What Video Games Have You Been Playing? Eight times I've died...

[EgonSpengler]

They're essentially completely combat-based, but I adored Elite Force and Birth of the Federation.

There really does need to be a new major Star Trek production. This would probably be easier if ownership wasn't always screwing it up. Ugh.

Yeah, I liked Elite Force. Never played Birth of the Federation. I also really liked Starfleet Command, which was 100% starship combat, based on a tabletop game I used to play.

 

[Broken_Erika]

Elite Force had some awesome custom maps.

 

[MaryKB]

I LOVED Birth of the Federation, but I'm always sad you csn only win by conquering everyone.

 

[Sommerswerd]

On that subject, game designers as a group haven't 'cracked the code' on a lot of non-combat gameplay. Exploration gameplay has come along really nicely, and just the pure exploration components of games like The Long Dark, Subnautica and Far Cry are entirely playable games in themselves (some stealth games, like Dishonored and Styx: Master of Shadows have great exploration components too, but make it hard to explore by killing you when you take a wrong step). Stealth and survival mechanics are making progress, but are mostly still frustrating and/or tedious (Subnautica was a much better game when I turned off the hunger & thirst components). The Long Dark did some great stuff in making the environmental gameplay engaging, even thrilling; getting through the night, outdoors in a blizzard is actually pretty gripping. The thirst and hunger mechanics are still tedious wastes of time, though not as bad as in most of the survival games I've played. Construction/base-building has made some strides lately, but is still seemingly years from being satisfyingly combined with other things. Banished started out merging a city-builder with survival gameplay, and Cities: Skylines started out blending city-building with crisis management, but both lost their nerve and are just sandbox games brushed with a little olive oil; Frostpunk took the baton and really ran with it, and is the only game I've played that makes city-building a real game instead of just a pile of blocks.

FrostPunk is certainly a gem, the combination of real city building with actual hanging on by a thread, under constant threat, life-and-death, survival gameplay is superb. The desperation and dread is quite immersive and I actually feel a twinge of sadness anytime I hear the death-bell toll for one of my citizens who have just died... and the way the main game literally forces you to choose between being a "Big Brother" uberfascist dictator or a "Spanish Inquisition" fanatical fundamentalist demagogue... because "desperate times" is a pretty intriguing twist... especially the way it's introduced so gradually and innocuously at first to "give people a little hope". The replay value is pretty great too, even with the linear campaign-style "storyline".

 

[Snerk]

I've been playing some Farpoint and it's pretty impressive. I even have that nifty VR Aim gun which I got for my b-day, and works great with the game. It's truly some next level stuff. But I'm really struggling with getting motivated to play anything at all these days. It's all meh.

 

[Synobun]

I'm about twenty hours into Star Trek Online now.

It's decent enough that I'll probably see it through, and maybe play other storylines, but it's bad enough that I'll be mad about it the whole time. Server latency ranges from inadequate to terrible. Missions are poorly balanced; some are incredibly easy while others are stupidly difficult. Getting one-shot killed over and over and over again isn't fun, especially when the missions scale so there is no way you can, for example, level up to get an advantage. I've started just calling in AI reinforcements any time I get one-shot now because there is absolutely no way I can do it alone.

The duty roster feature is kind of cool but I found out the hard way that the credit requirement missions are permanent and you don't get those credits back. When you can earn 25 to 30k credits a day at most (without gaming the system or primarily seeking to earn money), doing a 50k credit mission is... taxing on the bank account.

As an aside, the storyline for the Federation is just... stupid. So stupid. I'm relying solely on an appreciation for Star Trek to get through it.

I changed my mind. This game is wack.

Onto ESO!

 

[EgonSpengler]

FrostPunk is certainly a gem, the combination of real city building with actual hanging on by a thread, under constant threat, life-and-death, survival gameplay is superb. The desperation and dread is quite immersive and I actually feel a twinge of sadness anytime I hear the death-bell toll for one of my citizens who have just died... and the way the main game literally forces you to choose between being a "Big Brother" uberfascist dictator or a "Spanish Inquisition" fanatical fundamentalist demagogue... because "desperate times" is a pretty intriguing twist... especially the way it's introduced so gradually and innocuously at first to "give people a little hope". The replay value is pretty great too, even with the linear campaign-style "storyline".

I'm not sure how many city-builders actually went for more than sandboxes. Banished seemed to start out aiming to be a survival game, but it wimped out real fast. I tried one of the Anno games once, but didn't get far enough to see what it really had going on. Nothing wrong with sandboxes, btw, I played the original SimCity and Cities: Skylines a ton.

 

[Synobun]

I changed my mind. This game is wack.

Onto ESO!

This game is blurry. Literally everything is blurry. It's like I'm blind. I guess my laptop isn't good enough.

Onto... nothing... I guess Stellaris? The DLC is on sale. I could probably swing one of them. Which is most essential?

 

[Senethro]

The Utopia expansion. If you like the game and want to play it more then pick up the story packs at christmas.

 

[Lexicus]

Either Utopia or Synthetic Dawn I'd say. Actually, reading the description, without Utopia there are no ascension perks? If that's true it's gotta be Utopia.

 

[Synobun]

Utopia it is!

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

I'm not entirely sure what I'm playing. Those are some lovely textures.

 

[Sommerswerd]

I'm not sure how many city-builders actually went for more than sandboxes. Banished seemed to start out aiming to be a survival game, but it wimped out real fast. I tried one of the Anno games once, but didn't get far enough to see what it really had going on. Nothing wrong with sandboxes, btw, I played the original SimCity and Cities: Skylines a ton.

I've always loved Sim City as well. I started out with the original on SNES and quickly moved up to the much improved Sim City 2000 on PC In fact, I'd say that the trifecta of Sim City 2000, Civilization 1, and Wolfenstein 3D... was my introduction to "modern" PC gaming, and the point where I transitioned from mostly console gaming into mostly PC gaming.

Now having played some RTS campaigns and games like FrostPunk, I really think Sim City missed the boat with not having more campaign style play integrated into the game. It would have been really cool to fight off riots, growing political unrest, or organized crime taking over, survive a war or invasion by a foreign power, host the Olympics, maybe even see superheros and supervillains descend on your city and cause mayhem... maybe there are some expansions that did this later but all I've seen is variation of the sandbox.

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

I remember that CivCity: Rome had some campaign-type gameplay, though I never really played around with it and just stuck in sandbox. The game's a few years old though and I don't know if it's even still available.

 

[FriendlyFire]

Azure Lane
Some kind of Kancolle clone game, but they built on it with weird sims management, I dont know what Iam doing to be honest
I figured out aircraft carriers are your AOE nukers, Battleships are archers, Cruisers DPS, Destroyers are your evade tanks and each of the ships have unique skills which you need to match up

 

[dusters]

Been getting back into Age of Empires 2. It has a lot of new civs now. Competitive side of the game is alive and well.

 

[Arakhor]

I remember that CivCity: Rome had some campaign-type gameplay, though I never really played around with it and just stuck in sandbox. The game's a few years old though and I don't know if it's even still available.

It's right here on GOG.

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

That's good.

I wish the feature to put in a CD key and get the game DRM-free was more widely available. It's only available for about half a dozen games and when you're on a budget rebuying games you already have isn't much fun.

 

[Synobun]

I'm a few hours into Stellaris but don't really know how well I'm doing. I'm just sorta expanding on two fronts perpetually to cut off my neighbours. It's 2275 and my fleet is 4.3k in strength. Is that good? I dunno. I haven't seen any rival fleets but all the auto-generated enemies are 5k+ so I imagine that isn't great.

That said, I've met everyone and they are all inferior to me according to the Contacts page.

Which is much better than my first run, in which I met someone while I had 11 population and 1 colony and they had 70 and 8.

 

[Senethro]

I'm a few hours into Stellaris but don't really know how well I'm doing. I'm just sorta expanding on two fronts perpetually to cut off my neighbours. It's 2275 and my fleet is 4.3k in strength. Is that good? I dunno. I haven't seen any rival fleets but all the auto-generated enemies are 5k+ so I imagine that isn't great.

That said, I've met everyone and they are all inferior to me according to the Contacts page.

Which is much better than my first run, in which I met someone while I had 11 population and 1 colony and they had 70 and 8.

The only good strength level is More Than. Look at your neighbours fleet strength estimate, and keep in mind that Equivalent is a wide category that feels like it goes from half to double.

Don't try too hard to win. You'll learn more from doing something wildly silly.