Videogames: Perfect homies for the great indoors.

[Werthead]

Alien Isolation was getting a bit too tense for my current mindset, but thanks to my dual monitor setup I found a solution to alleviate the tension.

[Caligula_K3]

In this quarantine world, I've mainly been playing a mix of Animal Crossing and Stellaris. The new Stellaris update is fantastic, and has really gotten me back into the game; though to be fair, it'd been over a year since I last played, so I've gotten the benefits of many updates in one. Animal Crossing is a very cute, relaxing game, though I can't help but always compare it to Stardew Valley, which I think just fits what I want out of a game like this more. Animal Crossing has a lot of grinding, and a lot of waiting...

I also started Shadow of War the other night. I really liked the Nemesis system in Shadow of Mordor and am excited to get back into it. Like in the first game, all story elements seem really boring or silly (Shelob is a sexy spider lady!), so I'll probably mainly ignore all of that, get to a point in the plot where I can really play around with orcs and orc armies, and make my own stories.

[A True Kaniggit]

2 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Alien Isolation was getting a bit too tense for my current mindset, but thanks to my dual monitor setup I found a solution to alleviate the tension.

That's a happy little post if I've ever seen one.

[Stannis Eats No Peaches]

I don’t remember seeing much discussion about Doom Eternal here? It’s great fun, while much harder than the previous game. The lore and exposition are a bit weird and completely unnecessary, so I could do without it. The marauder enemy was fine as a boss fight, but is just fucking annoying as a regular enemy, and I often turn the difficulty down when he shows up just so I can get rid of him quickly. He’s not fun to fight against.

The reason I’m actually posting about the game is the platforming, because good lord is it atrocious. Don’t get me wrong, I’m on board with breaking up the combat with some light platforming to take in the environments, which are very nice, but half of the jumps are impossible. I’ve just quit the game for a bit because I died multiple times trying to do the same jump in what I think is the penultimate level. My success rate of reaching the wall I’m suppose to grab onto after swinging from this monkey bar is around 10%, and it’s not the last obstacle in the room so I’ve not actually managed to get past it. There’s nothing tricky in theory about it, I just won’t make the jump. I double jump and dash, but I almost always fall well short and it’s infuriating.

 

Anyone else had a similar experience?

[Ramsay B.]

I complained about the jumping in Doom Eternal somewhere in this thread. The game was really fun, but those parts got so annoying. Just way too much of it too.

The hardest one for me was that windy jump over lava on the floating platforms. I forgot what level it was but it drove me fucking insane. I had a bunch of extra lives and I wasted them all I think.

[Poobah]

Overall I really like Doom Eternal, like quite a lot, but it isn't what I expected. It's all about the way they've set up combat - these carefully curated set piece battles, which when you're in the right state of flow to remember to use all your tools just feel fantastic. It's such a visceral, action-packed experience, which is somehow both an adrenaline-fuelled bloodthirsty rampage and also a highly tactical ballet of decision making and resource management. And somewhat in there I think it's fair to say that only about half of that last sentence is what one would traditionally call DOOM-y. My only real complaint in the first few hours of play was "why the fuck am I out of ammo again?" but that's a really big problem - when the ammo runs out so does the action, if I wanted to scrounge for every bullet I'd be playing a survival horror. There's a real learning curve to it and while I grew to accept that this game named DOOM wants me to press more buttons than the one that makes my gun go BOOM CHUNK CHUNK, I still crave that sometimes which is why I'm eternally (hurhur) grateful that the infinite ammo cheat is there for brain free stress relief.

I really enjoy and I think it's fair to say that I'm pretty skilled at platforming so I kinda... honestly I barely even noticed it in Eternal, it just slotted into the whole experience naturally for me with doomguy's speed and mobility. I can see why they'd be annoying and don't really make sense randomly added to a shooter tho.

100% Agree about the Marauder, fuck that thing. Every time I have to fight one it totally shits on everything that's fun about the game - the pace grinds to a halt; I feel weak, crappy, and generally disempowered - instead of attacking I spend my time running and dodging and hiding and urghhhh; most of the plethora of fun tools you get to engage with the combat immediately don't work.... yeah I hate it, it's such a scripted, prescriptive fight that you have to do way more times than is necessary (once is as mentioned exactly enough) that kicks you right out of the action.

[Impmk2]

Yep fuck the Marauder. Platforming I didn't find too bad, though there were a few occasions I could've done without it.  Also (spoiler for the final boss):

Spoiler

Did anyone else find the icon of sin fight very lame, and way too easy? It was just do the same fight 2x over with essentially unlimited resources. Took me a few goes to get the first bit down, but then just had to repeat pretty much exactly the same thing again which wasn't an issue. Very anti-climactic.

 

[Werthead]

Alien Isolation pulled a bit of a bullshit move. I got into a vent and had a wander along it, turned a corner and the xenomorph was waiting, motionless, right there, blam, dead (pretty much like how Dallas got offed in Alien). Usually the game tries to play fair by giving you some warning the xeno is around (drool dripping down from the ceiling, the motion tracker going off etc) and allow you to avoid it but this was completely unavoidable.

I looked through some online sources and there seemed to be some debate about how the AI director handles the xeno in player-accessible vents. Apparently the xeno is not supposed to go into them unless it sees you go into one, but I was ultra-careful entering the vent to make sure the alien wasn't around. One of the YouTube videos suggested that the game may generate the alien in a vent as a one-time thing early on (this is only Mission 6, so the second level to feature the xeno in free-roaming mode) to keep players on their toes, but won't do it repeatedly because it's hugely unfair.

It did also occur to me that the game might be more interesting if it changed things up: rather than insta-killing you, perhaps there was a 33% chance or something it immobilised you and dragged you off for cocooning, giving you a chance to escape along the way.

Also, the alien being immune to shotgun blasts to the face at pointblank range is total BS (Corporal Hicks would like a word).

I did inadvertently discover it's possible to cheese the game by hitting reload when the alien attacks instead of letting it actually kill you. I got an achievement for finishing a mission without being killed by the alien when it did catch me, I just reloaded before the death animation kicked in. That seemed a bit corny.

[briantw]

On 4/20/2020 at 4:38 PM, Stannis Eats No Peaches said:

I don’t remember seeing much discussion about Doom Eternal here? It’s great fun, while much harder than the previous game. The lore and exposition are a bit weird and completely unnecessary, so I could do without it. The marauder enemy was fine as a boss fight, but is just fucking annoying as a regular enemy, and I often turn the difficulty down when he shows up just so I can get rid of him quickly. He’s not fun to fight against.

I was watching a YouTuber play Doom Eternal and just watching the Maurader was annoying as fuck. 

[Stannis Eats No Peaches]

23 hours ago, Poobah said:

Overall I really like Doom Eternal, like quite a lot, but it isn't what I expected. It's all about the way they've set up combat - these carefully curated set piece battles, which when you're in the right state of flow to remember to use all your tools just feel fantastic. It's such a visceral, action-packed experience, which is somehow both an adrenaline-fuelled bloodthirsty rampage and also a highly tactical ballet of decision making and resource management. And somewhat in there I think it's fair to say that only about half of that last sentence is what one would traditionally call DOOM-y. My only real complaint in the first few hours of play was "why the fuck am I out of ammo again?" but that's a really big problem - when the ammo runs out so does the action, if I wanted to scrounge for every bullet I'd be playing a survival horror. There's a real learning curve to it and while I grew to accept that this game named DOOM wants me to press more buttons than the one that makes my gun go BOOM CHUNK CHUNK, I still crave that sometimes which is why I'm eternally (hurhur) grateful that the infinite ammo cheat is there for brain free stress relief.

I really enjoy and I think it's fair to say that I'm pretty skilled at platforming so I kinda... honestly I barely even noticed it in Eternal, it just slotted into the whole experience naturally for me with doomguy's speed and mobility. I can see why they'd be annoying and don't really make sense randomly added to a shooter tho.

100% Agree about the Marauder, fuck that thing. Every time I have to fight one it totally shits on everything that's fun about the game - the pace grinds to a halt; I feel weak, crappy, and generally disempowered - instead of attacking I spend my time running and dodging and hiding and urghhhh; most of the plethora of fun tools you get to engage with the combat immediately don't work.... yeah I hate it, it's such a scripted, prescriptive fight that you have to do way more times than is necessary (once is as mentioned exactly enough) that kicks you right out of the action.

Regarding the platforming, I acknowledge that I am clumsy as fuck, but this one jump just makes me think that there’s something wrong with the game, or my controller maybe. Unless I’m missing a trick on how to jump further, I really can’t make this jump apart from freak occasions where I magically just seem to go further.

 

But yeah the marauder is a terrible enemy that kills all the game’s momentum. Whose idea was that thing?

[Poobah]

17 minutes ago, Stannis Eats No Peaches said:

Regarding the platforming, I acknowledge that I am clumsy as fuck, but this one jump just makes me think that there’s something wrong with the game, or my controller maybe. Unless I’m missing a trick on how to jump further, I really can’t make this jump apart from freak occasions where I magically just seem to go further.

 

But yeah the marauder is a terrible enemy that kills all the game’s momentum. Whose idea was that thing?

Which level is it / where? If you give me a screenshot or something I can at least tell you if you're missing some trick / solution that isn't just execution based.

[Rhom]

I’ve reached the part of FFVII Remake where it “opens up” just before you go to Shinra HQ for “end game.”  This is the first part where I feel the game is needlessly bloated with optional fetch quests.

[felice]

11 hours ago, Werthead said:

Also, the alien being immune to shotgun blasts to the face at pointblank range is total BS (Corporal Hicks would like a word).

It's not a military-issue shotgun, it's something that's been nerfed for use on a space station without risk of causing a hull breach?

[Inkdaub]

Cloud is slowly starting to loosen up.  A tiny bit.  Maybe.

[Mexal]

12 hours ago, Rhom said:

I’ve reached the part of FFVII Remake where it “opens up” just before you go to Shinra HQ for “end game.”  This is the first part where I feel the game is needlessly bloated with optional fetch quests.

Yea, I hear you. I didn't mind that much, it was a nice break knowing that the end game was coming and it did get me some skill books.

1 hour ago, Inkdaub said:

Cloud is slowly starting to loosen up.  A tiny bit.  Maybe.

He high fives! This is the challenge with a story in multiple parts; the full arc takes awhile for us to experience.

[Werthead]

3 hours ago, felice said:

It's not a military-issue shotgun, it's something that's been nerfed for use on a space station without risk of causing a hull breach?

It'd probably just make more sense not to have a shotgun in the game - or on a space station - at all. In addition, the revolver is pretty hefty and acts like a Magnum, so I'm dubious that wouldn't damage the alien either, though granted maybe not enough to kill it.

[Rhom]

Ugggh... Pull Ups.

I spent an hour and a half last night trying to get that.   Only once did I get it perfectly, and Jules got 44 and tied me.  This morning I got another perfect round at 43... and he got 44.  The next round I fell and he only got 42.  

[Mexal]

3 minutes ago, Rhom said:

Ugggh... Pull Ups.

I spent an hour and a half last night trying to get that.   Only once did I get it perfectly, and Jules got 44 and tied me.  This morning I got another perfect round at 43... and he got 44.  The next round I fell and he only got 42.  

Hahaha. I beat Andreas with 13 and then moved on.

[Fez]

Finally got some fiefdoms in Bannerlord. I joined the Southern Empire and have been granted two castles (and accompanying towns) in the border region seized from the Aserai. Which means my game has finally transitioned from a lot of trading and fighting bandits to constant battle against Aserai incursions. It's been fun, but unfortunately I feel like I've reached the point where I've sort of exhausted the amount of content in early access. Currently, there's no real progression within a kingdom, and the only way to create your own kingdom would involve abandoning my current gains and complete a quest that involves go around talking to some more major lords about a historical battle (seriously). So I want to stay where I am, but that means just fighting the same battles over and over and interacting with an extremely simplistic castle management system. I've enjoyed my time a lot, but I look forward to the game having more content.

[Werthead]

Also been playing Steel Division: Normandy 44 which was unexpectedly solid. It's a WW2 RTS but focuses on macro campaigns. So rather than focusing on squad-based combat with some moderate armour support (like Company of Heroes), it's more on a battalion or even division level of an entire battle front stretching for miles, with commands mostly given from a hugely zoomed-out view with areas of control changing in real time on the map. You can deploy armour, aircraft and artillery, but heavier units are slower so only arrive on the battlefield in timed intervals. You can zoom right down to a CoH level of view if you really want to, but given you're commanding units separated by miles, it's not a great idea mid-combat.

Just the right mix of arcade playability and historical accuracy (i.e. units have limited ammo, but it's not as insanely limited as say Men of War so you can actually fight for a reasonable amount of time, but in a prolonged battle you will have to worry about resupply). I also really like the maps, which are based on real RAF and US photo reconnaissance maps of Normandy in June 1944.