) than what i can achieve with weapons, it was such a needless risk. Also, it seems like there is a short window where you can melee and still use Brace. But I am not sure if it's a bug? I wish they'd uncouple melee from move, or at least allow another move or brace afterwards. It's extremely annoying when you are right next to them and the melee option won't allow you to move behind them like it would if it was slightly further away :/

Also wish DFA hit one part of the mech, like melee, but I think it hits two different parts, one per leg? Which makes it an awful attack considering the risk to your own mech (and not to mention back exposed with no brace). Atleast if it hit one part, you could almost guarantee that a part of the mech was gonna get blown and it would feel like the risk was worth it!

I would like some more diverse mods though. The double heat sink idea is excellent and I wish I could get more somewhere.

My understanding is that it's very different in the tabletop game, but I find going all ballistic or LRM leads to the most broken set-ups in the game. Precision strike is stupid powerful, but almost as powerful is Knockdown+called strike mastery. And with LRMs you can make a glass cannon heavy or assault that's way out of range of the enemy that can core any mech basically every turn.

PPCs are likewise way overpowered, if you can get enough of them. Take an assault, put 5 or 6 PPCs and nothing else on it except whatever tiny amount of armor will fit. Stay as far away as you can from enemies, and you will core any mech every other turn thanks to the way overheating works. Firing every single PPC won't just overheat the mech, it'll make it shutdown and take a tiny bit structural damage, which causes you to miss a turn (and let enemies called shot you, which is why you need to stay out of range) but you dissipate all heat and the following turn you can just fire all of them again and core out another mech.

You do need at least one or two close range mechs to keep enemies engaged and sensor lock as needed. I usually do have a couple med lasers fitted on since the space is there, but their main role is to have SRMs and a AC/10 or AC/20 (if possible). Both are way too heavy, but being able to output that much damage to one spot is invaluable, and with two mechs like that you can knockdown any enemy to get a called shot for your glass cannon if needed. If precision strike is up though, they can each core any light or medium, and sometimes beyond that. 

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12 minutes ago, Fez said:

My understanding is that it's very different in the tabletop game, but I find going all ballistic or LRM leads to the most broken set-ups in the game. Precision strike is stupid powerful, but almost as powerful is Knockdown+called strike mastery. And with LRMs you can make a glass cannon heavy or assault that's way out of range of the enemy that can core any mech basically every turn.

PPCs are likewise way overpowered, if you can get enough of them. Take an assault, put 5 or 6 PPCs and nothing else on it except whatever tiny amount of armor will fit. Stay as far away as you can from enemies, and you will core any mech every other turn thanks to the way overheating works. Firing every single PPC won't just overheat the mech, it'll make it shutdown and take a tiny bit structural damage, which causes you to miss a turn (and let enemies called shot you, which is why you need to stay out of range) but you dissipate all heat and the following turn you can just fire all of them again and core out another mech.

You do need at least one or two close range mechs to keep enemies engaged and sensor lock as needed. I usually do have a couple med lasers fitted on since the space is there, but their main role is to have SRMs and a AC/10 or AC/20 (if possible). Both are way too heavy, but being able to output that much damage to one spot is invaluable, and with two mechs like that you can knockdown any enemy to get a called shot for your glass cannon if needed. If precision strike is up though, they can each core any light or medium, and sometimes beyond that. 

I think cannons and energy weapons shouldn't be able to target out of sensor range of the mech doing the targeting, even if another allied mech is in range. That should be reserved only for missiles.

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13 hours ago, Fez said:

PPCs are likewise way overpowered, if you can get enough of them. Take an assault, put 5 or 6 PPCs and nothing else on it except whatever tiny amount of armor will fit. Stay as far away as you can from enemies, and you will core any mech every other turn thanks to the way overheating works. Firing every single PPC won't just overheat the mech, it'll make it shutdown and take a tiny bit structural damage, which causes you to miss a turn (and let enemies called shot you, which is why you need to stay out of range) but you dissipate all heat and the following turn you can just fire all of them again and core out another mech. 

Damn! Didn't know about this bit of the mechanic. I always stay below overheat threshold. I thought you'd blow up the mech if you hit max overheat! It's one of the reasons i don't like rocking the PPC.

I can see why someone might like the PPC setup if they use the strategy you've highlighted above. I might have to try this out!

13 hours ago, Corvinus said:

I think cannons and energy weapons shouldn't be able to target out of sensor range of the mech doing the targeting, even if another allied mech is in range. That should be reserved only for missiles.

They'll have to rebalance all the long range weapons (lasers and ballistics, probably sensors too) if they do that. And it will kill the sniper role :/

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The Dark Souls remaster is out a day early on Steam. Disappointed to learn the Switch release was delayed until sometime this summer. I'm just gonna grab the xbox version I think. Probably not really a great portable game anyway. 

It also kinda sucks that Steam users who own the original get half off but console users don't. But the I did get the original for free through xbox games with gold so I can't complain. 

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2 hours ago, RumHam said:

The Dark Souls remaster is out a day early on Steam. Disappointed to learn the Switch release was delayed until sometime this summer. I'm just gonna grab the xbox version I think. Probably not really a great portable game anyway. 

It also kinda sucks that Steam users who own the original get half off but console users don't. But the I did get the original for free through xbox games with gold so I can't complain. 

Switch games keep getting delayed while getting earlier release on other platforms. Really a bad look.

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It's been a long time since Nintendo platforms were a priority for multi-platform titles. The player base has largely become concentrated down to Nintendo only gamers who have very little interest in games not made by Nintendo and all platform gamers, who have very little interest in using a Nintendo machine as their platform of choice for multi-platform games, because Nintendo machines are very underpowered compared to the other available platforms. For Switch there is the draw of being able to play these games that normally have you tied down to your computer desk or couch anywhere you want. But that is only a draw for a relatively small number of people, in comparison to being able to pay the game on hardware that makes the game look much better on big HD screens.

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1 minute ago, Sword of Doom said:

Really enjoying Detroit: Become Human right now.

Jace would appreciate a good review when you have the time. I quite enjoyed Beyond: Two Souls before it went completely batshit about 2/3 of the way through.

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I'm about thirty-five to forty hours into Final Fantasy XV and last night the Altissia chapter kicked me in the stomach.   I'm surprised at how into this game I am getting even though I only play once or twice a week.

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3 hours ago, Inkdaub said:

I'm about thirty-five to forty hours into Final Fantasy XV and last night the Altissia chapter kicked me in the stomach.   I'm surprised at how into this game I am getting even though I only play once or twice a week.

Spoiler

Something else went into a stomach. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

 

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My Destiny 2 group and I finally got the final boss of the new raid lair down last night. We've been trying almost every night since the lair released two weeks ago. On the run where we finally managed it I lost connection to our voice chat for about half of the fight, but somehow we managed to salvage it and get it done. 

By far the hardest fight they've added to that game (and apparently it was a direct response to people complaining the other raid encounters were too easy) and it felt so good to get it done. 

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I got one more campaign mission to do in BattleTech (I think), but I'm trying to build up my mech roster ahead of it. I did a protect the research base mission that got me a 2nd Highlander, but I still lack those elusive 100T mechs. I'm doing another merc mission where I may get a 2nd Battlemaster, but I hope it doesn't cost me too much. The Highlanders and the one Battlemaster are the only assault mechs I got. The rest of my best are a Black Knight, 2 Orions, and 2 Grasshoppers.

There was a mission that had a King Crab in it, but it was too difficult to pull off without major losses, so I gave it up. It's the only time I encountered a King Crab, and I've not encountered an Atlas outside the priority missions where you go with Lady Kamea.

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I just finished the game. Going into the last mission I had 2 Battlemasters and the Star League Highlander. Kamea is with you for the final mission, so you only need 3 Assaults for the last mission. Actually you could probably pull it off with 2 Assaults, 1 Heavy and Kamea, but it'd be tough.

King Crabs are inane. I've also only seen one, and no other Atlases bar Kamea's.

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