Video Games - Storage Space Blues

[IlyaP]

22 minutes ago, Rhom said:

Lucky you.  I wish I could go back and experience that game fresh.

That good, eh? 

I'm only a few minutes into it, but the...slow-mo Matrix thing? Kinda over it. 

[Mexal]

I've been playing a bunch of Tiny Tina's Wonderlands, the Borderlands spin off, to keep me sane after all that Elden Ring. What a great game. It hits the itch well. Gearbox has perfected this type of game.

[Rhom]

4 hours ago, IlyaP said:

That good, eh? 

I'm only a few minutes into it, but the...slow-mo Matrix thing? Kinda over it. 

It’s been a long time since I played; but yeah it has a special place for me.  Most feel like Arkham City is the best game of the series… and I might agree; but I liked the more compact nature of Asylum.

[briantw]

1 hour ago, Rhom said:

It’s been a long time since I played; but yeah it has a special place for me.  Most feel like Arkham City is the best game of the series… and I might agree; but I liked the more compact nature of Asylum.

Arkham City is a better overall game but I think Asylum tells the better story. 

[Fez]

Downloaded Weird West on PC gamepass; looking forward to trying it out after work tonight.

Though I would like to beat the final boss in Elden Ring before I dive fully into anything else.

[Werthead]

Finished Prey.

Got into that listless thing of not knowing what to play next, which I hate (when I have ~100 games unplayed in various launchers), so delved into another Total War: Rome Remastered campaign.

[IlyaP]

2 hours ago, Werthead said:

Finished Prey.

Got into that listless thing of not knowing what to play next, which I hate (when I have ~100 games unplayed in various launchers), so delved into another Total War: Rome Remastered campaign.

Cloudpunk DLC!

[IlyaP]

3 hours ago, briantw said:

Arkham City is a better overall game but I think Asylum tells the better story. 

Looks like it's...11 hours to beat the game?

Is there a reason I can't change key bindings to make the Space Bar = Jump?

[briantw]

3 minutes ago, IlyaP said:

Looks like it's...11 hours to beat the game?

Is there a reason I can't change key bindings to make the Space Bar = Jump?

I honestly can't imagine trying to play one of those games with a mouse and keyboard.  It's a controller game.  You'd have much more fun hooking up an Xbox controller imo.

And yeah, the first Arkham game isn't super long.  It's mostly linear.  Arkham City is mostly linear as well, but there's a decent sized open world with some side quests mixed in so it sort of perfects the formula.  Plus the open world means you get to glide and grapple around and truly feel like Batman soaring through Gotham.  

Then, of course, Arkham Knight introduced the Batmobile and then unfortunately felt constantly compelled to remind you that they introduced the Batmobile and it's to the overall detriment of the game.

[briantw]

I'll also add that the Arkham games likely have a special place in the hearts of anyone who watched the 1990s Batman The Animated Series, as they use most of the same voice actors.  Paul Dini was also a writer on both, making the Arkham games effectively an R-rated version of the 90s cartoon.

[Rhom]

1 hour ago, briantw said:

I honestly can't imagine trying to play one of those games with a mouse and keyboard.  It's a controller game.  You'd have much more fun hooking up an Xbox controller imo.

And yeah, the first Arkham game isn't super long.  It's mostly linear.  Arkham City is mostly linear as well, but there's a decent sized open world with some side quests mixed in so it sort of perfects the formula.  Plus the open world means you get to glide and grapple around and truly feel like Batman soaring through Gotham.  

Then, of course, Arkham Knight introduced the Batmobile and then unfortunately felt constantly compelled to remind you that they introduced the Batmobile and it's to the overall detriment of the game.

I really think Arkham Origins deserves a mention.  I know it gets knocked; but I thought it took the formula of City and just did more of the same with a great Christmasy setting.

[briantw]

5 minutes ago, Rhom said:

I really think Arkham Origins deserves a mention.  I know it gets knocked; but I thought it took the formula of City and just did more of the same with a great Christmasy setting.

Yeah, Origins is a solid game and the winter setting mingles well with Batman. 

[Heartofice]

I really loved Arkham City, the only version of the Batman games I ever owned. 

What I don't love is that most DC movies seem think this is template visual creative direction for all their Batman properties, because it might look ok in a game but is ugly as hell in a movie.

[Werthead]

Weird West picking up some very good reviews. Might be tempted by that one.

11 hours ago, briantw said:

I honestly can't imagine trying to play one of those games with a mouse and keyboard.  It's a controller game.  You'd have much more fun hooking up an Xbox controller imo.

And yeah, the first Arkham game isn't super long.  It's mostly linear.  Arkham City is mostly linear as well, but there's a decent sized open world with some side quests mixed in so it sort of perfects the formula.  Plus the open world means you get to glide and grapple around and truly feel like Batman soaring through Gotham.  

Then, of course, Arkham Knight introduced the Batmobile and then unfortunately felt constantly compelled to remind you that they introduced the Batmobile and it's to the overall detriment of the game.

There's nothing wrong at all with playing the games with a mouse and keyboard. They're perfectly playable that way, and all of them are well-optimised on PC.

Arkham Asylum is relatively short but it's very easy to change it up. There's a (mostly) linear path through the game, but also nothing stopping you turning around and going back into earlier levels with the later-unlocked equipment and finding new secrets, paths and (IIRC) Riddler challenges. Asylum is just much less obvious about it than City, Origins and Knight (by which time the formula had become tired and needed to be retired).

I have 11.5 hours in Asylum, 17 hours in City, 23 hours in Origins and 31 in Knight. I have to say they're not improved by getting longer, and City is probably the best overall.

[IlyaP]

12 hours ago, Rhom said:

I really think Arkham Origins deserves a mention.  I know it gets knocked; but I thought it took the formula of City and just did more of the same with a great Christmasy setting.

I just learned about this. There are FOUR games in this series? 

WHAT.

[Fez]

So Weird West has left me pretty cold actually; glad it was just on Gamepass.

I only played a couple hours, but from what I saw it's a very mechanical game. There's not too much in the way of dialog or personality; other than the setting itself. Which is neat, but is not unique. This would fine on its own (though I was hoping for something more story-driven after Elden Ring), but the mechanics don't feel great either.

At it's core, it's actually a twin stick shooter; which is not a genre I much care for. There are trapping of Dishonored, like stealth knocking out enemies and hiding the bodies. And there are abilities you can activate in combat, but none of it feels very good. It's also a pain to actually use them (at least on controller, but the reviews I saw said M+KB controls were even worse); to take a silent shot on my rifle for instance I had to press and hold LT, then press and hold RB, then press X, and then press RT. And the systems don't all neatly come together in the same way.

The game encourages fast saving and loading, like Shadow Tactics/Desperado 3; but there's not nearly the same level of creativity in the map design that I saw, or in the tactical options available to you. And if you're good at twin stick shooting it's all irrelevant anyway, you can just go in gun-blazing to everything.

Lastly, from what I read, it's actually 5 separate campaigns, not 1. And, other than a perk system, nothing carries over. No guns, no money, nothing. So you're actually discouraged from fully exploring spaces because even if you find cool stuff you'll lose it all as soon as you move on to the next campaign.

So yeah, it's a pass from me.

[Rhom]

4 hours ago, IlyaP said:

I just learned about this. There are FOUR games in this series? 

WHAT.

Origins was produced by a different studio.  Honestly, I don't think you can tell though.  It came out after City and plays essentially identical.  

[briantw]

19 minutes ago, Rhom said:

Origins was produced by a different studio.  Honestly, I don't think you can tell though.  It came out after City and plays essentially identical.  

It was a little buggier than the Rocksteady entries in the series, but other than that it's functionally identical.  I think it even uses the exact same map as Arkham City, only it's before the area was turned into a giant prison / half-flooded and it's covered in snow.

Story-wise, I think it's the second-best behind Asylum.  It might even be the best in that regard, although I think I'd need to replay it first to determine that.

[Werthead]

7 hours ago, IlyaP said:

I just learned about this. There are FOUR games in this series? 

WHAT.

There's a trilogy, of sorts, which consists of Asylum-City-Knight, made by the same team. Origins is a prequel made by a different team and using much of the Arkham City map (with an extension off one side), but in a different time period. It's a pretty solid game.

I think the general consensus is that City is the best overall, but Asylum has a lot of fans for how tight it is. Knight seems to be regarded as the worst, for being overlong and for forcing you to use the Batmobile in a lot of really stupid fights versus robot tanks, plus it's probably still the buggiest.

6 hours ago, Fez said:

Lastly, from what I read, it's actually 5 separate campaigns, not 1. And, other than a perk system, nothing carries over. No guns, no money, nothing. So you're actually discouraged from fully exploring spaces because even if you find cool stuff you'll lose it all as soon as you move on to the next campaign.

So yeah, it's a pass from me.

From what I've read, the main protagonist in each act becomes a recruitable character in the subsequent act and they keep all their gear and skill progression, so by the last act you've got a cool posse of experienced, hardcore characters.

I also gather that each act has its own storytelling and writing style, and the first is (deliberately) the weakest. The game becomes more ambitious in each subsequent act.

I must admit I'm not a huge fan of the twin stick shooter genre, but it's nice to have something that isn't turn-based yet again (if you're into that, there's the very underrated Hard West and that has a sequel out this year) and trying to do something different. I'll probably hold fire for a sale.

[RumHam]

The Switch really needs an "update all installed software button." I am having fun going through each title and trying to start it to see if it needs an update. 

I took a break from Elden Ring to try the new Stellaris update. I had a boring run where I only had to deal with two neighbors who weren't militant. Before the great khan arose more than half the galaxy was in our federation.

I don't know that it's possible to make the gameplay of "build a diplomatic federation" be as exciting as war. In the end it's mostly just numbers on a screen but still. 

The only thing I can think is to literally make it a chess-like game. Like each empire starts with a King, Queen, etc pieces and the political game is separate from the military one.