Video Games - Storage Space Blues

[IlyaP]

Today I discovered a game called Expeditions: Viking, and I don't know why it's so good. It's everything I don't like and yet it's...so fucking compelling. It's turn-based. It's got a really annoying camera angle. The UI is mildly frustrating. But ye gods, the writing and the music are just so marvellous. 

The score is composed by the ridiculously talented Knut Avenstroup Haugen, and the sound design and [occasional] voice acting is quite good, and the plot sufficiently compelling that it...all somehow works. 

And I don't even like turn-based games! And this one even has that weird diamond/tile...thing that I find so visually distracting! 

Yet it...works!  

[Corvinus85]

3 hours ago, IlyaP said:

Today I discovered a game called Expeditions: Viking, and I don't know why it's so good. It's everything I don't like and yet it's...so fucking compelling. It's turn-based. It's got a really annoying camera angle. The UI is mildly frustrating. But ye gods, the writing and the music are just so marvellous. 

The score is composed by the ridiculously talented Knut Avenstroup Haugen, and the sound design and [occasional] voice acting is quite good, and the plot sufficiently compelling that it...all somehow works. 

And I don't even like turn-based games! And this one even has that weird diamond/tile...thing that I find so visually distracting! 

Yet it...works!  

I haven't played it, but I played the most recent game in the series, Expeditions: Rome, released earlier this year. It's a great game, obviously with better visuals than its predecessor, and supposedly improved combat mechanics and UI. And yes, it has a great soundtrack (I've actually listened to it beyond playing the game), solid voice acting and a compelling story. It's also a fairly long game, not sure how Viking compares to it.

[Fez]

6 minutes ago, Corvinus85 said:

I haven't played it, but I played the most recent game in the series, Expeditions: Rome, released earlier this year. It's a great game, obviously with better visuals than its predecessor, and supposedly improved combat mechanics and UI. And yes, it has a great soundtrack (I've actually listened to it beyond playing the game), solid voice acting and a compelling story. It's also a fairly long game, not sure how Viking compares to it.

Vikings is shorter, I think I beat it in around 35 hours; compared to 55 for Rome. The first act of Vikings is as good as anything in Rome. After that though it becomes more clear that it had a much lower budget. The party members mostly fade into the background, instead of remaining central to the story; and the narrative becomes looser. There's a variety of different plot threads, which don't fully connect and many of which are not satisfying enough on their own. You also don't need to finish all of them, and I'm not sure any are required. Instead, your goal is to make decisions that max out either your military might or economic prosperity indicator before a time limit is reached. If you do, you get a good ending (and there are variations depending on choices); if you don't, you get the bad ending.

It's still worth playing if you like tactics games, but the limitations are more apparent. One big positive though is that the game doesn't shy away from what Vikings were, like AC: Valhalla did. If you want to slaughter defenseless monks when raiding churches, you can. Also, the first act really is a ton of fun.

[Werthead]

I'm replaying Batman: Arkham Asylum and I have to say it's aged like fine wine. Excellent combat, some great puzzle-solving and such incredibly satisfying, tight level design (something increasingly squandered over subsequent games), not to mention the absolutely brilliant voice acting (Mark Hamill's Joker should get some kind of love for being among the best voice acting ever done for a game). I also like how there's zero attempt to be an origin story or anything, it's just the full 100% Batman mythos on-screen, immediately. It's also held up graphically very well, for a game that's now thirteen years old.

The only real problem with it is that I think my age is finally kicking in and my countering and blocks and so on feel off compared to when I played this game for the first time. Better get more of those action game replays in before it's too late! :O

5 hours ago, Corvinus85 said:

I haven't played it, but I played the most recent game in the series, Expeditions: Rome, released earlier this year. It's a great game, obviously with better visuals than its predecessor, and supposedly improved combat mechanics and UI. And yes, it has a great soundtrack (I've actually listened to it beyond playing the game), solid voice acting and a compelling story. It's also a fairly long game, not sure how Viking compares to it.

Something I meant to check out is if they licensed any of the music from Expeditions: Rome from Rome: Total War. They are very similar, though of course drawing on the same source material.

[Rhom]

4 minutes ago, Werthead said:

The only real problem with it is that I think my age is finally kicking in and my countering and blocks and so on feel off compared to when I played this game for the first time. Better get more of those action game replays in before it's too late! :O

The struggle is real.

[Spockydog]

So my Mum gave me a stack of cash for my birthday, and I've decided to invest some of it in a comfy gaming chair.

Reckon I can spend up to £400. Are there any brands I should seek/avoid?

ETA: Think I'm going to get this one: Secretlab TITAN Evo 2022 Series

 

 

[IlyaP]

5 hours ago, Werthead said:

I'm replaying Batman: Arkham Asylum and I have to say it's aged like fine wine. Excellent combat, some great puzzle-solving and such incredibly satisfying, tight level design (something increasingly squandered over subsequent games), not to mention the absolutely brilliant voice acting (Mark Hamill's Joker should get some kind of love for being among the best voice acting ever done for a game). I also like how there's zero attempt to be an origin story or anything, it's just the full 100% Batman mythos on-screen, immediately. It's also held up graphically very well, for a game that's now thirteen years old.

Apparently trying to play this on a keyboard is not advised. I found the initial areas of the game extremely frustrating, as the game would constantly stop and give me advice and clues, treating me like someone who'd never played a videogame before in his life, and to the best of my knowledge I could find no clear way to disable that feature.

[IlyaP]

10 hours ago, Fez said:

Vikings is shorter, I think I beat it in around 35 hours; compared to 55 for Rome. The first act of Vikings is as good as anything in Rome. After that though it becomes more clear that it had a much lower budget. The party members mostly fade into the background, instead of remaining central to the story; and the narrative becomes looser. There's a variety of different plot threads, which don't fully connect and many of which are not satisfying enough on their own. You also don't need to finish all of them, and I'm not sure any are required. Instead, your goal is to make decisions that max out either your military might or economic prosperity indicator before a time limit is reached. If you do, you get a good ending (and there are variations depending on choices); if you don't, you get the bad ending.

Looser? As in, it becomes less relevant than the goals you described?

[Kalbear]

2 hours ago, Spockydog said:

So my Mum gave me a stack of cash for my birthday, and I've decided to invest some of it in a comfy gaming chair.

Reckon I can spend up to £400. Are there any brands I should seek/avoid?

ETA: Think I'm going to get this one: Secretlab TITAN Evo 2022 Series

 

 

Secretlab chairs are very much worth the hype and the money. Only thing that I've found that is better is Herman Miller.

[IlyaP]

1 hour ago, Kalibuster said:

Secretlab chairs are very much worth the hype and the money. Only thing that I've found that is better is Herman Miller.

What makes these chairs in particular so recommendable to you? (My chair is slowly dying - so am starting to consider replacements.)

[Kalbear]

39 minutes ago, IlyaP said:

What makes these chairs in particular so recommendable to you? (My chair is slowly dying - so am starting to consider replacements.)

So they're built really sturdy and solid. They tend to be quite adjustable for gaming chairs. The big win is their padding, which is really great - doesn't heat up, compresses well, and does great for adding support for sitting a long time.

I personally prefer the mesh back because I like airflow more, but this was a major second choice. 

[Fez]

11 hours ago, IlyaP said:

Looser? As in, it becomes less relevant than the goals you described?

So the way the game is structured is:

Act 1- Relatively linear 8-hour story in Norway

Act 2- Wide open 25-ish hour story in England

Act 3- Extremely linear series of final battles

In Act 1, there is a set story to follow and when you reach the end of it the prompt for Act 2 happens. You can wrap up any optional content you missed first, but there isn't too much and you'll probably have done all of it already because you needed the XP.

In Act 2, there is no set story and there is no true "end". Instead, the goal is to hit 100 on either of two point trackers before the time limit expires. There are several ways to gain points, including hitting milestone decisions in questlines. And there are a few major and some minor questlines to follow. However, you could hit 100 by completing only some questlines and ignoring others entirely, or by getting to the mid-range of all the questlines and not completing any of them, or potentially ignore all the quests and grind for points (e.g., IIRC you get 2 economic points per 10,000 gold you donate).

Because of this open-ended nature, the game writing can't really account for all the Act 2 variations, so they generally have little impact until the end-of-game slides (since the major ones can influence which flavor of good ending you get; so long as you get your 100 points and win the final battles). Also, and this may just be a budget rather than structure issue, your companions are usually (though not always) silent in Act 2. Whereas they are chatty as anything, and even plot-important, in Act 1.

[Spockydog]

10 hours ago, Kalibuster said:

So they're built really sturdy and solid. They tend to be quite adjustable for gaming chairs. The big win is their padding, which is really great - doesn't heat up, compresses well, and does great for adding support for sitting a long time.

 

Just sprung for the Secretlab TITAN Evo 2022. Thought about it overnight, and seeing as my desk is where most of my time is spent (other than my bed), I figured it was worth the investment.

It won't be here until the weekend, but my brother is already jealous.

[horangi]

14 hours ago, Spockydog said:

So my Mum gave me a stack of cash for my birthday, and I've decided to invest some of it in a comfy gaming chair.

Reckon I can spend up to £400. Are there any brands I should seek/avoid?

ETA: Think I'm going to get this one: Secretlab TITAN Evo 2022 Series

 

 

I bought an earlier model Titan right before the pandemic.  My coworkers laughed at me then, but after a couple years of work from home, I'd dare say my back in a lot better place than theirs!

[Spockydog]

1 hour ago, horangi said:

I bought an earlier model Titan right before the pandemic.  My coworkers laughed at me then, but after a couple years of work from home, I'd dare say my back in a lot better place than theirs!

My current chair is supposedly a half-decent brand. £250 from Amazon. But it's got one of those mesh panel backs, and the lumbar support comes in the form of a hard plastic bar that can only be moved up or down by only a couple of inches. It's horribly uncomfortable.

I am sooooo looking forward to some cushioned comfort.

[Werthead]

Re-completed Arkham Asylum. I forgot how random the game gets towards the ending, with sudden shift from Joker being the main bad guy to Poison Ivy being a huge issue, and then abruptly back to Joker for the grand finale. There's considerably less than an hour between the big final boss fight to defeat Ivy and the big final boss fight to defeat Joker. It feels like an entire act of the game is missing between those points.

Can't complain too much though, and it's better to have a tight 11-hour game that leaves you wanting more than a 40-hour game that is at least 15 hours too long (hello Arkham Knight).

[Darryk]

12 hours ago, Werthead said:

Re-completed Arkham Asylum. I forgot how random the game gets towards the ending, with sudden shift from Joker being the main bad guy to Poison Ivy being a huge issue, and then abruptly back to Joker for the grand finale. There's considerably less than an hour between the big final boss fight to defeat Ivy and the big final boss fight to defeat Joker. It feels like an entire act of the game is missing between those points.

Can't complain too much though, and it's better to have a tight 11-hour game that leaves you wanting more than a 40-hour game that is at least 15 hours too long (hello Arkham Knight).

The Arkham games are still my favourite portrayal of Batman, even more so than the Nolan films.

[IlyaP]

58 minutes ago, Darryk said:

The Arkham games are still my favourite portrayal of Batman, even more so than the Nolan films.

What's the general consensus on Arkham City? 

[Werthead]

13 minutes ago, IlyaP said:

What's the general consensus on Arkham City? 

I think it's generally regarded as the best of the series (City has marginally higher Metacritic scores than Asylum, and is also the biggest-selling game in the series by far), although there is a hardcore number of gamers who believe Asylum is the best because of the tightness of the game design and its more obvious Metroidvania influences (the later games lose that a little bit and become more like standard open world games). City is not as big and flabby as Origins or Knight, mixing a good open-world (ish) design with Asylum's relative tightness, and still in a compact 20 hours. I would say that City does make you "feel" more like Batman in that as well as the big main plot, there's just random crimes and side-stories with other villains that you stumble across in the city that you can deal with as well. I might replay City in the near future.

[IlyaP]

1 minute ago, Werthead said:

I think it's generally regarded as the best of the series, although there is a hardcore number of gamers who believe Asylum is the best because of the tightness of the game design and its more obvious Metroidvania influences (the later games lose that a little bit and become more like standard open world games). City is not as big and flabby as Origins or Knight, mixing a good open-world (ish) design with Asylum's relative tightness, and still in a compact 20 hours. I would say that City does make you "feel" more like Batman in that as well as the big main plot, there's just random crimes and side-stories with other villains that you stumble across in the city that you can deal with as well. I might replay City in the near future.

Within about ten minutes of playing, I understand your comments immediately. Whereas I found Asylum *incredibly* frustrating due to the quasi-arcade style gameplay and in media res narrative, City feels like Batman as filtered through the imagination of mid-90s Terry Gilliam. My brain shot immediately to 12 Monkeys in the opening city reveal scene featuring the Penguin. 

City sure does seem to go to great lengths to want to wow the hell out of me with swooping shots and very Elfman-esque music!