Here we are, in the second thread for talking about what you're playing right now. Or, you know, as close to right now as you can, since you're obviously reading this right now, not playing a game. Hopefully. I don't know.
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Here we are, in the second thread for talking about what you're playing right now. Or, you know, as close to right now as you can, since you're obviously reading this right now, not playing a game. Hopefully. I don't know.
Right now, as all things are, is relative. :smallbiggrin:
I've been playing Rogue Squadron on Steam these past few days. It's as fun as I remember it being on the N64, although the Steam version has a very annoying camera glitch where the camera has trouble keeping up with your ship.
I should probably look into the forums if there's a fix, but it isn't gamebreaking, so that's not too much of a problem.
I decided to pick up and push further into Jade Empire, and I'm glad I did. Once I pushed past the intro, it's becoming a lot of fun, and my choice to unreasonably favor Body over Mind and Spirit has worked well (to wit: I always put 1 point in Body. At each level, I put points in Mind and Spirit to make them as close to equal as possible). I'm mostly doing White Demon style, focusing on getting its speed and damage as high as possible... it's basic, but it works.
Notably, I was not expecting the flying machines.
Remember to pick up Mirabelle when you get to the big city.
Still fiddling about with Ark single player on console. Extinction map is fun. I like Ragnarok better.
That corrupted dinos can spawn as holiday colored variants is neat but feels like it cheats me out of some cool recolors since they cant be tamed.
I'm so happy for you! :smallbiggrin:Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark Hall
Now I want to replay Jade Empire... but I still need to finish my winter sale games... :smallfrown:
I feel the need to play it again now.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark Hall
I remember focusing on Body being rather effective, especially in the early game where you're much more dependant on pickups and free enemies are immune to martial styles. In the late game better chi and focus are more important so you can take down those enemies immune to either, but I tend to prefer Body.
Honestly, I've been thinking about Jade Empire, and I think most of my problems come from it's combat. There's just too many styles and not enough difference, I'd have probably combined several styles together and given each style more variation. Also I'd have probably gotten rid of either Weapon or Support Styles, probably the latter, just to keep things simple.
In playing Jade Empire, I considered how really cool a Robotech/Mosepeda game based on the engine could be... using Protoculture as a limit for things like your Alpha, but usually having enough to run your Cyclones.
Shouldn’t rooster707 have had the honor of making the new thread, as he started the last one? Or is that not a thing?
Anyway...
Thoughts on the remake? Spoiler free, preferably. I grew up loving RE2, but felt the gameplay took a turn for the better in 4.Quote:
Originally Posted by AnnWa
Hmm I’ve considered getting that game for a long time. I love playformers. Now I’m convinced.Quote:
Originally Posted by rooster707
It’s free on the Epic store right now, but only for... two more days, I think? Better hurry.Quote:
Originally Posted by danzibr
Niiice! Thanks for this. Never heard of the Epic store.Quote:
Originally Posted by rooster707
Now if I can do this on the Switch and/or PS4...
Slowly trying to enjoy X4 and fighting with a slightly under RAM'd video card. Still fun even with the issues that induces.
PC only, AFAIK, and you'll have to download the Epic launcher also. :smallannoyed:Quote:
Originally Posted by danzibr
(The store is pretty new. Epic is trying to compete with Steam, which... probably isn't gonna work, but the upshot is that we all get free games a couple of weeks.)
EDIT: Almost forgot. Link.
Epic Games has gotten the ire of a lot of people due to their predatory practices. They've sniped several games off of Steam, including the new Metro and the new Division, demanding that those games not be released on Steam for a year. It's particularly aggravating with Metro because it had been available to pre-purchase on Steam and was one week from release. I don't know if they've been bribing game companies to do it, but it's somewhat shady.
I didn't know about the Epic store either, and I literally live 20 minutes from their HQ & occasionally playtest their new products. This isn't anything special, they send out "sign up to playtest our new product" emails more than once a week if you've interacted when them face-to-face in any way. I just downloaded Axiom Verge because I remember it being kinda fun.
But... sweet fancy Moses, their PC installer is terrible. I'd thought their customer agreements are uniquely terrible, but this thing is painfully stupid.
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I just got Nox of GoG. It's sorta like Diablo, in that the meat of it is 2.5D dungeon crawler, though the comparison appears to come more from it coming out around the same time as Diablo II than anything else.
The good: The writing's fun, the battles are fast, and it has 3 distinct storylines depending on a choice you make right at the start.
The bad: You don't get much in the way of character building. You level 1-10 without making many choices, aside from "what spells do I buy", and if you have enough money you can get them all.
The Ugly: The battles are fast either way. I'm in chapter 4 of the conjurer quest, and just finished fighting my first necromancer. I had to try it 5 times, because he can one-shot me.
Playing Witcher III, and just finished the Crones of Crookback Bog storyline. Dang, I forgot how good they made that storyline!
I'm still playing Smash Ultimate daily online. Game's just that much fun. I'm up to 10 characters in Elite Smash now - so I guess I'm making it my goal to just see how many I can get in there. Currently working on R.O.B. and Falco, with the former going better than the latter.
The recent announcement of BlazBlue Cross Tag getting more characters and a balance patch has tempted me to pick that up again, but for now, I'm waiting to see if it'll get any of my favorite Persona characters that aren't already in (or any new RWBY characters at all, but I'm not expecting that). The first one revealed was Teddie, which makes sense given he was the biggest omission from the roster as it stood, but I was never a fan of his play style. If they throw in Elizabeth, Margaret, or especially Rise, though, yeah, that'd get me to set Smash aside for a while. ...unless it releases around the same time as Joker arrives in Smash, anyway. Which is a fear, given that's scheduled for April, and the BB Tag update is sometime in spring. Though in that case, I may actually try to play both, something I've never tried before with fighting games.
Single-player I've been playing Total War: Shogun 2, but I've talked about that in the thread where I asked which Total War game to try. Also slowly going through my Fire Emblem Fates: Revelation run through, and I'm at about the halfway point. So far, it's fine - I am disappointed by the number of stages they're re-using from Birthright and Conquest, but in at least some cases they've changed up elements of them enough that I don't mind that much, and I have liked the stages that were new. And the story is back to being normal Fire Emblem rather than the frustrating stupidity of Conquest's, so that's nice. Currently pausing my plot progress to figure out who my romantic/breeding pairings will be and start recruiting children. Which is going to take a while since this path has so many characters.
A new thread and a new (for me) game. Diablo 3. I hear that it changed a lot since it's release. I'm glad I'm playing it now. It's really addictive, though. I wonder how long it is. And if the necromancer is worth it.
I'm not even going to attempt that game until the PC upgrade I've got pegged for later this year happens--my PC hasn't been upgraded in four years, and it wasn't exactly top flight even after I did that!Quote:
Originally Posted by Triaxx
Yes, Jade Empire is a really charming and fun game. A bit underappreciated.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark Hall
On Topic: I've started another Warhammer 2 Total War campaing, this time as Louen Leoncour, Bretonnia.
Things are tense, but manageable. Carcassone is destroyed so I wont get the Fay Enchantress, but at least I confederated with Bordeleaux.
Hey, apparently Yakuza Kiwami is available on Steam! I think I know where all my (pretty scarce) gaming time is going for a while.
Well thanks thread, you made me feel like playing Jade Empire again, to the point I've bought the Steam version despite having the Xbox version*!
So went with Monk Zheng as my Avatar, focusing more on Body and Mind over Spirit and with Legendary Strike as my style (and going Open Palm, although I really wish that Bioware hadn't messed up the morality system by turning Closed Fist into 'puppy kicking evil'). An hour in and wishing I'd gone with White Demon instead because it's just that little bit better, but LS's kicks get the job done once you've upped it's damage and speed a bit. The one thing I'm remembering is just how much you have to concentrate on one style at the beginning and how you'll find yourself boxed into a small number of styles due to the low number of upgrade points. I remember my first playthrough I began with Thousand Cuts but abandoned it for Legendary Strike, and boy did the points sunk into TC bring me down.
* To be honest, this is mainly because I bought the Xbox version preowned a few years ago and want modding capability.
I gave it two tries and lost motivation because ... actually I do not really remember. I think some of the early fights was rather frustrating? I will give it another try, all you guys can't be wrong. :smallbiggrin:Quote:
Originally Posted by Anonymouswizard
The winning move is to shut down the prison (who likes prisons anyway?) and open up a much more profitable lumber company.Quote:
Originally Posted by oxybe
I got Nox too some time ago and my problem is that I keep forgetting to save on a frequent basis and then something one-shots me out of nowhere. Otherwise it can be quite fun, I will return when the frustration has subsided.
I've just picked up Kiwami 2 on PS4 to continue the adventures of the Very Earnest Punching Man. After playing 0 and Kiwami 1 Kamurocho is starting to feel comfortable now.Quote:
Originally Posted by Cozzer
The were. I'm playing a custom Wu the Lotus Blossom who I've respecced as Tiger Shen... she's all Body, with White Demon style, and renamed Wu the White Lotus. I don't touch my support style, and only just picked up the Spirit Thief style, which will no doubt help my endurance.Quote:
Originally Posted by Iruka
A big trick, that I wish I'd learned earlier, is to use focus mode carefully... dip in, throw the block-breaker, dip out. Dip in, kill a weak opponent, dip out.
Storm Dragon is okay, but I remember better Support styles coming along later. I'm not that keen on Spirit Thief, it's great if you use a lot of Chi, but at the same time I'm not sure it's much better than having Dawn Star meditate. I've got to just before the bit where you pick up Spirit Thief, and man is levelling a Martial Style up first practical (although I think I might have recieved double points on my first level up*). I remember one Support Style that let you paralyse an enemy with it's strong attack, although that might have been one of the magic styles.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark Hall
In all honesty, the main problem with the early fights is getting to grips with the system. I just breezed through Chapter 1, and had barely any trouble with the fights. Suffering from the One Trick Pony problem right now, anything immune to Martial styles requires me to fall back on an unlevelled Dire Flame or Golden Star, but I don't think any of them come up for another level or two.
Oh, and I'm fully convinced that you should just customise your characters instead of taking the prebuilds, especially if using one of the builds with Thousand Cuts (which is the fastest style of the four basic ones, but only if you never finish the combo).
* Which is in no way a bad thing, I remember style points being rare enough that I ended up only using two or three styles by the end game. Especially as I'm planning to use both Legendary Strike and, once I finally get it, Iron Palm.
Really? It's been a while since I played, but I recall having enough to go around. By the end of the game I was never using the starting style or weapon anymore - I usually switched to the Leaping Tiger as my martial style, the double axes as my weapon, and... *looks it up* Storm Dragon as my preferred support style, usually with the ice or earth magic thrown in every so often and some use of Spirit Thief when necessary.Quote:
Originally Posted by Anonymouswizard
If you liked 4, you'll love the remake. This isn't some re-mastered edition where they try and pull you in with shiny graphics but the same dated gameplay - it is functionally an entirely new Resident Evil game that broadly follows the plot of Resident Evil 2. The mechanics are straight out of 4 with the over-the-shoulder gameplay and limited ability to move and shoot - it's all very familiar. The big difference is that ammo consumption is very much at the level of the early games, rather than 4 where you could comfortably kill everything with ammo to spare if you were a little bit careful. You have to decide which zombies are worth taking out, board up windows to stop additional guys from breaking in, and run past zombies that are not directly in your way.Quote:
Originally Posted by danzibr
As someone who loved RE4 to bits and thought every RE game since was trash (although I haven't played 7), I thought the RE2 remake was a terrific return to form.
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In terms of what I've been playing, I finally decided to give The Council a try. I was really enjoying it as a game that seems to actually have really distinctive paths and changes to conversations based on how you react, as opposed to the Telltale Games that try to hide how similar the routes are. However, I just got to the big plot twist which reveals that
Spoiler: Plot twistDemons are real, you are one, and everybody is being mind controlled to some extent
And BOY did that ruin the game for me. I'm debating whether to continue through the final episode, but I'm so disappointed in that plot twist and the direction the story is going that I'm just not sure. It's a textbook lesson on how to ruin a perfectly good premise by going too far into the woods with your writing.
For more mindless fun, I finally decided to give Overload a try. And well..it's Descent. Not much more to say than that. It's a lot of fun for what it is, but I do kind of wish they had tried to innovate a bit more than they did. Definitely the best Descent clone I've played though.
@Rodin: huh, not an identical story. Wonder if it changes the canon.
Also, on every game since being not so good, I actually liked 5. It had some really derpy moments (like punching a boulder), but I liked it. 6 was pretty awful. 7 I started, didn’t like what I saw, maybe it improves.
I don't want to come across as defending Epic, or anything, but platform exclusives aren't really anything new. And while they're definitely annoying for us consumers, I wouldn't say they're "shady," and there's definitely no bribery involved. It's just business.Quote:
Originally Posted by Resileaf
Anyway, back on topic: I finished Axiom Verge. I don't really have anything new to say about it, but it was good. Now I'm starting on Hollow Knight - usually I wouldn't play two games this similar back to back, but that giveaway threw off my lineup. While they're both Metroidvanias, Axiom Verge is extremely Metroid while Hollow Knight seems to take a lot of inspiration from Dark Souls. I haven't played enough to say much more yet, but the art is beautiful.