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

[PPQ_Purple]

Nobody makes you buy DLCs. If you cannot afford them, play those cheap, crappy phone games. You are not entitled.

He has a point though. Like, a DLC is different from an expansion pack in that it's supposed to be small in terms of content but also relatively cheap to compensate for that. The Sims 4 however have a track record of charging full expansion prices for everything and not making a distinction price vise between the stuff that's actually worth that full price and something that should be like a 5 euro DLC.

And they are not alone in this. Like, the latest HOI4 DLC is basically something modders could have cooked up. And yet it costs 15 USD which is outrageous for 3 focus trees and some mechanics.

We the consumers have been normalizing this behavior on part of gaming companies for far too long if you ask me. I remember back when 60 USD equivalent bought you a full price game that was finished. And than you could spend half as much to get expansion packs that were basically full on extra games on the same engine. And games weren't full of DRM or always online either.

Bottom line is gaming companies, like all capitalist entities are going to give us as little as we accept for as much money as we are willing to give them. And maybe the time has come to draw a line and say at least no further.

 

[Sommerswerd]

American Truck Simulator. Route 95 through Idaho is a fun drive (probably irl, too). Also picked up Montana, Wyoming and Colorado from the Steam Spring Sale.

Spoiler :

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American Truck Simulator: Pulling two trailers with 58,000 lbs / 26,000 kg of crushed cars is like driving a train.

Along the Snake River in Idaho, heading for Oregon.

Spoiler :

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Drawbridge on the Snake River. "Sister Christian" on the '80s radio station. This song always makes me think of the scene in Boogie Nights with Alfred Molina.

Spoiler :

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Beautiful graphics and scenery. Sort of an odd concept/premise. I've never played it though. What is the game about? Is it like X series where you are running a shipping company and trying to build a fleet of trucks by making money on deliveries? Or is it like The Long Dark where you are just trying to survive in your travels?

It seems from what you describe that the different routes/highways are designed to be real-world accurate. Is that the case? If so that would be fascinating... to travel real life routes, especially if you get to travel roads you have visited in RL to see how it compares to the game. How "open" is the environment? Can you take exit ramps to side roads, or truck stops and such, or do you have stay on the main highway the whole time? Can you get into accidents with the other cars? Are the distances/times between the places accurate? Like if you are traveling a distance that would take an hour in RL, does it take an hour in the game? Do you have to stop to eat?

 

[EgonSpengler]

Beautiful graphics and scenery. Sort of an odd concept/premise. I've never played it though. What is the game about? Is it like X series where you are running a shipping company and trying to build a fleet of trucks by making money on deliveries? Or is it like The Long Dark where you are just trying to survive in your travels?

It seems from what you describe that the different routes/highways are designed to be real-world accurate. Is that the case? If so that would be fascinating... to travel real life routes, especially if you get to travel roads you have visited in RL to see how it compares to the game. How "open" is the environment? Can you take exit ramps to side roads, or truck stops and such, or do you have stay on the main highway the whole time? Can you get into accidents with the other cars? Are the distances/times between the places accurate? Like if you are traveling a distance that would take an hour in RL, does it take an hour in the game? Do you have to stop to eat?

You basically just drive around. Maneuvering the truck takes a little thought, and a heavy or large load can make that harder, but the game is very forgiving. It's not really meant to be challenging. Times and distances are compressed, and you're only able to access a fraction of each city's roads. But within those parameters, they've tried to model real cities & highways accurately. You can build a fleet of trucks and hire drivers to drive the ones you aren't using yourself, but I haven't done that.

 

[EgonSpengler]

The Long Dark

At Interloper difficulty, everything starts with a hacksaw. Day 9, Pleasant Valley. I spawned in Ash Canyon, made the hike up to the mine to get the technical pack and crampons, then headed for the exit. No sense [screwing] around here without any gear. On Timberwolf Mountain, I saw a wolf take a deer and decided to seize the day and chase the wolf off with a torch. It was dark by the time I finished cleaning the deer and it had started snowing, so I couldn't see a thing. I took the wrong route and accidentally slipped on the cliff down into the ravine. [Fork]. So I had to climb all the way down. Good thing I had the crampons, I guess. I ditched the meat and the deer skin when I got to the bottom, because I'd have to sneak past the bear to get back to the cabin, and in the dark I wouldn't see him until he was throwing his shuriken at me.

Spoiler :

So I lost like half a day 'cause I'm a moron. In Pleasant Valley, I visited the plane wreckage, the draft dodger's cabin, the red barn, and Thompson's Crossing. Now I'm in the farmhouse. I still don't have a hacksaw. Or a bedroll. Or a hammer. Or a magnifying glass.

 

[Smellincoffee]

Beautiful graphics and scenery. Sort of an odd concept/premise. I've never played it though. What is the game about? Is it like X series where you are running a shipping company and trying to build a fleet of trucks by making money on deliveries? Or is it like The Long Dark where you are just trying to survive in your travels?

It seems from what you describe that the different routes/highways are designed to be real-world accurate. Is that the case? If so that would be fascinating... to travel real life routes, especially if you get to travel roads you have visited in RL to see how it compares to the game. How "open" is the environment? Can you take exit ramps to side roads, or truck stops and such, or do you have stay on the main highway the whole time? Can you get into accidents with the other cars? Are the distances/times between the places accurate? Like if you are traveling a distance that would take an hour in RL, does it take an hour in the game? Do you have to stop to eat?

At its most simple, you're literally driving a truck. That's the main activity in the game. You can, however, buy garages and trucks, and then hire drivers. It seems like a way to create passive income more than anything else, but I just play AST to listen to music/podcasts/whatever. There are some hard-core simmers who make it more realistic & difficult (adding mods that make them wait for air pressure to build up before they begin driving), and then there's people like me who turn off damage and then drive like we're playing GTA. I also play EuroTruck Simulator, bur prefer the American version because of longer uninterrupted drives. I've been on some routes IRL that I've driven in the game, and it's ....interesting -- uncanny, sometimes. Cities are very much compressed, of course, and some areas are inaccessible: you can see a sign directing you into downtown Santa Fe, for instance, but aside from seeing La Fonda in the distance you can't actually get there. There are also liberties taken: I know in an early build of the game something like the Very Large Array was present in Arizona or Nevada, long before New Mexico was added. I don't know if it's still there in that location or not, since they do update the map from time to time. (I practically NEVER go to California -- I tend to go back and forth between the PNW and the Four Corners, as my primary base is in Flagstaff.)



I've been playing the Stardew Valley 1.6 update. Haven't gotten very far -- just summer. Books from the bookseller are too expensive for me just yet, as I'm trying to build a productive base. Did a boneheaded thing and forgot to save money for strawberry seeds at the Egg Festival, so I'll have to wait for the Night Market to get any of those. Meadowlands Farm is a challenge -- I like the waterfall, but had to build a well for my primary field near the house. I have a second field near the water as well, but need to make it larger.

 

[Quintillus]

^Yeah, ATS/ETS2 are the "truck simulator" equivalent to the "walking simulator" genre. It's about the scenery, seeing somewhere different. In ETS2, I mainly drove around the Alps. You eventually make money and can buy better trucks, but as I'm not really into trucks IRL, that's not a big appeal. Although I'm more aware of the various truck brands I see IRL now. I conceptually like the idea of navigating without the optional GPS (except within the compressed cities), but in practice it's only just getting far enough east to be in areas where that's feasible without having my atlas out.

---

I finished up my Poland Civ VI game, and am happy to report that Poland can into space. I got a 1996 Space Race victory; Spain was my closest opponent, though several countries made it to the Moon. There were only two dramatic parts at the end. One was avoiding a diplomatic victory, and making sure England wouldn't win one. I was happy to lose 2 diplomatic victory points in the 1970 World Congress, helping me avoid winning, and strategically voted to minimize my chances of being awarded points. Since I'd been in first, in a 36-28 vote, the other countries voted to give me those -2 points (I voted to give Hungary, who was way behind diplomatically, two points). But England had 17 of 20 diplomatic victory points after that Congress, so I was concerned I would lose (or perhaps accidentally win myself) in 2000. Then I realized that I could build multiple copies of each of the components to speed up intergalactic rockets, not just one copy of each, which allowed me to win before Y2K.

The other mildly dramatic part was that war with China, where I wound up conquering all of China just because it was so easy. It really didn't help me at all, and half of Beijing was underwater (we warmed up the planet a lot, with England leading the way; I think I finished 4th but 2nd through 4th was all quite close). But it let me try out Modern Armor and Helicopters and Missile Cruisers; the Giant Death Robot was not completed in time. The Ottomans, my new neighbors, were a bit nervous, so I stationed the GDR in the nearest city and built up WMDs for lack of anything else useful to build while my spaceship traveled the stars, and that proved an effective deterrent.

Fun fact, until 1981 all of my power generation was hydro, solar, or wind, but in 1981 I accidentally generated some nuclear power in a captured Chinese city, earning an era point for doing so. The clean power generation was what let me finish 4th in global warming, despite having led the race early on.

---

Now I've started an Ottoman game, with a tentative goal of winning by domination, which I've never done before. Playing on a Huge Inland Sea map, and my neighbor is, appropriately enough, Persia. Civ VI lacks a meme thread like Civ IV has, so I'll share the meme here:

For those who don't play VI, Persia's leader Cyrus likes you more if you declare surprise wars. Unfortunately for him, in both games I've played with Persia, he's been my next door neighbor and the surprise war has been against him.

It's too early to say how it will end; Persepolis is the largest city in the world, and while my Eagle Warrior (hired from a barbarian clan) could have soloed one of their weaker cities, they rapidly reinforced it with an archer, leaving me with a captured worker and a pillaged improvement (which still gave me enough faith to found a pantheon - not a bad haul). But I have two regular Warriors and that Eagle forming a perimeter to prevent them from expanding to the good land to their west, the clan formed a city state to their north that appears to be influenced by Greece, and to their east is desert, so I'm optimistic that even if I can't win, I can at least effectively contain them. And to make things better, when I asked their neighbor-across-the-desert Victoria of England if she would join the war, she demurred, but then said, well, for 14 gold, why not? Needless to say, England now has 14 more gold, even if all they do is be a distraction, that's well worth it to keep my historical rival from sending all their forces west.

I do wonder if Civ VI has the Civ III concept of culturally-linked start locations - was I just lucky that Persia started nearby, or does it know that Persia should historically start near the Ottomans?

 

[Quintillus]

Meet Paradise City:

It seems Sim City 3000 is popular, so an update on Paradise City.

It's 1927 now, and Paradise City has been debt-free for 9 years. Nearly 41,000 people call Paradise their home, a modest growth rate considering, but Axl has started making some city services available.

Here's the 30,000 foot view:

Most of the farms have closed due to pollution, although off to the east, a new Paradise Farms development has been started, with three new farms providing fresh wheat and more wheat. The roadways around the lake indicate planned future highways and avenues, and the outline of the future lakeside downtown area; farther southwest is the coast. You can also see the expansion of various neighborhoods.

Axl's home neighborhood has recently opened a marina:

Because what rock star doesn't want a nearby marina? It probably should have been opened closer to the mayor's house, but the plan is to have one at each end of the lake, and perhaps one on the smaller lake as well. This is the most prosperous area of town, with all those green lawns and some fancy shops, as well as a hugely popular bus route around the lakes.

Bus routes... we invested a lot in public transit, both trains and busses. It seems the trains are popular in industrial areas and the busses in residential ones. In these close-knit quarters, busses won out, but I haven't given up on rail. Subways remain far above our modest budgets, and at any rate, in the primarily low-density areas we have, public transit does not collect enough in fares to cover its expenses. But it has noticeably reduced traffic around the lakes.

Next up is a close-up of one of the old-school Paradise Farms, and the residential areas near it:

Happily, the farm continues to exist with the houses nearby, despite the fickleness of Sim City 3000 farms, which seem to take every excuse to disappear. The areas by the farms, as well as the areas between the lakes, are nearly the only areas of the town with positive aura - that SC3K concept of well-being that can be hard to pin down. Farms, it seems, are good for the soul.

Finally, one of the larger new neighborhoods, southeast of the lakes:

We've gradually been expanding up onto the higher elevations, terracing our residential areas, and now having that nifty medium-density commercial zone including a shopping mall near the hospital. Several medium-land-value rowhouses are visible, and we've been designating these as historic markers of our progress. The industrial areas are all former farms, which were incrementally taken over by industry. Trees provide a partially-effective pollution blocker and theoretically increase aura, parks and ponds are more common in new developments, and our newest power plant is visible, belching pollution into the air but keeping the lights on. A less-polluting oil plant was considered, but as it would have cost roughly two years' worth of revenue versus a bit over one year's worth for the coal plant, it was ultimately not pursued.

A police station is also visible. We now have multiple police and fire stations, enough schools for all the students, and thanks to that hospital in the screenshot, enough hospitals as well. Now the petitioners want a jail - they say our law enforcement is not the most effective without one. What will it be next? A library? A museum? A zoo? All three? Probably. Oh well, we're profitable now, so we're on the way towards Paradise City actually being a desirable place to live. Right now it's just... adequate, but moving up in the world.

I've also enjoyed playing with, rather than against, the terrain. I remember most of my Sim Cities being vast expanses of grid-based sprawl, rectangles upon rectangles. Here, in part because I couldn't afford to flatten all the terrain (only enough to try to encourage farms), I've done much more of only localized flattening, while building at multiple elevations, and as a result the city has a more organic appearance.

 

[Bonyduck Campersang]

I do wonder if Civ VI has the Civ III concept of culturally-linked start locations - was I just lucky that Persia started nearby, or does it know that Persia should historically start near the Ottomans?

I don't think it does, because the YNAEMP modpack has culturally-linked start locations as a feature

 

[Kyriakos]

A better world ^^

Still, this mod has its own problems.

 

[Smellincoffee]

A better world ^^

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Still, this mod has its own problems.

Constantinople!



Still playing the Stardew Valley update. Ran into green summer rain and saw all kinds of fun trees, but my axe was at the blacksmith's and I couldn't pick it up because Clint was in the saloon with everyone else, hunkering down from the storm. I've never seen Penny or Haley in the saloon before, so that was interesting. The green rain also created so many weeds and moss that I collected HUNDREDS of both, working until 1 am so I could get as much as possible. Wasted time fishing and didn't run into any event-related fish.

 

[EgonSpengler]

I'm disappointed to see Millennia getting such mixed reviews. Oh well. Back to Civ VI, I guess.

 

[Arakhor]

I thought that Civ VI was rather meh when it came out too. I still play it today with a whole bunch of UI improvement mods.

 

[Kyriakos]

MEH.
Defeated Italy in a war and took Sicily. But my army is still 1/3 of theirs*, because there is a shortage of raw materials for my fuel factories (=airplanes) and relative shortage of tanks too (although I actually produce tanks with my own resources).

Infamy is a major problem too.

*I won through naval blockades + having conquered the islands + Dubrovnik.

 

[Takhisis]

Clearly historical reparations are in order and it should be from Nicaia in the west (called by its Frankish overlords ‘Nice’) to at least Nikaia in the east (the recently-liberated ‘Iznik’) and also, taking the N-theme to its logical conclusions, Nicopolis and Naissos.

 

[REDY]

So this is Victoria II with some mod? I see the game is now discounted in GOG.
Honestly I would like to play with Czechoslovakia peacfully. In Heart of Iron I just ruin the whole purpose of WWII game by destroying Germany and Italy before ww.

 

[Kyriakos]

So this is Victoria II with some mod? I see the game is now discounted in GOG.
Honestly I would like to play with Czechoslovakia peacfully. In Heart of Iron I just ruin the whole purpose of WWII game by destroying Germany and Italy before ww.

It is the New Era mod (NEM).

 

[EgonSpengler]

I thought that Civ VI was rather meh when it came out too. I still play it today with a whole bunch of UI improvement mods.

Yeah, same.

They've never fixed the 2nd-half problem, though. That may be the one thing that has me curious about other, similar games, like Millennia and Humankind. I'm currently trudging through the last 1/3rd of my Aztec game, begging the game just [flipping] end already. I probably won't finish it. I can't remember the last time I finished a game of Civ VI. I have no reason to think Civ VII will be any better, in this regard, but never say never, I guess.

 

[EgonSpengler]

Path of Exile: Misdirection

Last night, in anticipation of Necropolis, I was looking over poe.ninja and Path of Building, trying to see what sort of character I wanted to try. I started noticing a lot of references to "Boneshatter" and "Penance Brand", which I'd never heard of before. It turned out I'd been using an out-of-date version of the game's Wiki, for who knows how long.

If I Google "Path of Exile Active Skill Gems" or "Path of Exile wiki", the first result takes me to a page from the Expedition League, Summer of 2021. Those pages are from the Fandom Path of Exile Wiki, which I guess isn't being updated anymore, and hasn't been for going on 3 years. The one we want is the official Path of Exile Wiki. And they look similar, similar layout, same color palette, etc.

Anyway, Templar-Inquisitors were the 3rd-most popular class in the Affliction league. But most of them used Penance Brand, and I don't want a Brand build. So that's not much help. 1,046 characters registered at poe.ninja used Smite as a main skill, but only 1 of them was a Templar. No help there, either.

I'm contemplating a Boneshatter build. Juggernauts are the overwhelming choice for that (74%), which does have a certain appeal. Slayers (26%) are the 2nd-most popular choice.

Someone built an Occultist for Affliction with a DPS of 8 billion. Another person built a Juggernaut with a Strength score of 4,439. DPS on that one is only 2.7 billion.

 

[Birdjaguar]

Path of Exile: Misdirection

Last night, in anticipation of Necropolis, I was looking over poe.ninja and Path of Building, trying to see what sort of character I wanted to try. I started noticing a lot of references to "Boneshatter" and "Penance Brand", which I'd never heard of before. It turned out I'd been using an out-of-date version of the game's Wiki, for who knows how long.

If I Google "Path of Exile Active Skill Gems" or "Path of Exile wiki", the first result takes me to a page from the Expedition League, Summer of 2021. Those pages are from the Fandom Path of Exile Wiki, which I guess isn't being updated anymore, and hasn't been for going on 3 years. The one we want is the official Path of Exile Wiki. And they look similar, similar layout, same color palette, etc.

Anyway, Templar-Inquisitors were the 3rd-most popular class in the Affliction league. But most of them used Penance Brand, and I don't want a Brand build. So that's not much help. 1,046 characters registered at poe.ninja used Smite as a main skill, but only 1 of them was a Templar. No help there, either.

I'm contemplating a Boneshatter build. Juggernauts are the overwhelming choice for that (74%), which does have a certain appeal. Slayers (26%) are the 2nd-most popular choice.

Someone built an Occultist for Affliction with a DPS of 8 billion. Another person built a Juggernaut with a Strength score of 4,439. DPS on that one is only 2.7 billion.

I'm in queue at 10,528 for the start. I will be starting with boneshatter. It is the best of the melee builds and I have two characters in Standard using it. A high physical dps weapon is the main ingredient. I have a 2h axe version and a 1H axe and shield version. Are you going to play SC or SSF?

 

[Birdjaguar]

@EgonSpengler Jugg is the best path for boneshatter far and away.