What Videogames have You Been Playing XX: Virtual Imperialism

[MaryKB]

I've been playing a bit of Harry Potter: Puzzles & Spells on my phone. It's better than I expected it to be and really feels like Harry Potter. They did a great job with the theming.

 

[warpus]

I started up a new game of EUIV after buying all the DLC and all the content on humblebundle for $25. Playing as Poland and only 20 years in, but so far have already seen a bunch of the new game dynamics in action. Pretty happy with my purchase even though a lot of the differences won't pop up on my radar in this game, as a lot of them seem to impact far away places only.. but.. I should be running into assorted changes here and there.

Right off the bat it seemed wayyyy too easy to fully annex the Teutons. They didn't put up a fight at all. 15 years into the game and they are already gone, which doesn't seem right. One war is all it took to neutralize them and leave them with 2-3 provinces, which I annexed right after the truce was over. Muscovy seems to be growing faster than usual too though, they've already annexed Estonia and are stronger than me. I'm not sure if these 2 things are coincidence or a new game balance thing or what. Hopefully Russia doesn't become too strong too fast though.

 

[Zardnaar]

Russia is fairly OP now

 

[Takhisis]

FredLC!

It is my duty to provide you with non-violent, child-friendly games so that you can introduce your new child to the world of videogames.
I'll start by recommending

SuperTuxKart
Frogatto
Civilization III
Imp of the Sun
Tunic

All of highly educational and ludic value.

 

[warpus]

A game with genocide for a child??

 

[Takhisis]

Well, Frogatto is a game in which you don't have to do a genocide run to win, it's just a platformer.

 

[EgonSpengler]

Best nonviolent games I've played and would play again today:

Portal (2007) and Portal 2 (2011) - Truly classics. I haven't played either of them in a while, but I'd think they're eminently playable today. If I had a friend who'd never played PC games before, and if they were looking for something nonviolent, I might gift them these two.
SubNautica (2014) - There's also a sequel, SubNautica: Below Zero. I didn't think it was as good as the first one, but if you love the first one, you'll like the second one.
Cities: Skylines (2015) - There's an avalanche of DLC for this one, so if you like the base game you can expand it almost as much as you want. It's still in active development.
Euro Truck Simulator 2 (2012) and American Truck Simulator (2016) - They're both still being actively worked on, and new free updates and paid DLC get released periodically.
The Long Dark (2014) - I'm still playing this one myself, off and on. It's also still being actively worked on by the devs.
Firewatch (2016) - Probably the least-replayable of the bunch, but I thought it was worth a mention.

I deliberately picked out some older games, because they all stand the test of time, and I think you can get all of them for short money, probably $20 when they're not on sale. If you look for a seasonal sale, you can likely get some of these for, like, $5. I just looked up Portal and Portal 2 on Steam, and you can get both in a bundle for $15, and that's not even on sale, that's the regular price. I think I've seen the first game on sale for $1 before.

 

[warpus]

I gotta ask, what's good about the truck simulator games? Is it basically like a long-distance driving sim, and you're mainly driving on highways? Doesn't that get boring? Should I be thinking of this as a "flight simulator on the road" ? Or what kind of games are these exactly?

 

[red_elk]

Portal and SubNautica are my favorites too. Both have SciFi storyline, but Portal is a 3D puzzle while SubNautica is survival adventure with a lot of crafting. Similar to Long Dark, but much less hardcore, more about relaxed exploration and enjoying beautiful views.

The Turing Test is a puzzle similar to Portal.
Observation is also a good Sci-Fi adventure.

 

[EgonSpengler]

I gotta ask, what's good about the truck simulator games? Is it basically like a long-distance driving sim, and you're mainly driving on highways? Doesn't that get boring? Should I be thinking of this as a "flight simulator on the road" ? Or what kind of games are these exactly?

Yeah, I was surprised by how engaging I found it. It's a driving sim, but not a racing sim. It's a relaxed game, and maneuvering the big truck is the 'challenge', if there is any challenge at all. I actually prefer Euro Truck 2 to American Truck, precisely because the roads in Europe are so often the old-style, narrow, winding roads that are more interesting to drive. The American interstate system built in the '50s is those 6-lane highways that just go straight for miles and miles. Kind of boring. (You don't have to use those. You can choose to use the old pre-'50s highways and surface roads if you want to, but if you're supposed to deliver a trailer from Los Angeles to Seattle by a certain time, taking the scenic route doubles your driving time. That's why they built those long, straight interstates in the first place.)

You can also choose how complex you want the driving sim to be. The basic "arcade" controls are just the steering wheel, the gas pedal and the brake pedal. The next degree of control makes you use the 12-to-18 speed gear shift manually. You can go all the way up to close-to-realistic, where you have manual control of the engine brake, the engine ******er, the differential lock, and the trailer brake, if it has one. You can also increase the difficulty by taking jobs that pull two trailers at once, or an articulated trailer, or a super-heavy or extra-wide cargo. Moving a 60-ton industrial heat exchanger on the winding roads between France and Switzerland was one of the most stressful gaming experiences of recent memory. If you're a madman or you just have several hundred dollars to burn, the game supports a driving wheel, foot pedals, a manual gear shift, and multiple displays (I'm not sure if these games have been optimized for ultra-wide displays or VR yet, but they'd be well-suited to either).

But a lot of the game is just leisurely driving around, listening to the radio, and looking at the scenery. They've mapped Europe from Ireland to Russia, and are making their way across the United States, from West to East. (They also continually go back and update old maps. They redid France a couple of years ago, and recently redid California.) The game's map isn't real-life perfect. The timeframe is compressed - Fresno to Las Vegas is about a 6-hour drive, irl, but it's 20 minutes in the game - so the map has to be compressed accordingly. And the map only has roads that trucks would drive, so you'll drive past a lot of things you can't access.

 

[PhroX]

Transport and Rollercoaster Tycoon are great if you're looking for non-violent games. They're old, and thus graphically very dated, but still play very well. OpenTTD is even free on Steam, so there's little reason not to try.

Although the default settings have enemies to fight, Factorio can be played non-violently by turning them off and thus making the game purely about building your factory. And it's a phenomenal game in either mode.

 

[warpus]

@EgonSpengler That explains this game so much better for me.. It was always a bit of a "Won't this be boring?" mystery.. And now I'm thinking.. That might actually be fun

Transport and Rollercoaster Tycoon are great if you're looking for non-violent games. They're old, and thus graphically very dated, but still play very well. OpenTTD is even free on Steam, so there's little reason not to try.

Transport Fever 2 is the modern take on Transportation Tycoon Deluxe. Basically the same premise and game dynamics, the main difference being that in TF2 you can build roads and railroads in any direction (and not only in set tiles), and you can't play against AI opponents. And oh yeah, lots of mods

 

[Birdjaguar]

Best nonviolent games I've played and would play again today:

Portal (2007) and Portal 2 (2011) - Truly classics. I haven't played either of them in a while, but I'd think they're eminently playable today. If I had a friend who'd never played PC games before, and if they were looking for something nonviolent, I might gift them these two.
SubNautica (2014) - There's also a sequel, SubNautica: Below Zero. I didn't think it was as good as the first one, but if you love the first one, you'll like the second one.
Cities: Skylines (2015) - There's an avalanche of DLC for this one, so if you like the base game you can expand it almost as much as you want. It's still in active development.
Euro Truck Simulator 2 (2012) and American Truck Simulator (2016) - They're both still being actively worked on, and new free updates and paid DLC get released periodically.
The Long Dark (2014) - I'm still playing this one myself, off and on. It's also still being actively worked on by the devs.
Firewatch (2016) - Probably the least-replayable of the bunch, but I thought it was worth a mention.

I deliberately picked out some older games, because they all stand the test of time, and I think you can get all of them for short money, probably $20 when they're not on sale. If you look for a seasonal sale, you can likely get some of these for, like, $5. I just looked up Portal and Portal 2 on Steam, and you can get both in a bundle for $15, and that's not even on sale, that's the regular price. I think I've seen the first game on sale for $1 before.

Why isn't Lemmings on your list?

 

[Synobun]

The flight simulator comparison is a good one, both in cost and utility. You can do it arcade style like Egon suggested, or go all out with pedals and accessories and additional difficulties. MS Flight Simulator (the older ones, anyway; I know nothing of that new one they made) has literally thousands of add-ons, ranging from new planes, new cockpits, new airports, new scenery, etc., both freeware and payware.

One difference with the flight simulator is that it is true to size, though with a speed setting. Hardcore enthusiasts won't speed up flights at all and do the whole thing in real time.

Fun is what you make of it. Lots of flight sim players, for example, are part of virtual airlines. They download liveries of the fake airline and they do scheduled flights like you would IRL. I have no doubt that truck sims have similar circles.

 

[Zardnaar]

Anything like the old Ports of Call games where you run a shipping company?

 

[Takhisis]

Anything like the old Ports of Call games where you run a shipping company?

If you're asking for recommendations, there's always the various Tycoon games, especially Open Transport Tycoon Deluxe.

 

[Zardnaar]

If you're asking for recommendations, there's always the various Tycoon games, especially Open Transport Tycoon Deluxe.

Recommendations or suggestions idk what's out there

 

[EvaDK]

My main issue with the reboots was the intense gore in the death sequences.

(Lara Croft voice actress looks at the lines she has to record
LC: Arrgh!
LC: Aarrghh!!
LC: Aarrgghhhhh!!!
...

It's my favorite TR...also was my first so did not have a benchmark on controls going in. However, for me, while the controls made the game difficult it also made it rewarding. Great tombs, challenging puzzles/bosses, and I think the best story relative to the fact that TR is pretty light on story. Def think it the most underrated TR.

I really want to play it. An entire TR game with tombs and puzzles I have never played. Perhaps I should give it another chance - any tips with regards to the controls?

 

[lymond]

I really want to play it. An entire TR game with tombs and puzzles I have never played. Perhaps I should give it another chance - any tips with regards to the controls?

Oh gosh. It's been such a long time, I'm not sure I can be of much help in that regard. I'd just say be patient with game. If I recall, they implemented a system in this game whereby Laura gains experience that improves her strength and agility a bit as the game progress. Not direct XP like she gets now but more like power ups from performing certain actions...so semi-rp. (It's that very system I think that plays into the control problems and probably turned folks off from the game and made it the more unpopular TR - but I like it myself) One thing I don't like about the newer TR games is the emphasis on RP elements. Not that I don't like RP stuff, but with TR I just want to get on with it and focus on the raiding. The RP is only half-baked anyway in my opinion. I'd rather they put that energy into more story and levels.

 

[FredLC]

FredLC!

It is my duty to provide you with non-violent, child-friendly games so that you can introduce your new child to the world of videogames.
I'll start by recommending

SuperTuxKart
Frogatto
Civilization III
Imp of the Sun
Tunic

All of highly educational and ludic value.

Hi there, buddy. Dully noted!

It shall take a while, though; Helena is too young, just 1 year 4 months... I was at least five when I got my first Atari...