What Video Games Have You Been Playing? #23: Lost in Shalebridge Cradle

[Chukchi Husky]

Hm. Well, fingers crossed. My game already crashes from time to time, but I haven't figured out what's doing it.

Buffout 4 and FO4 Crash Log Auto Scanner can help with finding out what causes the crashes.

 

[PPQ_Purple]

Haha what?

You literally checkpoint before every boss. At least as far as I got into the game. Maybe that changes later.

Also sounds like you should be using the harder lockon that centers the enemies so that they don't drift behind the player model.

That does not really change things. Flying around not bothering to dodge projectiles because they aren't too dangerous and holding down left click to let auto aim kill them just isn't challenging or fun.

 

[Senethro]

You literally checkpoint before every boss. At least as far as I got into the game. Maybe that changes later.

That does not really change things. Flying around not bothering to dodge projectiles because they aren't too dangerous and holding down left click to let auto aim kill them just isn't challenging or fun.

It was more the conclusion you drew from the existence of checkpoints.

 

[PPQ_Purple]

It was more the conclusion you drew from the existence of checkpoints.

Well it's kind of hard not to draw it when the evidence speaks for it self:

• The run to bosses is usually not very fun. Indeed, of all the levels I played the ones that were fun were the ones without bosses. It's literally you either have a fun level or a good boss but not both.
• The bosses are hard as all hell. But if you can get over that actually not bad. A bit too spongy on the HP department for my taste but that's about it.
• Checkpoints before each boss.

What other conclusion is there to make than that the devs know the weaknesses of their game and used checkpoints to compensate?

 

[Senethro]

I think putting checkpoints before bosses is a standard practice that barely invites examination.

 

[Thorgalaeg]

Anyone tried Starfield?

 

[PPQ_Purple]

I think putting checkpoints before bosses is a standard practice that barely invites examination.

Not in any From Soft game I've ever played. Admittedly this is my first game from the Armored Core series but the Souls games make a point of forcing you to run a gauntlet to get to the boss. And honestly with the levels being this short as they are checkpoints are just unnecessary.

 

[Arakhor]

Anyone tried Starfield?

Yes. It's essentially The Elder Scrolls IN SPACE, with planet exploration, outpost building, wacky space magic and retro-futuristic technology which looks like they decided that the 90s was the peak of culture.

The only ship-flying you do is for combat or shooting asteroids, so do not go into it expecting Elite: Dangerous or No Man's Sky.

 

[Zardnaar]

Yeah, survival mode was almost what I wanted. I liked the tougher combat. The Hard & Very Hard difficulty modes seem to just give your enemies more Hit Points, so fights simply take longer and use more resources, they're not really harder, per se. Very Hard was just tedious, a lot of the time. But most of the survival aspects of survival mode were annoying, rather than interesting. I find that to be true in most games that put a layer of survival mechanics over their other stuff. Subnautica, for example, was so much more enjoyable when I shut off the hunger & thirst mechanics. There's a mod that lets you quicksave in Fallout 4's survival mode without needing a bed, which is the single worst part of survival mode for me, but I still got bored of having to manage hunger, thirst & sleep.

There have been two exceptions, games where survival is the entire focus, and it isn't just a complicating/frustrating/aggravating layer over the base game: The Long Dark of course, but also the Frost total conversion mod for Fallout 4. If you haven't played the latter, I highly recommend it. It's gleefully brutal, and it's almost purely survival & exploration. After playing regular Fallout 4, you really have un-learn and re-learn combat in Frost.

Anyway, I'm hoping that Sim Settlements 2 on Normal or Hard difficulty will present an interesting game, even though I'm basically a superhero. I'm using the 'mortal settlers' option from a mod, and I've already lost two people to a Raider attack on Sanctuary. I'd like to find a mod that adds kids & elderly people - Settlers who use resources but don't do as much work and don't contribute to the defense of Settlements. I think at some point Sim Settlements 2 becomes almost a strategic game, with larger and larger incursions by Raiders, Super-Mutants and Gunners. There's a "Chapter 2" and a "Chapter 3" which I think is about a full-blown war with the Gunners (I didn't look closely, to avoid spoilers).

I like Survivor mode live off the land type builds. No settlement building, leave Sanctuary hills level 1.

Once you know where all the good early game stuff is its not that bad.

Adhesive actually matters. Won't have enough early on to do everything you want. Melee kinda helps.

 

[Thorgalaeg]

Yes. It's essentially The Elder Scrolls IN SPACE, with planet exploration, outpost building, wacky space magic and retro-futuristic technology which looks like they decided that the 90s was the peak of culture.

The only ship-flying you do is for combat or shooting asteroids, so do not go into it expecting Elite: Dangerous or No Man's Sky.

So a space game without space. I think I won't go into it. Having watched some reviews it seems to me Bethesda has decided to live in 2010 forever.

 

[EgonSpengler]

I like Survivor mode live off the land type builds. No settlement building, leave Sanctuary hills level 1.

Once you know where all the good early game stuff is its not that bad.

Adhesive actually matters. Won't have enough early on to do everything you want. Melee kinda helps.

I strongly recommend Frost, then. Sounds like it's right up your alley. (And to anyone else who enjoys survival games. Or masochism, in general.)

EDIT: I just looked at the Frost installation guide, and it's gotten a lot more complicated than when I played it a few years ago. Sheesh. I guess I can't recommend it unequivocally. I'm still curious to try it again after I finish or get tired of my current game, but it looks like a lot of work.

EDIT 2: That said, there's a lot of interesting-looking mods there, even if you're not going to play Frost. I'm bookmarking some of them to use with my regular game.

 

[Broken_Erika]

I strongly recommend Frost, then. Sounds like it's right up your alley. (And to anyone else who enjoys survival games. Or masochism, in general.)

If you try Frost, start on easy instead of survival or you might end up like this guy.

 

[Zardnaar]

I strongly recommend Frost, then. Sounds like it's right up your alley. (And to anyone else who enjoys survival games. Or masochism, in general.)

EDIT: I just looked at the Frost installation guide, and it's gotten a lot more complicated than when I played it a few years ago. Sheesh. I guess I can't recommend it unequivocally. I'm still curious to try it again after I finish or get tired of my current game, but it looks like a lot of work.

EDIT 2: That said, there's a lot of interesting-looking mods there, even if you're not going to play Frost. I'm bookmarking some of them to use with my regular game.

Don't really like survival games as such just got hooked.

I play very few games and then tend to master them beating them in the highest difficulties and then further restraining myself.

I still bust out Civ 3 or SMAC on occasion and generally play Paradox games for 5-10 years.

Slowly working my way through nightmare mode on Assassins Creed Odyssey, beaten Civ3 on deity and sid levels.

I feel ripped off if I dont get 200+ hours out of a game.

 

[Thorgalaeg]

I dont use to get hooked for any game anymore Last one was Baldur's Gate 3 but it lasted less than a week. Before that it was RimWorld and before that Fallout 4 IIRC.
Anyway when I get hooked I have the impression of being wasting my time (more than an impression, the realization of a fact) so I tend to cheat to finish the game asap.

 

[EgonSpengler]

I strongly recommend Frost, then. Sounds like it's right up your alley. (And to anyone else who enjoys survival games. Or masochism, in general.)

EDIT: I just looked at the Frost installation guide, and it's gotten a lot more complicated than when I played it a few years ago. Sheesh. I guess I can't recommend it unequivocally. I'm still curious to try it again after I finish or get tired of my current game, but it looks like a lot of work.

EDIT 2: That said, there's a lot of interesting-looking mods there, even if you're not going to play Frost. I'm bookmarking some of them to use with my regular game.

Reading through this guide, I learned a few things:

Alternatively, you can use ScreamingLake’s Wabbajack “Stay FROSTy”. A Wabbajack is a mod-pack that can be installed with a few clicks, and includes most/all mods you need already. For more information, visit ScreamingLakes’s Discord and their website

I'd never heard of a 'Wabbajack' before, so that's useful lingo, I guess. But more importantly, getting all of the mods for Frost in a bundle sounds helpful.

Do not install your game in the Program Files folder. Do not install any game in that folder, or have your Steam Library in there.Program Files is a special Windows System folder, and Fallout 4 doesn’t load mods correctly if it is in that folder.

I've never heard this before, but I Googled it, and sure enough, it's been recommended practice for years. It has something to do with the permissions. Just installing games, and services like Steam, on your plain ol' C: drive is the recommended course. But I guess it only really applies to heavily-modded games, and not even all the time. I've been playing a heavily-modded Civ VI for years, using mods from Steam's Workshop, and have never had a problem. I played Empire: Total War with only a couple of mods, one of which was a doozy, and I never noticed any real problems.

However, as I mentioned above, my modded Fallout 4 game has been crashing a bit, and there are a couple of mods that don't appear to be running properly. And I'm not even running as many mods as some people do. I think I have ~50 mods, of which only one - Sim Settlements 2 - is substantial (I guess I don't know that the size or in-game scope of a mod is a factor in how well it runs or whether it conflicts with other mods, I'm just assuming). I think some people play F4 with hundreds of mods. I figured the problem was in the load order, which I haven't messed around with, but maybe it's this thing with the Programs folder (fwiw, the Frost installation guide includes load order recommendations for its mods, so they've done that work for us).

What is/was the “Nexodus”?

Back in 2021, Nexusmods silently tried to add huge changes to its Terms of Services, but tried to push the changes as silent and fast as possible. Mod authors can not delete their mods from Nexusmods as a result of these changes. Don’t like what Nexusmods is doing? Nexusmods treats you unfairly? To bad, you can’t delete your mods anymore. That’s why many people left.

I hadn't heard about this. I guess I haven't modded my games much since before the Pandemic? (Not counting Civ VI, but I was content using what's available from the Steam Workshop.) Nevertheless, all of the essential mods and 90% of the recommended mods in the Frost guide are linked at Nexusmods, so you don't have to go hunting for them.

---

Some of the good-looking mods cited in Frost installation guide, that would seem to be useful for vanilla Fallout 4:

Spoiler :

Survival Configuration Menu

Features a brand new eat and drink system, which relies on weight of the item instead of the caps value and allows you to control it.In addition to that, you can tweak many aspects of the surviv

www.nexusmods.com

Unlimited Survival Mode - F4SE

This is a F4SE plugin which restores some hard-coded features disabled by game in survival mode,for example,unlock console,enable TGM,enable fast travel,restore vanilla compass settings,enalbe quick s

www.nexusmods.com

Campsite - Simple Wasteland Camping (and HD Sleeping Bags)

Campsite is a simple, lightweight camping mod that adds craftable / carryable tents, sleeping bags (new HD textures!), dog beds, fires, lanterns, and cooking pot, each with their own unique dynamics,

www.nexusmods.com

Ultra Exterior Lighting

This mod adds shadow cast lights to many of the physical light sources in the Fallout 4 exterior world including Far Harbor and Nukaworld. There has also been vast improvements made to the general lig

www.nexusmods.com

Ultra Interior Lighting

This is a comprehensive lighting mod that brings you many more shadow lights and a general improvement to overall lighting, ambience and fog to the interiors of the Commonweatlh, Far Harbor and Nuka W

www.nexusmods.com

Clarity - A Visual Overhaul

A zero performance loss, very subtle visual overhaul. Removes many annoying visuals in the game.

www.nexusmods.com

Interiors Enhanced - Darker Ambient Light and Fog

Ambient light power and fog brightness inside all interiors reduced by 60%, without touching any directional light sources whatsoever, keeping lighting 100% true to vanilla except for those dark corne

www.nexusmods.com

Classic Holstered Weapons System (CHW)

Finally, a proper engine-level system for showing holstered weapons on characters, with various customization options.

www.nexusmods.com

 

[Broken_Erika]

I've never heard this before, but I Googled it, and sure enough, it's been recommended practice for years. It has something to do with the permissions. Just installing games, and services like Steam, on your plain ol' C: drive is the recommended course. But I guess it only really applies to heavily-modded games, and not even all the time. I've been playing a heavily-modded Civ VI for years, using mods from Steam's Workshop, and have never had a problem. I played Empire: Total War with only a couple of mods, one of which was a doozy, and I never noticed any real problems.

By default, Steam installs games under C:Steam/steamapps/common.

 

[EgonSpengler]

By default, Steam installs games under C:Steam/steamapps/common.

My Steam is in the Programs folder, but it's been so long, I don't remember if I did that myself or if I just did what the installer recommended. I actually don't have many games installed right now. It might not kill me to reinstall everything to C:. I assume my Fallout 4 save-files can just be copy n' pasted into the new folders. I might try that and see if it helps with the crashing at all. The Frost guide also strongly recommends Mod Organizer 2 over Vortex, which is what I'm currently using.

 

[Arakhor]

Steam loves to install its games library to the C-drive, and if you do that, it has to be in the Programs folder. I set up another games library on my D-drive and set that as the default, with only the most resource- intensive games directed to my secondary library, which is installed on my SSD (C-drive).

 

[Broken_Erika]

I assume my Fallout 4 save-files can just be copy n' pasted into the new folders.

You can easily move your save games, asd long as you have all the same mods it should work. I mean, you can download other peoples save games on the Nexus. I moved them to a whole new computer once, of course fallout on that laptop crashed more than an alchoholic at a demolition derby and ran as a slideshow as soon as any combat started.
Also, savegames should be under Documents/My Games/Fallout4/Saves.

Steam loves to install its games library to the C-drive, and if you do that, it has to be in the Programs folder.

No it doesn't. I've never installed steam or been prompted to install steam in the program files. And i've installed steam on win7, win8.1 and win10

 

[Arakhor]

Well, in my experience, plus what I've read, if you install Steam on the C-drive, it will automatically install in Program Files, with no choice on your part. That's why I created the second library, simply to have a choice as to where to install my games.