What videogames have you been playing? version 1.22: What's with that plural?

[Chukchi Husky]

I'm playing Tropico 4 again. I'm finding this one easier than the earlier games or maybe because of the campaign it's more gradual in making the game more difficult. The humour in 4 is really obvious, as one event in the game where the superpowers ask you for money shows.

China: Most honourable leader, we need a bit of cash.
EU (represented by the UK): Tally ho, old boy! We're a bit short of cash at the moment.
Middle East: Oh no, all my wives are having their birthdays and I need a bit of cash.
USSR: The revolution needs your help! We need a bit of cash.
USA: Pay our Freedom Tax or we'll invade!

 

[Gorbles]

As I've been waiting for the temperature to go down so I can return to GotG without my GPU causing stuttering, I've been messing about more with Yugioh Duel Links. I used to be into the physical TCG, and I've idled in it for years, picking up digital freebies here and there. Decided to finally make a Dark Magician deck and see how far I can push it in the current event.

Pretty far! I'm sometimes stuffed by an incredibly bad deck shuffle, but by and large it's proving to be a very viable computer player-killing deck. I doubt it's anywhere near "meta", but the meta these days is basically "infinite chain into undefeatable board on turn 2", and I just can't be bothered with that.

Also been replaying the campaign for Dawn of War 2, which was a great RTS-with-RPG-elements for its time. Love it.

 

[EgonSpengler]

Older folks (like me) can remember the Arcades, then the original Atari/commodore then Nintendo/Genesis days when there were no tutorials... you just pressed start and off you went, trial and error, pays yer muney and takes yer chances.

I also feel like the early PC games were less forgiving than they have been in the last 25 years. In my memory, getting slaughtered was just the learning curve. I came to PC gaming from tabletop wargames & ttrpgs, and I suppose the developers of a lot of early PC games did, too. So learning a game by getting folded up like a lawn chair was nbd, as long as I felt like I was making progress on my next attempt. I also feel like game design was better than it is now, but it's hard to know how much that's true and how much is rose-colored nostalgia goggles.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Now I roughly know what I'm doing, I have finished 3 campaigns in Age of Wonders 4. Working on a 4th. And I'm quite pleased about the difference in playstyle depending on your build.

Death from above High culture archer build. This is simply OP and unfair. You can boost your archers to make them into medieval ICBMs.
Sturdy dwarves Barbarian culture defence build. Straight forward do anything to boost your army's defence. Dwarf tanks.
Undead Molekin Dark culture necromancer moles. This was the build I struggled with the most. Once I realised I needed Tome of the Horde and crank out disposable tier 1 units, also known as pre-zombies, it clicked. Weaken enemy, get the perks of fighting against weakened enemies with cheap units who I will happily sacrifice.

Now I'm figuring out the Animal build. Seems pretty straight forward. Summon animals and boost the hell out of them.
To do is an order build. Which seems pretty complicated.

 

[Smellincoffee]

was trying to get into it, but everything feel so generic, the world is vast yet empty. It's populated with npc that really feel like literally npcs: no real interaction or dialogue except just trading "emoji". Ugh, it's like a better version of Fable, and I hate Fable.

Trading emoji? Are you doing the online version? The single-player game is full of encounters, and the npcs you meet can be friendly/guarded/hostile depending on them and your honor, and different dialogue can be found mixing up the greets and antagonizes. I've been playing this game every week almost since release and I still hear new lines of dialogue or run into something new in it on a regular basis.


Continuing with Stardew....I've just hit my first fall, and was able to forge my first sprinklers and have started doing my planting around them. I've also been forging bars while watering, so my little dude is moving on up in the world. I've gotten deeper into the mines but haven't found anything more interesting to fight than the slimes. I suppose when winter arrives I'll do nothing BUT the mines. I still have not been able to get the fishing minigame to trigger....I click on the pole, I click on my dude, and every time he just yanks in the reel without anything following.

 

[EgonSpengler]

Are you doing the online version?

When I started RDR2, I actually did start the online game by mistake. It took me about an hour to realize I was playing the wrong game.

 

[Smellincoffee]

When I started RDR2, I actually did start the online game by mistake. It took me about an hour to realize I was playing the wrong game.

"The main character has no dialogue! What is this, GTA3 with horses?!"

I've tried RDO a few times and had a mildly successful moonshining business, but paying money to do it on a monthly basis is absurd. If I ever upgrade my PC to the point that it could handle RDR2 the way it's meant to be seen, I'll give it another shot.

 

[H4run]

Trading emoji? Are you doing the online version? The single-player game is full of encounters, and the npcs you meet can be friendly/guarded/hostile depending on them and your honor, and different dialogue can be found mixing up the greets and antagonizes. I've been playing this game every week almost since release and I still hear new lines of dialogue or run into something new in it on a regular basis.

The only interaction I got with npc is something like "greet them", "grab them" or "kick them in the nuts" or something like that. Yes, there is some interesting moment like helping someone wounded in the middle of the road, and bring him to a Doctor and in order to save his limb the Doctor did amputation, but after that when I want to speak further or interact further I just can't, it's just ended there. There's one interesting encounter of a man abusing and slapping a female slave in the middle of a road, which I happily shot him to death with all my pleasure, then the girl just run and that's it. I mean, it's like a short random event that perhaps will increase your honor and whatnot, but the generic part of it is they don't package it as a side quest, there's no continuation and artificial awareness like:

"Hey, thank you for saving me from my abusive master, my name is X"
Option "offer to escort her somewhere save" or "let her go by her own" or "capture her and sell it to the slave trader"

This is what filled the emptiness, and create artificial life and color around the game. But instead she just run, and she's not even realize what you were doing and what happened, the game not good enough to sugarcoat the event to keep my immersion on, she's just like npc from The Sims.

When I started RDR2, I actually did start the online game by mistake. It took me about an hour to realize I was playing the wrong game.

That happened to me as well.

 

[Smellincoffee]

The only interaction I got with npc is something like "greet them", "grab them" or "kick them in the nuts" or something like that. Yes, there is some interesting moment like helping someone wounded in the middle of the road, and bring him to a Doctor and in order to save his limb the Doctor did amputation, but after that when I want to speak further or interact further I just can't, it's just ended there. There's one interesting encounter of a man abusing and slapping a female slave in the middle of a road, which I happily shot him to death with all my pleasure, then the girl just run and that's it. I mean, it's like a short random event that perhaps will increase your honor and whatnot, but the generic part of it is they don't package it as a side quest, there's no continuation and artificial awareness like:

"Hey, thank you for saving me from my abusive master, my name is X"
Option "offer to escort her somewhere save" or "let her go by her own" or "capture her and sell it to the slave trader"

This is what filled the emptiness, and create artificial life and color around the game. But instead she just run, and she's not even realize what you were doing and what happened, the game not good enough to sugarcoat the event to keep my immersion on, she's just like npc from The Sims.


That happened to me as well.

That's odd. Some of the random encounters will result in the rescued party offering a house-robbing tip to the player, or giving them a gold ring or something. Of course, there are limitations. Once when I was taking a lady to Emerald Ranch, I kept stopping to pick herbs and such, and she lost patience and ran off. It's also possible to accidentally frighten someone you're trying to rescue -- that happens a lot to me when I'm trying to free escaped prisoners by shooting the chain between their feet. Pro tip: don't use a shotgun for that.

 

[H4run]

That's odd. Some of the random encounters will result in the rescued party offering a house-robbing tip to the player, or giving them a gold ring or something. Of course, there are limitations. Once when I was taking a lady to Emerald Ranch, I kept stopping to pick herbs and such, and she lost patience and ran off. It's also possible to accidentally frighten someone you're trying to rescue -- that happens a lot to me when I'm trying to free escaped prisoners by shooting the chain between their feet. Pro tip: don't use a shotgun for that.

I see, so it's unusual, it's not intended to be like that, now that's interesting I might give it another run if that's the case, because the theme, the world build, the story are suppose to be my kind of rpg, thanks for letting me know this.

 

[Sommerswerd]

I also feel like the early PC games were less forgiving than they have been in the last 25 years. In my memory, getting slaughtered was just the learning curve. I came to PC gaming from tabletop wargames & ttrpgs, and I suppose the developers of a lot of early PC games did, too. So learning a game by getting folded up like a lawn chair was nbd, as long as I felt like I was making progress on my next attempt. I also feel like game design was better than it is now, but it's hard to know how much that's true and how much is rose-colored nostalgia goggles.

Another thing about PC gaming back in the late 80s/90s was that we were all unfamiliar with scumsaving. So even in games where you could theoretically revert to earlier saves, we just weren't even aware of how to use it as a tactic/exploit or even once you started to get a clue as to exploiting savegames, you would always forget to save until it was too late and your game was already beyond the point where you could salvage it. So you just ended up loading to the doomed save and still getting slaughtered over and over.

Another scumsave limiting dynamic I remember, were save codes, which were these ridiculously long text sequences/passwords that you hade to enter, which would load the game with your progress intact. River City Ransom was one game that used this feature. But the codes were so long, and utilized a bunch of characters which were nearly impossible to distinguish in handwritten form, like capital "i" versus lowercase "L" or capital "S" versus number "5" and so on. So when you tried to enter your password, it would never work and you couldn't tell where you wrote it down wrong. So the only choice was to just start over from the beginning and try to win the game in one setting.

One more was the cartridges that allowed saves, because there was a save-battery installed in the cartridge and/or console and/or savedisk, but you could only have a very limited number of saves. Zelda II was like this. You only got IIRC, three save files... so what would inevitably happen, is that you would have to erase a critical save file in favor of a newer one, then realize later that you screwed something up and needed to go back to the savepoint that you'd erased... or start over. The other thing that would happen is other people, like siblings, would play the game and erase your saves in favor of their own, so you would lose your progress.

The Long Dark - The Hunted: Part 1

I'm still at the Pleasant Valley Farmhouse . My entire game has been totally derailed by the Frontier Cooking update. I have been happily ignoring the mission and cooking up a storm for days. I've cooked a bunch of baked potatoes, porridge, teas, then I found a skillet, which unlocked new recipes, so then I made myself some pannocks (flatbreads) and my cooking skill leveled up from all the cooking I was doing, so then I was able to make more things like pancakes. I've got so much food that I have enough to eat and continue cooking... I'd almost forgotten about Smokey waiting for me outside ... but this experience has made me even more convinced that an optional demon-bear would greatly enhance survivor mode. The cooking update has made this challenge almost a different game entirely, because I can actually make a viable living at the same time as hiding from Smokey, rather than being forced to stay on the run by food scarcity. It will be interesting to see how many days I last in this challenge, because formerly, this mission only allowed you to last about two or three days. I've got to be at least a week in by now if not more.

Now I am looking forward to going back to my survivor game to see how the new enhanced cooking affects it. I cant wait to go back to Gray Mother's and Paradise farm to see what goodies are in those big kitchens. Also, I noticed that you can make a rose-hip berry pie, which is awesome because I always end up with so many rose hips, that aren't that useful otherwise... as a medicine/tea they are barely worth the effort to collect/prepare/cook them.

 

[Lexicus]

Zelda II was like this. You only got IIRC, three save files... so what would inevitably happen, is that you would have to erase a critical save file in favor of a newer one, then realize later that you screwed something up and needed to go back to the savepoint that you'd erased... or start over. The other thing that would happen is other people, like siblings, would play the game and erase your saves in favor of their own, so you would lose your progress.

Pff, in Pokemon we had one (1) save slot

 

[H4run]

Another thing about PC gaming back in the late 80s/90s was that we were all unfamiliar with scumsaving. So even in games where you could theoretically revert to earlier saves, we just weren't even aware of how to use it as a tactic/exploit or even once you started to get a clue as to exploiting savegames, you would always forget to save until it was too late and your game was already beyond the point where you could salvage it. So you just ended up loading to the doomed save and still getting slaughtered over and over.

The game was more fun that way, I remember I still refuse to save-scum during my early run of civ 4. Also looking after maximum build or tips spoil the exploration aspects in modern gaming and make it less fun, despite knowing that I still save-scum and still look after tips and how to maximize character build because I don't want to screw it up, the later actually not totally my choice because due to strict character balancing facilitating players that demand harder difficulty and to avoid easy exploit, many current rpg game's character built should be plan carefully, hence precision is needed and your freedom to build a character is somewhat limited.

 

[Synobun]

I still have not been able to get the fishing minigame to trigger....I click on the pole, I click on my dude, and every time he just yanks in the reel without anything following.

It's a waiting game. You hold down your trigger until the bar fills up, then release. That casts the reel out far enough. And then you wait until the reel starts to shake (it'll also make a sound). Click when that sound/shaking is still happening and it'll open the minigame.

It can be fairly frustrating at the very beginning when you're stuck with the worst rod and the lowest skill, but it gets easier quickly.

 

[Sommerswerd]

The game was more fun that way, I remember I still refuse to save-scum during my early run of civ 4. Also looking after maximum build or tips spoil the exploration aspects in modern gaming and make it less fun, despite knowing that I still save-scum and still look after tips and how to maximize character build because I don't want to screw it up, the later actually not totally my choice because due to strict character balancing facilitating players that demand harder difficulty and to avoid easy exploit, many current rpg game's character built should be plan carefully, hence precision is needed and your freedom to build a character is somewhat limited.

Its always about finding the balance that works for you and makes the game the most enjoyable. Do you play on the harder difficulties and suffer loss after loss to get that ultimate payoff of finally figuring out how to beat the game on your own, or do you just drop the difficulty level so that you can progress, or do you hit the internets for the walkthroughs, tricks, tips, etc., to get through the challenge? It all depends on what is the most fun for you. Sometimes I want to avoid the stress, sometimes I want to grind it out for the challenge.

The Long Dark has been doing a pretty good job with updates at making some things harder, while simultaneously making other things easier to compensate. The balance has been pretty good.

 

[H4run]

Its always about finding the balance that works for you and makes the game the most enjoyable. Do you play on the harder difficulties and suffer loss after loss to get that ultimate payoff of finally figuring out how to beat the game on your own, or do you just drop the difficulty level so that you can progress, or do you hit the internets for the walkthroughs, tricks, tips, etc., to get through the challenge? It all depends on what is the most fun for you. Sometimes I want to avoid the stress, sometimes I want to grind it out for the challenge.

The Long Dark has been doing a pretty good job with updates at making some things harder, while simultaneously making other things easier to compensate. The balance has been pretty good.

I always play a game in normal difficulty, except for strategy genre or when I was younger and had good reaction and reflect I max-out the difficulty for fighting games (KOF, Samurai Showdown, etc).

While in rpg/adventure easy difficulty feel like a cheat to me, while hard difficulty seems like playing the game in a way that's not intended to be (make me grind more than necessary, or struggle more than necessary), and if I'm not able to handle the difficulty on normal that means that game is too hard for me and I will not decrease the difficulty instead I will just give it up entirely.

What do you think about today rpg games characters built? For instance titles like "Pillar Eternity", "Divinity Original Sin", etc? Do you think the games flexible enough to let you build your characters and it will works (able to end the game) as long as you build it with a sound logic? Because I read review of many of the new western rpg games precision is often needed whenever you build a character, and the punishment for building it wrongly will come at mid-end game, if you can't fix it that means you are pretty much screw and need to load back or worse start a new game. I suspect this condition happened due to players demand challenging difficulty and with that a more "balanced" consequently "precise" character-build planning.

 

[Sommerswerd]

I always play a game in normal difficulty, except for strategy genre or when I was younger and had good reaction and reflect I max-out the difficulty for fighting games (KOF, Samurai Showdown, etc).

While in rpg/adventure easy difficulty feel like a cheat to me, while hard difficulty seems like playing the game in a way that's not intended to be (make me grind more than necessary, or struggle more than necessary), and if I'm not able to handle the difficulty on normal that means that game is too hard for me and I will not decrease the difficulty instead I will just give it up entirely.

What do you think about today rpg games characters built? For instance titles like "Pillar Eternity", "Divinity Original Sin", etc? Do you think the games flexible enough to let you build your characters and it will works (able to end the game) as long as you build it with a sound logic? Because I read review of many of the new western rpg games precision is often needed whenever you build a character, and the punishment for building it wrongly will come at mid-end game, if you can't fix it that means you are pretty much screw and need to load back or worse start a new game. I suspect this condition happened due to players demand challenging difficulty and with that a more "balanced" consequently "precise" character-build planning.

I don't play many modern RPG games nowadays but I have played them in the past. My feeling is that it is far more enjoyable if the game can be completed regardless of what character, and/or character class you choose, or what stats you roll and/or how you build your character. I understand that certain stats, abilities, weapons, accessories, etc., will be "optimal". That is unavoidable, since behind all these shiny flashing lights on the screen its ultimately just a bunch of math going on so some formulas will "add up" better than others. I also understand that because of this, people will study the game and figure out how to "optimize" ie., squeeze every last benefit, exploit, RNG tactic etc., out of the game.

I'm OK with certain characters, civilizations, leaders, etc., in certain scenarios being unable to "win" because its a feature of the scenario that they are doomed and I'm fine with games that you can't "win" because they have no win condition, you just play until you die (like TLD).
However, I do not like the game being designed where your build choices are invalid, as in you can't possibly finish the game with a particular character build. To me a well designed game would allow you the possibility of progressing to the "end" or maximizing your enjoyment with any of the options provided, or not allow you to pick options that are non viable, particularly on "normal/standard/medium" difficulty. Letting players pick a bunch of build options that they developers should know aren't going to be viable seems pretty cynical to me. It implies that the developers are essentially duping the gamers with a bait-and-switch and/or false choice. They are giving you a bunch of scare quotes "choices" to make you say "Oooohh look at all the lovely choices I have available, such a rich and robustly designed game"... meanwhile they are laughing behind your back saying "Hahaha stupid silly players, there are only 2 viable combinations, but you will only find out after wasting your time getting stuck in the mid game a bunch of times. Thanks for the money, suckers!"

 

[H4run]

However, I do not like the game being designed where your build choices are invalid, as in you can't possibly finish the game with a particular build. To me a well designed game would allow you the possibility of progressing to the "end" or maximizing your enjoyment with any of the options provided, or not allow you to pick options that are non viable, particularly on "normal/standard/medium" difficulty. Letting players pick a bunch of build options that they developers should know aren't going to be viable seems pretty cynical to me. It implies that the developers are essentially duping the gamers with a bait-and-switch and/or false choice. They are giving you a bunch of scare quotes "choices" to make you say "Oooohh look at all the lovely choices I have available, such a rich and robustly designed game"... meanwhile they are laughing behind your back saying "Hahaha stupid silly players, there are only 2 viable combinations, but you will only find out after wasting your time getting stuck in the mid game a bunch of times. Thanks for the money, suckers!"

Very true, that's actually ruined the role-playing experience that is exactly what I think as well. If I have to choose between tolerating unfairly powerful built but with larger and more open built options; and a well balance selection of characters built with narrow spectrum I will choose the former.

 

[Sommerswerd]

Very true, that's actually ruined the role-playing experience that is exactly what I think as well. If I have to choose between tolerating unfairly powerful built but with larger and more open built options; and a well balance selection of characters built with narrow spectrum I will choose the former.

What I like, is when you are in the character/civilization/race choosing/creation stage, the game alerts you to how difficult the game will probably be, if you go with that particular choice. Total War: Three Kingdoms does this. Its not a real RPG of course, rather its a hybrid wargame that combines RTS, RPG and 4X elements, but the point is that in the character selection stage, the game alerts you that picking the particular character will make the game Very East, Very Hard and so on, so you can decide in advance what kind of experience you want.

In character building, I also prefer manual point allocation over rolling random stats. First of all, rolling stats should not allow ridiculous, non-viable values. Nor should it be possible to roll super low stats that are obviously going to be rejected by the player, as its pretty tedious to have to keep rolling and rolling to get good stats. Its also fairly pointless to make it possible to have very high stats along with very low ones, as players are obviously not going to accept low stats when they can just re-roll until they get high ones. I remember a Genesis RPG game, Buck Rogers: Countdown to Doomsday that allowed you unlimited re-rolls of stats with ridiculously low rolls that would result in a party of characters that would get slaughtered in the very first battle due to thei low HP values. That's just dumb. Why even allow that? I prefer it when the game gives you a point allocation pool to draw from and then just lets you balance the stats however you want. Its more balanced than random stat-rolls and takes alot less time than endless re-rolls.

 

[H4run]

What I like, is when you are in the character/civilization/race choosing/creation stage, the game alerts you to how difficult the game will probably be, if you go with that particular choice. Total War: Three Kingdoms does this. Its not a real RPG of course, rather its a hybrid wargame that combines RTS, RPG and 4X elements, but the point is that in the character selection stage, the game alerts you that picking the particular character will make the game Very East, Very Hard and so on, so you can decide in advance what kind of experience you want.

Very nice point. That's a very classy way to level difficulty as oppose to drag the slider to the right and make every enemy got 2x more HP and Bosses got 1.5X more HP and do 30% more damage to players-> this concept is just lazy in my perspective, often it doesn't make the game more challenging it just make the games/combat longer Ghost of Tsushima is a good example for that or most of difficulty mods in Elderscroll games. This kind of difficulty model apply very well in scenario modes for strategy rpgs (Paradox games), this kind of difficulty mode also applied very well even in jrpg games like for instance Saga Frontier, so you are playing the game as intended to be but with different challenges based on the condition of the characters/factions.

But difficult built doesn't mean a wrong built, it's a playable and calculated and tested. This is a kind of difficulty mechanic that I like best, it is dissolved and becoming one with the game.

In character building, I also prefer manual point allocation over rolling random stats. First of all, rolling stats should not allow ridiculous, non-viable values. Nor should it be possible to roll super low stats that are obviously going to be rejected by the player, as its pretty tedious to have to keep rolling and rolling to get good stats. Its also fairly pointless to make it possible to have very high stats along with very low ones, as players are obviously not going to accept low stats when they can just re-roll until they get high ones. I remember a Genesis RPG game, Buck Rogers: Countdown to Doomsday that allowed you unlimited re-rolls of stats with ridiculously low rolls that would result in a party of characters that would get slaughtered in the very first battle due to thei low HP values. That's just dumb. Why even allow that? I prefer it when the game gives you a point allocation pool to draw from and then just lets you balance the stats however you want. Its more balanced than random stat-rolls and takes alot less time than endless re-rolls.

Oh yes, me too, anytime any days, I was a console player, witnessing for the first time how some pc wester rpg player keep rolling dices until it reflected a base stats that suits them seems silly to me, I guess that's due to the DnD old mechanic that's still persist in a much contemporary games without any good reason why it still there.