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Video Games: Gears of Borderlands


Werthead

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4 hours ago, RumHam said:

I got the xbox game pass to try The Outer Worlds. Got up to Monarch but I'm just not feeling it for some reason. Too much fighting the same kinda enemies (mauraders and those space dogs. ) The whole Elder Scrolls/Fallout 3+ gameplay loop of "go here, shoot them, get stronger" just isn't doing it for me right now for whatever reason. The writing is good though. Are there any planets with like low gravity or swarms of things to mix it up a little? 

Simply a wasted-potential game in my opinion, sadly :( . I really liked The Outer Worlds’ art-style. Retro sci-fi? I’m getting it without much of a thought, I really dig this direction and I think Obsidian did a superb job here. Everything else though...? Political message shoved down your throat with a shovel, samey gameplay with samey enemies all over the place. It’s just Fallout: New Vegas if New Vegas was like, what, two shelves of quality worse? Something around that. Factions are boring and simplified (when compared to F:NV, which serves as a Sèvres model here), companions are boring and bland. Game does not get any better than Monarch.

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Phoenix Point is solid but a bit janky, and it seems to simultaneously want to be streamlined and easy to play like XCOM but also complex and with tons of hardcore simulation stuff that can be a bit tricky to master, like the original X-COM. Solid so far but I wonder if that issue of trying to please everyone is going to be more of an issue as the game progresses. It's not as polished as any of the Firaxis XCOMs either.

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20 hours ago, Kalbear said:

That sucks to hear. Please do report it on the game pass app or on any other feedback - they do listen to this and it does matter.

That's a good call, honestly. I usually don't do that, but this is still labeled as a beta.

14 hours ago, Spockydog said:

The only ones I've tried are Forza Horizon 4 and Gears 5. Both are both bug-addled nightmares.

Do you think it's the app or the games? For me, Gears 5 I couldn't ever even get started.

8 hours ago, Durckad said:

I'm using it to play Outer Worlds and I haven't really noticed any glaring issues. The UI is pretty godawful and some free games don't show up properly but it runs fine and it hasn't crashed at all. Definitely not a patch on Steam but if you're gaming on a budget it might be a good option if it gets fixed up and the UI issues get resolved in the future.

This is true. The one game I got it for was Outer Worlds, and that game has more or less worked well. A few times it began to stutter, and I kind of lump that into the Xbox pass as an issue due to the other issues. But I found Outer Worlds to be pretty bug free.

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7 hours ago, Werthead said:

Busy week on PC. Phoenix Point and Halo: Reach both out today, Red Dead Redemption 2 on Thursday.

Halo: Reach has probably the campaign/story mode in the series. The hold out till you die firefight mode was also amazing. Both are much better in co-op.

I actively disliked the story mode of Red Dead Redemption 2.  They learned nothing from the criticisms of the first game's pacing. Or decided to double down. I'm sure it's a fine story, but it's not what I want in a game. 

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36 minutes ago, RumHam said:

Halo: Reach has probably the campaign/story mode in the series. The hold out till you die firefight mode was also amazing. Both are much better in co-op.

I actively disliked the story mode of Red Dead Redemption 2.  They learned nothing from the criticisms of the first game's pacing. Or decided to double down. I'm sure it's a fine story, but it's not what I want in a game. 

I got a certain distance into RDR and then just decided I didn't care enough about the story to see it through. So there was nothing motivating me to go for RDR2.

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7 hours ago, Simon Steele said:

Do you think it's the app or the games? For me, Gears 5 I couldn't ever even get started.

Probably a bit of both. I've always had problems with titles purchased through Microsoft Store, but these two games have been particularly frustrating. The support from Turn10/Playground for Forza was quite literally the worst customer service I have ever experienced in fifty years as a consumer (and I bought the ultimate edition of that game the day before they announced it was going to be on Gamepass. Grrr.). After reading stories of tickets remaining unanswered for months on end, I didn't even bother getting in tough with Coalition support for the Gears issues.

 

 

 

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Somehow yesterday when trying to put on some background music while trying to work the Youtube algorithm of doom got the idea to overwhelm me with a nostalgia wave:

 

Anyone remembers one of the best RTS of all time? God, I don't want to know just how many hours I put into the skirmish matches there as a kid. XD

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20 hours ago, Toth said:

Somehow yesterday when trying to put on some background music while trying to work the Youtube algorithm of doom got the idea to overwhelm me with a nostalgia wave:

 

Anyone remembers one of the best RTS of all time? God, I don't want to know just how many hours I put into the skirmish matches there as a kid. XD

I remember thinking Earth 2150 started off really well and then didn't really sustain it through the whole game. The modular units were cool though.

It's been fricking ages since I played it though.

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Have a bunch of games coming today that I ordered on black friday.  Most in the $10-20 range.  Horizon Zero Dawn Complete Edition, God of War, and a 3 game Resident Evil pack for the switch.  That should keep me occupied until Elden Ring comes out in the spring.

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1 hour ago, Werthead said:

I remember thinking Earth 2150 started off really well and then didn't really sustain it through the whole game. The modular units were cool though.

It's been fricking ages since I played it though.

You mean the campaign? Admittedly, I actually never finished that one because it was so goddamn hard. As awesome as it was to have your home base and units carry over from mission to mission, it was too easy to get tangled up in dividing your money in unit production, research and the building of your arc that you end up broke and get overrun in a particularly hard mission. The game was really punishing if you didn't save for events going really badly...

But I loved the skirmish matches to bits! Just enable the "Uncle Sam" mode where everyone has essentially infinite money and watch everyone go apeshit at each other with ridiculous armies until the nukes start flying. Except Lunar Corporation because they were freaking invincible in "Uncle Sam" mode, with the AI flying in new buildings anywhere on the map, completely rebuilding their base, while you are still busy dismantling their old one.

I just remember coming back to the game every few years back when I was still in school. It had such an amazing flow.

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Wow, did they polish Phoenix Point in a couple months. It's a lot, LOT better so far than the backing build. And the graphics are significantly better; in particular the flashlight highlighing for overwatch is fucking rad. 

Dash got nerfed but it's still pretty insanely overpowered, and having the ability to bolt across the map to shoot people in the face at close range is pretty nuts. It's not quite as insane as dash+ quick aim was where you ran to an area with 4 aliens using dash, put yourself in the middle of them, and quick aimed each single one and shot all 4 in the face without their being able to respond. 

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8 hours ago, Kalbear said:

Wow, did they polish Phoenix Point in a couple months.

I've had crashes to desktop and looped animations that can only be stopped by force-quitting. I hate to think what it was like before the polish.

During the brief intervals when I can actually play the game, it's been pretty good. But I think the claims of it being a Firaxis XCOM-killer are safely not the case (also waiting for Firaxis to formally announce XCOM 3 in the New Year, as I believe they were holding off out of politeness for Gollop).

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Ah, running the game direct from the exe seems to have averted the crashes, which is weird (the Epic Games Launcher shouldn't interfere with it).

Now I've been able to get into the game, it's pretty good although having to manually reload and re-equip ammo is dull busywork. I can see why they ditched it from the Firaxis XCOMs. The geoscape mode is a lot more interesting and fun. One problem on combat missions is that the enemy just rush your starting position, so you never get to see most of the map as you just fortify the landing zone and fend off the enemies.

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I realized I think I haven't played any games besides FFXIV for almost a month. I just haven't found anything else that hooked me. Even Outer Worlds had me lose interest midway through; I'm not entirely sure why, on paper I should've loved it. I blame the silent protagonist though; that's always a negative for me.

I did pick up A Plague Tale: Innocence though, which I'm looking forward to playing over the holidays. A relatively short, entirely narratively focused game seems perfect right now.

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I finished Fallen Order and it was alright.  I loved that lightsaber, though.  Game was fun just didn't really grab me like I was hoping. 

I'm back to Control now and it's still one of the best games I've played.  I love it...even when I have to navigate through trash over and over to reach a boss that takes me a few times to beat. 

Next I might play Plague Tale.  Fez above reminded me I've been wanting to play that one for a while now.  It's hard, though, as I have Arkham City and Uncharted 4 right there every time I turn the PS4 on.  We'll see.

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15 minutes ago, Inkdaub said:

I finished Fallen Order and it was alright.  I loved that lightsaber, though.  Game was fun just didn't really grab me like I was hoping. 

I'm back to Control now and it's still one of the best games I've played.  I love it...even when I have to navigate through trash over and over to reach a boss that takes me a few times to beat. 

Next I might play Plague Tale.  Fez above reminded me I've been wanting to play that one for a while now.  It's hard, though, as I have Arkham City and Uncharted 4 right there every time I turn the PS4 on.  We'll see.

I didn't connect with a single character that wasn't Second Sister. It was fun and engaging gameplay and a surprisingly decent story. Just really flat characters that kinda held it back. Still Good, like you said. But there's cracks.

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2 hours ago, Werthead said:

Ah, running the game direct from the exe seems to have averted the crashes, which is weird (the Epic Games Launcher shouldn't interfere with it).

Now I've been able to get into the game, it's pretty good although having to manually reload and re-equip ammo is dull busywork. I can see why they ditched it from the Firaxis XCOMs. The geoscape mode is a lot more interesting and fun. One problem on combat missions is that the enemy just rush your starting position, so you never get to see most of the map as you just fortify the landing zone and fend off the enemies.

Both the ammo thing and the bull rushing become a lot more engaging when you start facing harder guys. A mission I did by the skin of my teeth had me grabbing dropped guns because my guns had run out or been destroyed and relying on my snipers handgun and a couple shitty shotguns to finish off the last bits. 

And other enemies hang back and bolster things. 

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When it comes to Black Friday buys, I must admit that I for once fell into the trap. In order to satisfy my need for a space sim I bought Elite: Dangerous for six bucks last week. I haven't been able to play it, just accidentally entered the tutorial one night and found myself surprised that it actually runs smoothly on my laptop. Yay for that, I guess!

I guess I now have something to relax to during the Christmas holidays, given that I heard that it's quite a slow game.

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Elite is slow but good once you get a bit of cash. Avoid combat at first, the starter ship sucks for it.

My Pc is 5 years old, so I got it for PS4. Barely played anythibg in almost a year (15 month old baby), and barely played Elite in almost 2 years. My Asp Explorer is still in the middle of nowhere, I’ll need to figure out the new scanning mechanics when I’ve time to get back into it.  My name is marked against quite a few planets in recognition as being the first pilot to discover them.

My exploration run to the Colonia system (where Jacques Station, a space station turned into a ship) is based, 22,000 ly from Sol (Earth’s system). I sold my data on docking at Jacques Station, and made 33 mill credits.

Trivia: Jacques Station was introduced in a short story that came with Frontier: Elite 2, where an android who owns a station plans to fit it with hyperdrives and take it off exploring.

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2 hours ago, Derfel Cadarn said:

Elite is slow but good once you get a bit of cash. Avoid combat at first, the starter ship sucks for it.

Thanks a lot for the hints! I was wondering what kind of missions I should do at the very beginning and thought cargo quests for the different factions might be a good start, similarly to the Taxi missions in the X-series (that also suck when it comes to payment). At least until I got a hang for how to handle the flight physics. I guess that's something running in the series.^^ The only other Elite game I ever played was the first one on an Emulator and god damn was I bad at adjusting my rotation to the rotation of a space station. Elite Dangerous is at least a bit more arcade-y from what I could gather from the tutorial, but I still kept messing up which way to move my mouse to in order to activate the right thrusters. I scraped two of the rings I was supposed to fly through when I accidentally drifted into the wrong direction and panicked while adjusting (and likely would have done a few more collisions if my new go-to move wasn't to just step on the breaks whenever I messed up). The ships sure handle a lot different than the ones in the X-series with its famous jelly-like space. XD I love this attempt at being more realistic, I just suck at it! :P

I have also heard that mining is extremely lucrative in this game, unlike the X-games where if you don't find the ultra rare Nvidium you shouldn't bother except when building static asteroid mines that have infinite output (which obviously isn't an option in Elite). So equipping myself for that is basically my intention until I have enough money to freely do whatever.

2 hours ago, Derfel Cadarn said:

My exploration run to the Colonia system (where Jacques Station, a space station turned into a ship) is based, 22,000 ly from Sol (Earth’s system). I sold my data on docking at Jacques Station, and made 33 mill credits. 

The exploring part sounds great! I have heard that so far only 0,0075% of the galaxy have been explored? That... sounds like quite an empty galaxy.^^ But damn, prepping for these trips seems hard, what with also having to deal with fuel. Makes me want to try it (after the mining stuff, mind you).

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