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

[Arakhor]

The next thread probably ought to be entitled: "Egon's continuing adventures in Stalker".

 

[Kyriakos]

I was playing a little Pharaoh: Cleopatra. But the game is simply too easy, even if you (like me) due to OCD insist on having only one continuous living area.

 

[EvaDK]

Was reading an article about Diablo IV this morning, about how the caster-classes are way more popular and effective than the melee classes, and also have multiple 'viable' builds. The article noted that people have already 'cracked the code' of the best builds for the melee classes, which are slower to level and less single-player-friendly than the caster classes anyway. This seems to be one of those recurringt problems in game design, like the 4X games with boring late-games, survival games with food-water-xyz management mechanics that are just tedious, or FPS games where everyone just ends up playing a sniper.

The melee classes (Barb and Druid) probably have the strongest endgame builds at the moment, but the Sorcerer and Rogue have the best levelling experience. My Sorc is at lvl 71 now; levelling from 60-70 was the hardest and felt quite slow, likely also caused by the devs nerfing one of the endgame levelling features; Nightmare Dungeons some days after the release. I'm getting a feel for the new Paragon system, which is excellent and allows you to make your build truly unique. The best new game mechanics feature though, is imo the ability to craft your own legendary items from rare items (not rerolling with random stats, like Diablo 3, but with improving the stats already on the item you want to use - this is crucial). Rare items therefore can often be more valuable to your build compared to legs, if they have the better stats.

As for negatives, I don't think they have managed to reshape the RPG endgame experience enough (it is still a lot of repetition, doing the same things over and over). I also think that the interface is still rough, meaning that some features are clearly lacking, like search functionality of your stash, or search functionality of the huge map with hundreds of individual locations/events. There's also some weird stuff going on with monsters crowd control; I sometimes get one shot by an elite and I can't see the ground effect that pins me to a spot, before it's all too late. This especially sucks for hardcore players, I imagine.

So far, I'll give it a solid 7.5/10 from my limited experience playing. They have a sound base game with amazing gameplay, artwork and aesthetics, but there are a lot of minor issues they need to iron out in coming patches and seasons. And then there's the question of how/if the devs plan to evolve the endgame, which is a big question mark at the moment.

 

[Ajidica]

"Boring late game" in a 4X is I think an endemic problem to the genre, especially sandbox 4x games. If they make the late game swingy, it means good performance in the early and mid game is not rewarded. Late game events to disrupt the situation also run the risk of making the game luck based. I was playing a game of GalCiv3 and was neck and neck with an AI. I was focused on an ascension victory so I didn't have the military/productive capacity to invade them. Right in the middle of that tension a late game event fired off and an uber-powerful precursor ship spawned in their territory and began wrecking everything. Asteroid bases, starbases, fleets; all went poof.

 

[EgonSpengler]

The next thread probably ought to be entitled: "Egon's continuing adventures in Stalker".

Wow, I haven't played that in ages. That game was scary. Like if Fallout was an Alien movie. I remember crouching in a pitch-black corner of a building for what felt like 10 minutes, watching a mysterious glowing orb slowly pace back and forth. I had no idea what it was or what it did, but I nevertheless had the sense that (a) it was looking for me, and (b) my rifle would do [naught]-all to it if it spotted me.

"Boring late game" in a 4X is I think an endemic problem to the genre, especially sandbox 4x games.

Yes. [Crap] game design is rampant. A near-total lack of gonads and/or imagination, when it comes to the late game.

If they make the late game swingy, it means good performance in the early and mid game is not rewarded.

[Crap] game design.

Late game events to disrupt the situation also run the risk of making the game luck based.

More [crap] game design.

I was playing a game of GalCiv3 and was neck and neck with an AI. I was focused on an ascension victory so I didn't have the military/productive capacity to invade them. Right in the middle of that tension a late game event fired off and an uber-powerful precursor ship spawned in their territory and began wrecking everything. Asteroid bases, starbases, fleets; all went poof.

Golly, that's really especially [crap] game design: Deus Ex [Screw] You.

 

[Ajidica]

Golly, that's really especially [crap] game design: Deus Ex [Screw] You.

*shrug*
It felt like they were trying to find ways to shake up the game. Normally the precursor ship wrecks face equally across the map, but I had some lucky space phenomena protecting my border from my biggest enemy, and they just controlled so much territory.
I didn't feel it felt like bad design, merely an example of how hard it is to shake up the late game.

 

[Sommerswerd]

The next thread probably ought to be entitled: "Egon's continuing adventures in Stalker".

Sign me up!!!

 

[Arakhor]

Or The Long Dark or what have you. Either way.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

You might as well call the next thread:

Which of these 2 videogames have you been playing?​

 

[EgonSpengler]

*shrug*
It felt like they were trying to find ways to shake up the game. Normally the precursor ship wrecks face equally across the map, but I had some lucky space phenomena protecting my border from my biggest enemy, and they just controlled so much territory.
I didn't feel it felt like bad design, merely an example of how hard it is to shake up the late game.

Yeah, I've never played GalCiv3. If the particular instance of the thing you describe is a mechanic that normally works, then I withdraw my comment. But I've heard/read before that game designers don't want to throw a bomb into a game just for the sake of shaking things up. My issue with that is that throwing a bomb into the game as a way of changing the dynamic and making the player actually play is sloppy and/or unimaginative design. When I was a DM for tabletop Dungeons & Dragons games back in the day, I never used the "wandering monster" tables that the game provided for you, because they were stupid. I would, on occasion, throw an abrupt encounter at my players, sometimes intended to just shake things up, but it was always calculated and never random. Occasionally, chaos can produce something that appears to be deliberate, even when it wasn't*, but simply introducing a chaos agent isn't intelligent game design.


* There was a game I used to play called City of Heroes. In the game, there were a bunch of different villain groups with different assortments of powers, which they would spam at you in sequence, without any tactics, with no rhyme or reason. They were just pre-programmed mobs, after all, we didn't expect them to be cunning. But there was one villain group whose set of powers clicked together in such a manner that it felt like they were genuinely coordinating their attacks against you in kind of a diabolical way. It was always thrilling, and they became my favorite villain group because of it. But they were still just a pre-programmed set of powers being spammed at me as fast as they could. It wasn't actually clever game design, it was just the one instance out of 15 that a set of behaviors happened to click. Seemingly emergent behavior coalescing out of the chaos, but no, it really was just a million monkeys on a million typewriters.

 

[FredLC]

I actually got the platinum on horizon zero dawn. For a full 100%, though, I'd need the two last DLC trophies; to finish a NG+, and to do it on Ultra difficulty.

I simply am not willing to do it, though.

So I decided to check if the bug that was preventing me to play Kingdom Come Deliverance had cleared out after lots of Nvidia updates, and... it has. I mean, I have a copy on xbox one x, but the load times on that plataform are atrocious, and much more bearable on PC.

So that one is my new gaming project. Lets see how far I'll get. People say that one is an acquired taste...

Regards .

 

[Arakhor]

KCD runs much better on the Series X than on the XB1, for what it's worth. Great game, though.

 

[Sarin]

People say that one is an acquired taste...

That's true. It's an old school kind of RPG. It doesn't handhold you nearly as much as modern ones, sometimes you have to think and do things that aren't marked to get the best result...but it has its flaws. The "learn by doing" system kinda means you end up as "master of all", with virtually no specialization, if you desire to be so, and it's honestly quite unbalanced in a way that it's much more difficult and frustrating to train up the basic first few levels to get the skill usable than it is to train it all the way to max level from there. Combat system is IMO very good, but many people don't like it. Once you get the basics down, it's not that hard to defeat most enemies 1v1, but against a group, you're in for a hard time if you try to take them head-on, even if you have the best gear and max levels in combat abilities.

The game puts great emphasis on historical authenticity and immersion. It's worth reading a bit about the setting. Especially about Jan Hus. A little hint...when his name comes up in conversation in main quest, make a permanent save ASAP. You're in the early stage of what's undoubtedly one of most hilarious quests in gaming history, and you will want to repeat one passage of it just for the variety of funny ways it can turn out based on your choices. Oh, and learn to read ASAP. It comes in very handy.

 

[Zardnaar]

So my Fallout 4 survival mode run stupidly easy as long as I bring my power armor.

First time I've done the Sanctuary Hills extreme water farm. Marco wad level 21 before he started a single mission.

Rushingvthe early railroad misdiond to get ballistic weave. Gonna join the brother hood of steal and try and complete the game. Also do the automation dlc and have guard bots each settlement.

Need those vertibirds.

 

[EgonSpengler]

I actually got the platinum on horizon zero dawn. For a full 100%, though, I'd need the two last DLC trophies; to finish a NG+, and to do it on Ultra difficulty.

I simply am not willing to do it, though.

So I decided to check if the bug that was preventing me to play Kingdom Come Deliverance had cleared out after lots of Nvidia updates, and... it has. I mean, I have a copy on xbox one x, but the load times on that plataform are atrocious, and much more bearable on PC.

So that one is my new gaming project. Lets see how far I'll get. People say that one is an acquired taste...

Regards .

That's true. It's an old school kind of RPG. It doesn't handhold you nearly as much as modern ones, sometimes you have to think and do things that aren't marked to get the best result...but it has its flaws. The "learn by doing" system kinda means you end up as "master of all", with virtually no specialization, if you desire to be so, and it's honestly quite unbalanced in a way that it's much more difficult and frustrating to train up the basic first few levels to get the skill usable than it is to train it all the way to max level from there. Combat system is IMO very good, but many people don't like it. Once you get the basics down, it's not that hard to defeat most enemies 1v1, but against a group, you're in for a hard time if you try to take them head-on, even if you have the best gear and max levels in combat abilities.

The game puts great emphasis on historical authenticity and immersion. It's worth reading a bit about the setting. Especially about Jan Hus. A little hint...when his name comes up in conversation in main quest, make a permanent save ASAP. You're in the early stage of what's undoubtedly one of most hilarious quests in gaming history, and you will want to repeat one passage of it just for the variety of funny ways it can turn out based on your choices. Oh, and learn to read ASAP. It comes in very handy.

I remember looking at that game when it was on sale a couple of weeks ago, but I didn't pull the trigger. The Steam Summer Sale is coming up soon-ish. Maybe I'll look for that again.

 

[Ajidica]

So I decided to check if the bug that was preventing me to play Kingdom Come Deliverance had cleared out after lots of Nvidia updates, and... it has. I mean, I have a copy on xbox one x, but the load times on that plataform are atrocious, and much more bearable on PC.

So that one is my new gaming project. Lets see how far I'll get. People say that one is an acquired taste...

A few tips:
1. The tutorial IS MUCH LONGER THAN YOU THINK. You will know you have reached the end of the tutorial when you meet a combat trainer.
2. Practice with the combat trainer a lot, in addition to raising your skills it makes you better at playing the game.
3. Practice your archery a lot before going on the hunting quest. Trying to complete it running down fuzzy and cuddly forest creatures instead of just shooting them is incredibly tedious.
4. Install a mod that lets you create saves whenever you want without expensive single-use items. There are a couple quests that come at you early in the game where you will die.

I just couldn't get into the game. The fact you never knew what the game might throw at you, such as a surprise multi-person fight, made it so I wasn't so much playing and enjoying the game but figuring out what quests I could do to level myself up and get better gear. The devs tried really hard, but unfortunately the game was just a bit too hard and impenetrable for me.

 

[Sarin]

A few tips:
1. The tutorial IS MUCH LONGER THAN YOU THINK. You will know you have reached the end of the tutorial when you meet a combat trainer.
2. Practice with the combat trainer a lot, in addition to raising your skills it makes you better at playing the game.
3. Practice your archery a lot before going on the hunting quest. Trying to complete it running down fuzzy and cuddly forest creatures instead of just shooting them is incredibly tedious.
4. Install a mod that lets you create saves whenever you want without expensive single-use items. There are a couple quests that come at you early in the game where you will die.

I just couldn't get into the game. The fact you never knew what the game might throw at you, such as a surprise multi-person fight, made it so I wasn't so much playing and enjoying the game but figuring out what quests I could do to level myself up and get better gear. The devs tried really hard, but unfortunately the game was just a bit too hard and impenetrable for me.

I disagree on 4. Saviour Schnapps is easy to make once you get basics in alchemy, isn't THAT rare, and IMO enhances the game because it makes you think twice about the saving for the purpose of saveloading, as it makes you tipsy, which can be in some situations detrimental. IMO it's a good design, although as you become more proficient in drinking and alchemy, the drawbacks will not hinder you in any way.
On 3., if you want to practice, grab the best bow you can handle and go play Chumps in Ledechko. You can wade a bit into the river, giving you advantage, and it nets a lot of archery XP if you win.

 

[Sommerswerd]

Or The Long Dark or what have you. Either way.

Well "Stalker" is the name of the "hard (standard?)"* difficulty level in The Long Dark, hence my confusion

*I guess it depends on whether you consider Pilgrim level to be "very easy" or Interloper to be "very hard"

The Long Dark - "The Hunted: Part One" challenge/mission

I actually just gave up, because i realized that stumbling around in the basement in the dark (because my condition was so low that I went to sleep before looting, I only picked up 3 out of the 5 flare shells. That's basically a deal breaker, so I started over. So then Smokey killed me again and again and again. In my next run, I made it to the big barn again, but couldn't outrun him as I was trying to cross the Pleasant Valley Farm to get from the big barn to the farmhouse. I remembered at the last minute to use my flare gun, but I pulled it out to shoot him without loading it, so it just went *click click click* and I got eaten. In my next run I foolishly tried to scrounge around for another piece of clothing outside before retreating into the basement and so Smokey came back and finished me off before I even made it to the basement.

In my next run, Smokey's introductory friendly mauling, where he just politely beats you within an inch of your life instead of eating you and then casually strolls off to give you a sporting chance to run away... resulted in Smokey destroying all... yes ALL of my clothing ... I'd never seen that happen before, I almost ended up dying pretty quickly after that from pure condition loss due to exposure, but after getting into the basement, I made it to the plane crash where I was able to get a full set of clothes. I also was able to build a big fire so that when I woke up and Smokey respawned inside the crash site, I was able to chase him off by hitting him with a torch, which I didn't know was possible. After he ran away, I used the chance to run for Draft Dodger's Cabin, spend the night, and then back to the big barn, which is where I am now. Back where I started... but this time with all 5 flare shells and a loaded flare gun

 

[Ajidica]

I disagree on 4. Saviour Schnapps is easy to make once you get basics in alchemy, isn't THAT rare, and IMO enhances the game because it makes you think twice about the saving for the purpose of saveloading, as it makes you tipsy, which can be in some situations detrimental. IMO it's a good design, although as you become more proficient in drinking and alchemy, the drawbacks will not hinder you in any way.

*shrug*
I only have so much time to play a video game, and I don't want to spent 20 minutes walking back to a location each time I die because of a badly placed save point.
Plus I enjoy being able to save when I want. I don't have to worry about "oh no, I need to make dinner but I'm not sure when the next save point is".

 

[Lexicus]

*shrug*
I only have so much time to play a video game, and I don't want to spent 20 minutes walking back to a location each time I die because of a badly placed save point.
Plus I enjoy being able to save when I want. I don't have to worry about "oh no, I need to make dinner but I'm not sure when the next save point is".

I feel the same way, limiting my save might have made it more immersive when I was a college student with nothing else to do over summer break but now I can't just play video games for 9 hours straight anymore.