What are you playing right now?

[Anteros]

Shenmue is an artifact of its day.

If you want to play something similar but actually modern and playable, then get Yakuza 0.

Even Yakuza 0 is incredibly slow and grindy. The story is interesting and the gameplay is solid, but gosh do they make you suffer to get to those parts. I thought Yakuza 6 was excellent though. More like a movie than a game, but it's an interesting movie at least.

[Jama7301]

Finished Paper Mario finally last night, and wrapped up the last of the pre-Heavensward patch quests for Final Fantasy XIV. I can finally start moving into the new story stuff that might actually have decent rewards. The patch quests were really... yeeeeesh.

Starting up Chrono Cross tomorrow, since I never got off Disk 1 for that one before.

[Wookieetank]

Finished Paper Mario finally last night, and wrapped up the last of the pre-Heavensward patch quests for Final Fantasy XIV. I can finally start moving into the new story stuff that might actually have decent rewards. The patch quests were really... yeeeeesh.

Yeah, there's a lot of gut punches to the feels in that stretch. Supposedly the writers started reading ASoIaF and taking inspiration from there (its a popular player theory anyways, not sure how true it is, but it seems to fit). Heavensward is great thought, and actually getting to fly around places is still neat.

On topic, picked up the Destiny 2 expansions earlier this week and have been playing through those. I can see why there was such an uproar over Curse of Osiris and Warmind. I quite enjoyed playing through both of them and they are amazingly gorgeous, but just was left wanting more (managed to clear both of them in 1 day without rushing anything). Forsaken on the other hand still has me working on the main quest even after 3 days of poking at it, and pours on the difficulty a fair bit, which in all honesty Destiny 2's PvE was needing. Overall quite pleased with the expansions, but they do have some flaws.

[Jama7301]

Started playing Chrono Cross, and hoooooooo boy the game is kinda vague. I've pulled up a spoiler free walkthrough, for when I get stumped, but for some reason, I hit a big block after Kid joined and she's like "Let's go to Termina!". And I did. and ran around without a clue as to what to do for a long time.

Also, there are apparently a billionty PCs in the game, good grief.

[Zevox]

So, Dragon Quest 11, spoilers for mid-to-late(?) game story (post-Yggdrasil):

Spoiler

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Wow, they actually pulled a "the villain won, now deal with the fallout" situation. Did not expect that out of Dragon Quest. I mean, I knew it felt like there had to be more coming after Yggdrasil even though I'd been pretty much everywhere on the map, as it didn't feel like the game's story had really run its course yet and it was still shorter than I'd expect, but I did not think it would be this. And you even lose your Luminary powers, which is definitely a step further than I'd ever expect Dragon Quest to take it - you're the chosen one/reincarnation of the ancient hero, but now you've lost the special powers that come from that, hope you can handle yourself without them.

Well, except for the ability to view memories through Yggdrasil's roots apparently. Which also apparently didn't just die when Yggdrasil did because.... plot convenience. Eh, oh well, an imperfect fun twist is still a fun twist.

Also, holy cow, Hendrick actually joins your party! Kudos to them on how thoroughly they kept that under wraps. Between the game's load screens plastering the seven-character party everywhere and even the pre-order bonus pins having just the seven I fully thought that was the whole party and did not expect another, much less the guy who spends the whole first half of the game chasing you trying to capture you for the villain. Granted it was always fairly clear that he was doing that out of misguided loyalty he was unwilling to question, but still, up until Yggdrasil I fully expected a boss fight with him at some point, not this. Fun twist there too for sure.

[Anteros]

So, Dragon Quest 11, spoilers for mid-to-late(?) game story (post-Yggdrasil):

Spoiler

Show

Wow, they actually pulled a "the villain won, now deal with the fallout" situation. Did not expect that out of Dragon Quest. I mean, I knew it felt like there had to be more coming after Yggdrasil even though I'd been pretty much everywhere on the map, as it didn't feel like the game's story had really run its course yet and it was still shorter than I'd expect, but I did not think it would be this. And you even lose your Luminary powers, which is definitely a step further than I'd ever expect Dragon Quest to take it - you're the chosen one/reincarnation of the ancient hero, but now you've lost the special powers that come from that, hope you can handle yourself without them.

Well, except for the ability to view memories through Yggdrasil's roots apparently. Which also apparently didn't just die when Yggdrasil did because.... plot convenience. Eh, oh well, an imperfect fun twist is still a fun twist.

Also, holy cow, Hendrick actually joins your party! Kudos to them on how thoroughly they kept that under wraps. Between the game's load screens plastering the seven-character party everywhere and even the pre-order bonus pins having just the seven I fully thought that was the whole party and did not expect another, much less the guy who spends the whole first half of the game chasing you trying to capture you for the villain. Granted it was always fairly clear that he was doing that out of misguided loyalty he was unwilling to question, but still, up until Yggdrasil I fully expected a boss fight with him at some point, not this. Fun twist there too for sure.

I'm thinking about picking this game up, but I'm not sure if I'll like it. I do like classic JRPG games, but I'm not a fan of silent protagonists, and I didn't really like the previous Dragon Quest game I played and quit it halfway. (Not sure which number it was, but the protagonist appeared to be the same as in this game.) I'm not too worried about the money aspect, but do you think I'll enjoy the game enough for it to be worth investing my time into, given that I didn't like the last entry I played? I didn't hate it or anything, I just didn't find the plot or the characters of the previous game interesting enough to keep me going.

[Kato]

Started playing Chrono Cross, and hoooooooo boy the game is kinda vague. I've pulled up a spoiler free walkthrough, for when I get stumped, but for some reason, I hit a big block after Kid joined and she's like "Let's go to Termina!". And I did. and ran around without a clue as to what to do for a long time.

Also, there are apparently a billionty PCs in the game, good grief.

It's been forever since I played it and I don't think I ever finished it.. Watched an LP though. It's not.. A bad game but definitely rough around the edges. Especially parts of combat felt unnecessarily cumbersome to me so I just lost interest.
Also, yes, probably one of the largest casts, though it can't compare to Suikoden.
Also, actual branching story lines.

[oxybe]

Radiata Stories laughs at your Suikoden and Chrono Cross. 45 characters? 108 characters? Try 176 that requires multiple playthroughs to get.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Finally dusted off my copy of Alpha Protocol, installed it, and I'm almost at the end now. It's interesting to see the parallels with Bioware RPGs, and the integration of NPC "like levels" into dialogue actually gets a lot more polish than I've seen in a game. Even if there's a shallowness to your relationships with most of the female cast.

I went stealth/pistol route, and the stealth in this game makes no sense and I love it. Hitting the stealth button and then walking up to everyone in a room and doing takedowns on them never gets old. "DUDE THIS GUY JUST CHOKED AND PASSED OUT IN FRONT OF ME, WHAT IS HAPPENING" Meanwhile, Chain Shot seems to render most bosses trivial. The moment they pop out of cover, I get sight on them and hit them with a bunch of headshots. Then wait for it to recharge.

A bit curious to see what other playstyles might bring, especially the ones centered on heavy weaponry. (Hacking seems less interesting because I already got good enough at hacking with just a single rank of hacking boost and low end hacking gloves.)

[Jama7301]

Finally dusted off my copy of Alpha Protocol, installed it, and I'm almost at the end now. It's interesting to see the parallels with Bioware RPGs, and the integration of NPC "like levels" into dialogue actually gets a lot more polish than I've seen in a game. Even if there's a shallowness to your relationships with most of the female cast.

I went stealth/pistol route, and the stealth in this game makes no sense and I love it. Hitting the stealth button and then walking up to everyone in a room and doing takedowns on them never gets old. "DUDE THIS GUY JUST CHOKED AND PASSED OUT IN FRONT OF ME, WHAT IS HAPPENING" Meanwhile, Chain Shot seems to render most bosses trivial. The moment they pop out of cover, I get sight on them and hit them with a bunch of headshots. Then wait for it to recharge.

A bit curious to see what other playstyles might bring, especially the ones centered on heavy weaponry. (Hacking seems less interesting because I already got good enough at hacking with just a single rank of hacking boost and low end hacking gloves.)

Alpha Protocol is legitimately one of my favorite games from the early '10s. For some reason, I really enjoyed the conversational system and enjoyed how things would change based off conversations and previous mission tactics.

[danzibr]

Suikoden 3 right now, but in 2 days that’s switching to Star Control: Origins.

[Zevox]

I'm thinking about picking this game up, but I'm not sure if I'll like it. I do like classic JRPG games, but I'm not a fan of silent protagonists, and I didn't really like the previous Dragon Quest game I played and quit it halfway. (Not sure which number it was, but the protagonist appeared to be the same as in this game.) I'm not too worried about the money aspect, but do you think I'll enjoy the game enough for it to be worth investing my time into, given that I didn't like the last entry I played? I didn't hate it or anything, I just didn't find the plot or the characters of the previous game interesting enough to keep me going.

Hm, that's hard to say, particularly without knowing which Dragon Quest you've played before (can't really say which that would be based on the protagonist, because every DQ has a different protagonist, and honestly none of them look that similar to 11's to me). In particular, I would say that if it was 9, the last real entry in the series (since 10 was an MMO that never made it out of Japan), it would be worth giving 11 a shot. 9 was notably different from much of the series in that your entire party was silent protagonists, since they were all fully customizable characters you created, an element that's otherwise only in game 3. Personally, I didn't like that and found it detracted from my enjoyment of that one quite a bit compared to others, especially 8, which has at least so far been my favorite, and certainly 11, which may well be my new favorite after I finish it.

If it was 8 though - which it would be if you recall the companion characters being a short and crude guy named Yangus, a mage woman from a rich family named Jessica, and a charming but slightly roguish knight named Angelo - then I'd say if you didn't like that one, you won't like this one. They're quite similar in their handling of the characters and writing, and of course in gameplay, which doesn't change much throughout the series.

If it was one of the older ones, harder to say. I will emphasize though that a big part of the appeal for Dragon Quest is that it is so old-school in just about everything, including the writing. Aside from graduating from "Dragon kidnaps Princess" in game 1 to "Dark Lord threatens the World" in game 2, the series' stories are pretty same-y by and large, fairly standard fantasy fare with a special chosen one hero opposing some dark lord or another, just with the occasional unique quirk or two thrown in.

I will add that I personally agree with you about silent protagonists, that's one thing that I don't think adds anything to any games and I wish they'd do away with it, but it doesn't detract enough from my enjoyment to keep me from liking series like DQ personally.

[Anteros]

It was the game that the pre-order costume is from, so I believe that was VIII? I think you're right that I probably won't like it, which is a shame because I've been wanting a good classic style JRPG for a while. Oh well, such is life. Maybe I'll try to find someone streaming a part that isn't too spoilery and watch a bit to see if it changes my mind. Thanks.

[Zevox]

It was the game that the pre-order costume is from, so I believe that was VIII? I think you're right that I probably won't like it, which is a shame because I've been wanting a good classic style JRPG for a while. Oh well, such is life. Maybe I'll try to find someone streaming a part that isn't too spoilery and watch a bit to see if it changes my mind. Thanks.

The pre-order outfit is of the DQ8 hero, yeah, and 8 is by far the game that 11 is the most similar to. So yeah, unless a stream or youtube video gives you reason to believe it's more up your alley than 8 was, I'd say it's a safer bet that it won't be.

[NRSASD]

After listening to too much Thief OST, I've been pulled back into the shadowy underworld of the Dark Mod. It's good to be back

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Alpha Protocol is legitimately one of my favorite games from the early '10s. For some reason, I really enjoyed the conversational system and enjoyed how things would change based off conversations and previous mission tactics.

Those aspects are so, so refined and tolerant of different choices. It feels that they went through so many possible permutations and made sure that they worked well. The vast majority of the time, I could see where my choices had impacts, but it was worked perfectly into the flow of conversation.

Spoiler

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I also really loved how I turned Margrand and it kicked in perfectly at the climax, creating this great straight-outta-movies moment.

[Silverraptor]

I'm about to start up Space Marine again. Was thinking of turning it into a Let's Play.

[tonberrian]

Still going strong on Divinity: Original Sin 2, but I've started up Dragon Quest XI now. So far so good.

[Metahuman1]

So, I recently stumbled on a few youtube videos about Diablo 2 vs. Diablo 3, and were the latter fails. And I find in a lot of respects, I agree with them. I use to enjoy Diablo 2 rather a bit back in the day, but Diablo 3, I tried it for a month or so and then just lost interest, largely for the reasons listed.


Anyway, so, this perked my interest and I started poking around. Turns out there's a D2 patch now to make it mac compatible. And that got me thinking. If the Mac and PC Online are compatible (I.E., it's not set up to were windows players must play only with other Windows players, and Mac Players must play only with other Mac players.), I could start doing like a family thing with my siblings and my dad. Something to just sit there and play around with as a group when we get spurts of time.

So, this leads me to 2 questions. 1: Is it possible to just download the game, either free, or inexpensively?

2: Do Mac and Windows users play multiplayer mixed, or is is separated?

If anyone know's, Id appreciate the information. Thanks!

[factotum]

You need to purchase it from Battle.net, I don't think there's any other source for it:

https://eu.shop.battle.net/en-us/product/diablo-ii

Note that the Lord of Destruction expansion is a separate product, so you have to double up the price there to get the full package.

[Zombimode]

So, this leads me to 2 questions. 1: Is it possible to just download the game, either free, or inexpensively?

It's 10$ per Piece (Base game, LoD), so 20$ for the complete game.

[Metahuman1]

It's 10$ per Piece (Base game, LoD), so 20$ for the complete game.

Well, I guess that just leaves question 2. Is it a case of Windows and Mac being kept separate form one another, or do they all just mingle?

[Jama7301]

From what I was seeing, it appears they can connect directly through TCP/IP, or through the in-game Battle.net.

Edit: Picked up Frozen Synapse 2 last night, and oh boy, I'm going to be JUST as bad at this one as I was at the first.

[rooster707]

Finished Watch Dogs 2, which, IMO, improves on the original in almost every way. (Not that that was too hard, but still.)

I feel like the story could have used a bit more work in places, though. The first game (IIRC) was dark and serious pretty much all the time, and the sequel tries to be much more fun and lighthearted. Which is good of the time, but when they do try to be serious with it, it doesn’t really work, IMO.

Thinking of picking up Divinity: Original Sin, since it’s on sale right now. Been a while now since I played a good old school CRPG.

[The Glyphstone]

Does it still have mandatory driving segments? those singlehandedly ruined the original for me.

[Sermil]

I'm playing Persona 3: Portable, female PC. Thought it would be interesting to see what they did with dating with a female PC, since the later ones are so very male-protagonist-centered.

Story is definitely not up to P4:G or P5's level, but not bad, not bad. The Persona series has never had the best combat, but oh boy, is it grindy in this one. I'm kinda glad I played P4:G first, I think the grind would have turned me off of the series if I started with P3.

Music is really good, though, as always.

[rooster707]

Does it still have mandatory driving segments? those singlehandedly ruined the original for me.

Just a few. They’re still pretty garbage though.

Decided to give Stardew Valley another try, and I think I got far enough to hit the loop this time, since I can’t stop thinking about it now. This is gonna be one of those “just one more turn” games, isn’t it?

(The intro could be better, though. This game is about farming, isn’t it? Then start me out with farming! Don’t have me go into town and hunt down 28 different NPCs at once on the first day!)

[Zevox]

I'm playing Persona 3: Portable, female PC. Thought it would be interesting to see what they did with dating with a female PC, since the later ones are so very male-protagonist-centered.

Story is definitely not up to P4:G or P5's level, but not bad, not bad. The Persona series has never had the best combat, but oh boy, is it grindy in this one. I'm kinda glad I played P4:G first, I think the grind would have turned me off of the series if I started with P3.

Music is really good, though, as always.

Personally, I feel it's P5's story that's not up to P3 and 4's level - mostly due to dropping the ball near the end, from about the point of, well, everything major with Akechi and onward. P3's story works extremely well all told, I feel, and ends up much more satisfying in its resolutions than P5.

And I take it you haven't played P3 before then? Because the female MC is particularly interesting to play when you can compare how the game changes based on your gender.

Spoiler: Very minor early-game spoiler for an example.

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For instance, with the female MC Junpei's jealousy of you getting appointed the field leader of the group takes on a sexist undertone that it obviously lacks as a male MC. In response to that you get Mitsuru jumping to your defense and insisting that Junpei will give you respect a couple of times when, for the male MC, she just ignores Junpei's jealous griping. It's subtle touches like that which make the female MC in P3P so well-done.

On romances though, I will say that you do get the better end of things with the female MC in one way: you can actually choose whether the social links that can become romances do. They first introduced that feature in P4, and never went back and added it to the male MC when they did P3P, so for him all social links that can become romantic do after a certain point (usually about level 5), so you kind of wind up unintentionally cheating on whichever you prefer if you want to advance all the social links.

(Another reason it's a good thing they have that for the female MC: one of the romance options for her for some reason is a grade-school kid. Yeah... )

[Zevox]

Well, I beat Dragon Quest 11 tonight. Or the main storyline, at least, because this game seems to have set up the hooks for its post-game content in the main story, which is a new one by me.

Spoiler

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I mean, there's that mystery voice that speaks to you after you defeat Mordegon, obviously, but also the lack of resolution to what was up with Erdwin's Lantern and the word "Calasmos" that was written in runes on its barrier, and the weird little ghosts that have been all around the game right from the start that weren't even acknowledged until one seemed to be involved in that instance. Even knowing there's apparently a fair amount of post-game stuff though, it's weird that I never found the key that opens all of those barred doors all over the game - I mean, that's a classic Dragon Quest thing, but you normally expect to find all those keys over the course of the main game, like you do with the Magic Key in this one.

Nonetheless though, this is theoretically the main game's end, so my thoughts - wow, did I really like this game. Unless they somehow screw the whole thing up with the post-game content, this is my new favorite entry in the series easily. I mean, the contrast to 9 couldn't be more stark, with the companions being a huge highlight of the game, and really I think it's particularly how much I like them that sets it up above even DQ8. Rab and Jade probably remain my favorite (I swear Rab has the best voice actor in the whole cast), but they did some good stuff with Erik, Hendrick, and especially Serena and Veronica. I mean, wow, I did not expect a companion to die and have that death actually stick in Dragon Quest, and it's that much more surprising that it's the one that looked like a child (even if she technically wasn't). I kind of wish Serena were a more expressive character, or her voice actress more on par with Rab's, because the only thing holding that back from being the highlight of the game is that I never quite felt the same sense of loss and mourning over her death from Serena that I did with Rab at his daughter's grave. (Oh, and Sylvando was always fun too, if very basic in his story compared to most of the rest. Also, maybe it's just because I went for Knives as his weapon, but he always felt weaker in combat than the rest too, so I rarely used him there.)

I will say that one point of disappointment for me is the Sword of Light. I mean, you forge it yourself, but they didn't use that as an opportunity to let you decide whether to make it a regular one-handed sword or a greatsword, even though your hero could be using either weapon type? It has to be a one-hander? That was pretty disappointing to me, forcing me to choose between not using it or respeccing to the one-handed sword tree (I chose the former). They had the perfect setup to let you customize your legendary weapon to your preferred style, and just didn't take it for some reason. Weird.

And that's in contrast to the fact that the mini-forge is probably the best damn crafting system that I've seen in a game in a long time. Simple but effective, I rarely went looking for ingredients and was able to make most of the items I found recipes for (the ones I wanted to make anyway), and the mini-game you play to get stronger versions of the items out of it is actually pretty fun and weirdly does make it feel like you're working on a forge, trying to hammer things just right to get that sweet +3 in the end. Kudos to them on that, a more than worthy successor to the Alchemy Pot of 8 and 9.

So, yeah, still have to do that post-game stuff, but all in all, I am very happy with this one. It's no Persona, but as far as classic-style JRPGs go, it's one of the best you could ask for.

[keepLooking]

May sound freaky, but for now, I'm replaying Broken Sword 3 (the very part that was the first one in series to me). Now I see how stupid its plot is, but anyway that's a brilliant