What video game are you playing?

[dublinirish]

Im still playing KCD2 but want to get to Baldurs Gate 3 and Expedition 33 before end of year..im always 9-12 months behind on releases

 

[dublinirish]

following..

 

[ulukinatme]

Im still playing KCD2 but want to get to Baldurs Gate 3 and Expedition 33 before end of year..im always 9-12 months behind on releases

Same...although I've waited for some even longer. I like to wait for a decent sale before I pull the trigger, unless it's something I really, really don't want to wait for which is maybe one game a year.

So I did finish Baldur's Gate III in the last week. There's spoilers below, I've tried to comment them out, but skip if you haven't played this one yet. Did a Sorc playthrough first, pretty normal, got all the party members and got the good ending. Then I went back and did an Honor Mode run, played as Dark Urge as an Oathbreaker Pally and got that wicked bad horrible ending for that one. Overall pretty pleased with the game. D&D games are often hit or miss, but this one was pretty good...and the first that I can remember where you actively have dice and roll on certain events.

Overall I thought the combat was pretty decent and at times challenging. There were definitely some party members/classes I think that could have used a boost. I thought Warlock in particular was pretty awful, I even looked around online at builds to try and make it more effective. I found even the best builds pretty lacking. I thought Sorc was superior to Wizard, even though Wizard is more versatile with spell choices. Sorc having the ability to dual cast, cast while silenced, cast as Bonus Action...those abilities trumped Wizards being able to carry a larger repertoire of spells. Despite this I did think the Evocation spells lacked a bit of "Oomph" compared to straight attackers like Fighters, although certain other spells like Hold Monster could be OP in the right situations. It seemed like the Sorc's best role was buffing Haste on party members and AOE damage, maybe the occasionally debuff. While I did have fun Shapeshifting into Owlbear form, I felt like Druids were a bit lacking as casters and a bit lacking as damage dealers making them jack of all trades, master of none. Still haven't done a Bard or Monk yet, but if I do a playthrough I plan to utilize both. For me it seemed like the heavy hitters were straight Fighter by far, Berserker, Paladin, and the Assassin/Gloomstalker. These three were almost required for some boss fights on tougher difficulties imo, at least one or more of the four were needed in those difficult moments. The one surprising thing for me was seeing the characters max out at Level 12. They couldn't push it to 20? I read somewhere that the devs couldn't balance the game if higher level spells and abilities were in there or something? Seemed like a lame excuse. Maybe they originally planned on DLC (Seriously, why no DLC?!) and would have introduced 8 more levels? I would love to go on some non-Illithid adventures with these characters. I think the casters in particular really missed out on their potential by not getting above Tier 6 spells.

Some character impressions with spoilers here:

As far as characters I had a lot of mixed feelings at first. Here were the ones I loved and thought were well done:
Shadowheart was one of my favorites early, although her fanatical religious zeal was off-putting at first. I liked how her story unfolded, the twist at the end, meeting the Nightsong, betraying Shar (Or embracing her, which is what I did during my Dark Urge run), and she was always useful in combat as a Cleric (Unless she casts Sacred Flame, of course).
Karlach was hard not to love, although it's hard to believe such a positive individual spent such a long time fighting in the Hells. She really grew on me.
I fucking loved the return of Minsc, he's absolutely still hilarious and I never wanted to remove him from my party once I picked him up.
Jaheira was still fun too, she's a good foil for Minsc. Having played BG2 it may have been nostalgia, but it was nice having her back.
Lae'zel really grew on me. Absolutely hated her at first...when it comes to races the githyanki are so damn ugly! Looks aside, she was even worse than Shadowheart when it came to the religious zeal, she was more fanatical and had no people skills at all. It led to some hilarious conversations though. It's interesting to see her growth as a character as/if she moves away from Vlaakith towards Orpheus, how she grows as a person, and seeing her softer side if you romance her. Quite the complex character. I really loved seeing some interviews with her voice actress too, talking about how she adapted to the Gith speech and how it's like 2nd nature to her now. The actress really seemed to fall in love with her character as well.

Those are the characters I enjoyed the most. The rest I found lacking in some areas or I just didn't care for them. I should point out that ALL the voice actors in this game did a fantastic job, one of the best in any game that I think I've ever seen. I've loved watching some behind the scenes videos of the actors, watching them play D&D together, there's a real chemistry there.

I really, really wanted to love Minthara...I took special precautions in her recruitment to make sure I didn't screw anything up, and she was great in combat, but...I dunno, maybe that super deep husky voice (That actress did a wondeful job) just rubbed me the wrong way I think. I like drow characters and I think they brought out the evil aspect of her well, even if you're playing a good natured playthrough. Oh, the neck tattoo, hated seeing that constantly too...don't care for tats in general, but seeing that neck tattoo every damn time we have a dialogue? Bleh.
I found Halsin to be a bit of a wet blanket. He's pretty bland, not much to say...although I did come to understand why there's so many jokes about bears in the sub Reddits. Not a bad character, just kind of forgettable.
I've already talked about Wyll and my dislike of the Warlock class. As a character I wasn't really that into his persona. It was really weird to see this guy that supposed to be legendary (As a level 1 Warlock) hero, and he winds up as a devil with horns...lecturing people on goodness and morals, yadda yadda. Obviously we find out later why he joined in a pact with Mizora, but I just found him to be a bit of a bore.
Gale really kind of pissed me off in the beginning, having to feed him my magical gear to appease his hunger. Not a great way to introduce yourself to the party! Fortunately that requirement ended pretty quickly...and then you find out he's a damn ticking time bomb that could explode and end everything? What the hell, man?! Maybe tell a bro before you join up? I wouldn't say I hated Gale really, we got off on the wrong foot. The big problem with Gale was my Tav was a Sorc and that made his roll kind of obsolete so I rarely ran with him. He did have some funny interactions, and I nearly pulled the trigger on making him a god but ultimately decided to destroy the crown. Unfortunately for my second playthrough (Dark Urge) I bit Gale's hand off right at the very beginning, so...he never got to replace the missing caster role in my party, I ended up converting Minthara to a Sorc since my Dark Urge was an Oathbreaker Pally.
While he was effective in combat as an Assassin/Gloomstalker, the character's persona I cared for the least was Astarion. I just don't know if he was well written. For a vampire he seemed just too weak and incredibly...submissive? It's a wonder he lured so many cattle back to his master. I get he was a vampire spawn, but even as a spawn he seemed to lack strength of conviction. I get that Cazador had his thumb on him, tortured him regularly, all that jazz. I just didn't buy the whole...vampire slave thing. Whiny...so...so...whiny...it was annoying. Obviously at the end of his arc he can become very powerful, and either way it's great to see him get revenge on Cazador who's a real dick...I just didn't really like his character and didn't bring him along often despite his versatility in combat as well as being a cheat code for lockpicking and traps.


As for the rest of the game, I thought the music was pretty great. Of course, nothing is going to top a boss fight against a devil that sings his own boss battle theme. I thought the story was pretty good. I wasn't crazy about having a damn worm in my head for the entire game, but obviously that's how it had to play out since the entire thing was Illithid-centric. I could have done without the Illithid powers as well, they generally seemed like a waste of time more often than not, unless it was used as a Bonus action. I don't care for Illithids in general, great for killing, really wasn't crazy about allying with one.The whole backstory for the Emperor seemed a little far fetched to be honest. I have yet to side with him in either playthrough, I always go with Orpheus or usurp Orpheus myself. I thought all the antagonists were well done, Gortash, Orin, Auntie, Raphael, Sarevok...Ketheric kind of fell short for me though. All I could see was J.K. Simmons face when he spoke. He did a great job, just an easy to distinguish voice. Story was good though, the devs did a fantastic job giving you options in how you completed quests as well as offering evil options. There's great replay value when you have options like that.

Here's one thing that got me...almost all the characters in this game had some crazy horrible tragedies tied to them (aside from the whole tadpole thing) and there are almost no normal humans in this story despite it being centered in Baldur's Gate. Among the major NPCs, it's almost exclusively elves and a few other races (Nothing against elves, my Tav was half elf, just seemed overblown). That seemed a bit crazy to me, like every person in the party has the worst possible luck backstory-wise. The only somewhat normal human in the entire party is Gale, and he has a damn bomb in his chest. As far as other tragic backstories, Astarion is a vampire but he's a spawn forced to be a slave for hundreds of years, Wyll is bound to a demon, Shadowheart regularly has her mind erased and that's just part of her backstory, Karlach is dying unless she goes back to the Hells, and Lae'zel...either has to reject her goddess and be hunted, or submit to her and become undead. Characters absolutely need to have low points to grow throughout a story, but it felt like Larian went a bit overboard with all these. Race-wise everyone else is either elven including Halsin, Jaheira, and Minthara, or they're part demon, or in Lae'zel's case Gith. Even Ketheric was elven. Gale is the only normal human among the main NPCs, and Minsc if you can count him. Doesn't really matter, just an interesting observation. I was looking up demographics of Baldur's Gate and it's like 57% human, 11% Dwarves, 8% Elves, 7% Halflings, and then 4% or less on Gnomes, Orcs, or others. Despite this we have almost no Humans, no major Dwarf NPCs, no Halflings, but a shit ton of Elves and Tieflings. Like, everywhere you turn it's Elves and Tieflings Would have liked to see a Dwarf maybe among the Origin companions. Don't see Gnomes much either. Some more variety would have been nice maybe.

Would love to ramble on more about this game (And I've rambled a lot), I did really enjoy it despite some minor pet peeves, but I have to wrap this up for dinner. Overall great game, worth the cash (Especially at a discount), and great replay capability when you consider Dark Urge runs, different romances, different quest options and character paths, etc. The voice acting was among some of the best I've seen in a game imo, and loved to see the chemistry the actors have behind the scenes. This is one of the better D&D games created imo, better than the original Baldur's Gate II I think, but I'm not sure I would rank it ahead of the original Neverwinter Nights. Obviously that's an older game that can't compare graphically and it was limited in other ways, but I'd put BG3 at a close 2nd.

 

[ACamp1900]

For fucks sake Ulk,… 😂

 

[ulukinatme]

For fucks sake Ulk,… 😂

Here's some of those videos of the cast playing D&D together, good stuff, great chemistry.

The whole Bing Bong story is good, this is just a clip:

 

[ACamp1900]

Ok so I was never the biggest nba fan compared to the other sports. I liked the clippers growing up and jumped on the Miller era pacers but that’s it really. I haven’t played an nba game since like nba live 99 lol. But I’ve been told 2ks career mode is as good as mlb the shows and with the pacers run I figured I’d give my career a try.

Anyone play it? Any noob suggestions??

 

[NDdomer2]

2k is great

 

[lcaps20]

2k is great

Looks like it's going to be a free game for PS Plus next month as well

 

[greyhammer90]

2K used to be the best sports game and particularly career mode in the industry. IMO the pay-to-win things killed it though. Everything became about earning 2K coins and the game is constantly reminding you that you can buy them. Felt like a mobile game by the time I stopped playing them around 4-5 years ago. Early PS3/360 days of 2K were insanely fun though. Both the Jordan edition and the LeBron covered one a year later are two of the best sports games ever.

 

[laughingirish92]

less than a week and the switch 2 preorders are out and can't wait to get mine thursday

 

[NDFAN420]

Just got a look at Euro Truck Simulator 2: Delivery to Russia
It's ****ing fantastic.

 

[calvegas04]

Just got a look at Euro Truck Simulator 2: Delivery to Russia
It's ****ing fantastic.

 

[ACamp1900]

Fuck GTA,… if I get a AAA Castlevania next year too (which is rumored),…

 

[ulukinatme]

Fuck GTA,… if I get a AAA Castlevania next year too (which is rumored),…

The first Bloodstained was excellent, for anyone that enjoyed Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. Great Metrovania style game, Igarashi is the man.

 

[IrishSpartan]

NIOH3!!!!! My favorite series and they said it was over but an alpha demo is out and new game is coming early next year! It’s so good and now open world.

 

[laughingirish92]

playing the switch 2 right and it is crazy good like being able to play games on a switch in HDR mode and plus new mario cart game is insane as you can spend hrs just doing whatever on a very large map in free roam just driving around doing challenges and riding the water and big waves and the e shop is so much better than the one on the first switch

 

[MrNimbus]

I'm trying to play nhl25 online with other people. Every online game I play is with people that just want stats. And the quit rate is insane.

 

[IrishBryan77]

I just got into The Hunter: Call of the wild. That's a pretty cool game.

 

[ACamp1900]

Okay, so NBA 2k Career mode,... the additions and quests are excellent and provide depth, but the gameplay itself is problematic enough that I still enjoy MLB The Show's career mode more. The problem is in the difficulty,... so on Roookie you win every game by 60 points and your guy scores as much as you want... on Semi Pro you win every game by 30 plus and still drop like 60 a game... on Pro you win every game by double digits and your guy will average like 40 plus a game.... so yeah, you need to play on All Star to make it interesting, however the shot difficulty is so high on All Star that you can win over half your game but only as a PG dropping assists,... on that level you cannot hit any shots, like at all. wide open jumpers, lay ups, threes off screens, I tried everything,... my guy is a 93 rated 3 point shooter with gold badges and all, so he's pretty much Steph with the badges active... and in 5 games on all star I'm shooting 1-30 from 3... the one that went in was shocking. This game desperately needs sliders for career mode, and it's just about game-breaking trying to find a difficulty that is challenging team-wise but fun player-wise. Also, as noted above, the mode is totally geared towards in-game purchases now if you ever want to max out anything... It's fun for maybe one season and then gets stale real quick. At least from a just wanting to play NBA games offline perspective.



So, I moved on to my yearly Castlevania, Bloodstained kick. I do this just about every summer break these days. My wife and youngest are playing with me now, though. We have been hitting CV 1, Curse of the Moon 1 and 2, and Dead Cells. I am happy to report that I can pick up CV 1 and make it to stage 6 right away; however, I die in the room just before Dracula. I've beaten the game enough to know that if I just practice for a few days, I'll knock that one out. What's funny about CV 1 is how impossible the bosses and the room just before Death were as a child because I did not know how important holy water was,... in fact, I remember thinking it was worthless as a kid. That explains why I never beat that game until I was an adult, because holy water is almost a necessity to beat this game, and it makes that insanely hard hall before Death pretty manageable. The family can get to stage 2, block 2, where the medusas plus platforming become a problem. My daughter got to the level 2 boss once so far. I also picked up CV3 on my own and got to stage 5 without dying... and saved it there for later.

Curse of the Moon 2 is fun bc it's the only game like this that is 2 players, at least that I play. We like that one a lot. I hope we get a CotM 3 one day.

Dead Cells might have the best replay value of a game that came out in the last decade, for my money. So many paths and different end game bosses. So many different builds you can roll with. I love that game.

 

[ulukinatme]

Okay, so NBA 2k Career mode,... the additions and quests are excellent and provide depth, but the gameplay itself is problematic enough that I still enjoy MLB The Show's career mode more. The problem is in the difficulty,... so on Roookie you win every game by 60 points and your guy scores as much as you want... on Semi Pro you win every game by 30 plus and still drop like 60 a game... on Pro you win every game by double digits and your guy will average like 40 plus a game.... so yeah, you need to play on All Star to make it interesting, however the shot difficulty is so high on All Star that you can win over half your game but only as a PG dropping assists,... on that level you cannot hit any shots, like at all. wide open jumpers, lay ups, threes off screens, I tried everything,... my guy is a 93 rated 3 point shooter with gold badges and all, so he's pretty much Steph with the badges active... and in 5 games on all star I'm shooting 1-30 from 3... the one that went in was shocking. This game desperately needs sliders for career mode, and it's just about game-breaking trying to find a difficulty that is challenging team-wise but fun player-wise. Also, as noted above, the mode is totally geared towards in-game purchases now if you ever want to max out anything... It's fun for maybe one season and then gets stale real quick. At least from a just wanting to play NBA games offline perspective.



So, I moved on to my yearly Castlevania, Bloodstained kick. I do this just about every summer break these days. My wife and youngest are playing with me now, though. We have been hitting CV 1, Curse of the Moon 1 and 2, and Dead Cells. I am happy to report that I can pick up CV 1 and make it to stage 6 right away; however, I die in the room just before Dracula. I've beaten the game enough to know that if I just practice for a few days, I'll knock that one out. What's funny about CV 1 is how impossible the bosses and the room just before Death were as a child because I did not know how important holy water was,... in fact, I remember thinking it was worthless as a kid. That explains why I never beat that game until I was an adult, because holy water is almost a necessity to beat this game, and it makes that insanely hard hall before Death pretty manageable. The family can get to stage 2, block 2, where the medusas plus platforming become a problem. My daughter got to the level 2 boss once so far. I also picked up CV3 on my own and got to stage 5 without dying... and saved it there for later.

Curse of the Moon 2 is fun bc it's the only game like this that is 2 players, at least that I play. We like that one a lot. I hope we get a CotM 3 one day.

Dead Cells might have the best replay value of a game that came out in the last decade, for my money. So many paths and different end game bosses. So many different builds you can roll with. I love that game.

I haven't played an NBA 2K game since 2016 I think. That's was the Spike Lee driven story career mode and it was pretty damn awful. There were no choices to be had, you had a gold digger for a girlfriend, a sister that wouldn't butt out, a best friend doing hoodrat shit and always getting into trouble (Literally to his unsurprisingly demise), a scummy agent, and a bit of a racist team owner (Although if you're white it doesn't make a lot of sense, even more so since your parents are black as is your twin sister. Smart move, Spike!). I'm not surprised it got offerred as a free game with Playstation Plus. The gameplay was okay, I had some fun trying to build my character and unlock various traits and perks. The story was just pretty awful, as was the nickname they gave your character "Frequency Vibrations" or just "Freq." Wow.

I've been wanting to replay Bloodstained. I've got Curse of the Moon 2, but haven't really fired it up. Originally picked it up because I thought it was 2 player Co-Op online, but found out after that it was just local Co-Op.

 

[ulukinatme]

I recently finished a couple old games I hadn't started and/or finished, Dragon Quest Builders 1 and 2. They were kind of like Minecraft, but they actually have a bit of story and they're based in the Dragon Quest lore. The first game is based on a premise or alternate world where the hero from the first game took the Dragonlord's offer to rule half the world and as a result the world falls into chaos. You have to rebuild classic towns from the first game, recruit townspeople to fight off monsters, and eventually take on the Dragonlord yourself to right history. The second game is somewhat similar, but it's based on DQ II with a similar but slightly different premise than the first.

I don't get really creative or artsy when it comes to building voxel games, I always go for efficiency and functionality. DQ Builders 1 and 2 do some interesting things with "Rooms" though. A room consists of any area that is enclosed by blocks 2 high on all sides, whatever shape, as long as it isn't too big (The max is something like 25 blocks x 25 blocks or something, maybe a bit more). Then whatever you put in the room will designate how the room is used or viewed by your villagers. Put a bed, light/torch, and a pot inside? Simple bedroom. Add a sign /w a villager's name on it along with a chair? Private bedroom. Add another bed? Shared bedroom. The list goes on. You create pools, spas, kitchens, cafeterias, restaurants, exercise rooms, relaxation (massage) rooms, museums, various gardens, bathrooms (You can actually collect villager crap for fertilizer ha!), Those are just some I've unlocked, there's a ton more I haven't seen and many of those have additional variations.

The first game is apparently harder to find, but the second has a lot more QoL additions and has more going for it imo. It's not a tough a game, the combat is fairly simple as it's made for all ages. The games can scratch a building itch if that's your thing, or if you like exploring and unlocking progression along the way. The stories aren't anything to write home about given the target audience. If you're a fan of the DQ series you may enjoy all the nostalgia references. I don't know if I would have enjoyed the games much had I not played DQ games before, but I find a lot of Survival/Building games kind of played out these days and the only one I really still enjoy going back to is 7 Days.


Right now I'm playing another old game, one I picked up from a Steam sale earlier this year I think: Tactics Ogre Reborn. I remember watching my little brother play Tactics Ogre on PS1 back in the day, but I never really gave it much of a chance myself. I loved FF Tactics quite a bit, which obviously took cues from Tactics Ogre (And other strategy games I'm sure). I'm still in Act 1, but I'm planning on finishing the remake instead of losing interest or giving up this time. I'm already wanting to compare it to FF Tactics though and I'm wishing a bit the Skills worked the same way.

 

[GATTACA!]

These were the days

 

[ulukinatme]

These were the days

Looks like it got pulled

 

[GATTACA!]

Looks like it got pulled

Bitch ass mods

 

[GATTACA!]

Op uploaded it elsewhere

 

[ulukinatme]

Op uploaded it elsewhere

They got some of it right for sure. One of the comments:

"Sounds about right. Sprinkle in some racist banter and high pitched nonsense and boom! Like a time machine."

I'm glad I avoided a lot of that We used a lot of Ventrilo/TeamSpeak among friends when we played Counterstrike/Day of Defeat, not as much bullshit to deal with from randoms like this. Now it's Discord. I generally hate playing games with randoms, and I stay away from Deathmatch stuff these days. I'd rather Co-Op in a survival like 7Days or something similar.

 

[ScissorLift]

Wolfenstein

 

[ulukinatme]

Just finished Tactics Ogre Reborn. It's very easy to see how it was the grandfather of Final Fantasy Tactics, the similarities are endless. I've got some mixed feelings about it. It's hard for me to compare it to the original Tactics Ogre as I didn't make it real far in that one before I lost some interest. I never played the PSP remake of Tactics Ogre either, and apparently Reborn is a remake of that remake. They added some QoL improvements from what I've understood (Again, played the original in a limited fashion, so I've had to use sites breaking down the original to use as a comparison). The graphics are improved for more HD screens, but still beautiful pixel quality. The music is improved, and apparently the dialogue/translation has been refined. They added voiced dialogue to the character's lines, not the best voice acting work I've seen, but not bad either. The material could have been better, and the King's English got crammed in where it probably shouldn't at times (Like a lowborn peasant speaking as a noble, when the dialect should have been more unrefined).

They apparently made quite a few changes to the combat and the class system. I don't recall exactly how the class progression worked in the original, it's similar to Final Fantasy Tactics, but I guess they made it more streamlined in Reborn. You use Class Marks to change classes, and when you change classes you get all the skills and abilities you would have for that class up to your current level. As a result they've removed "TP" from the game, so you get class abilities as you level. You also don't retain any previous abilities from your old class, you only have the abilities for your new class. As a result there's no reason to grind other classes really, you're best bet is to kind of keep certain characters in their respective classes and use them as needed in battles where their abilities will be of use. On a bit of a downside, most classes get all their abilities somewhere between levels 20-30 and the game goes as high as 50. You'll continue to get improved Skills as you go beyond the 20s and 30s, but rarely any new abilities that you didn't already have. For instance, Warriors get their last new ability "Double Impact" at 25, and all skills after that are just higher level versions of skills you already have, so nothing new or exciting really from levels 26-50.

Another addition to the combat is the Card system. Basically during battle various Cards drop on the ground, Allies and Enemies can pick them up during their turns. The Cards act like buffs for that battle where they increase Attack, Magic, MP Regeneration, Auto Skill procs, Crits, or certain Cards dropped by dead enemies can improve Stats permanently (Although very small basically insignificant gains). These can provide a tipping point in battles against bosses, but the reverse is also true. This is a bit of a pain point actually, as once you get to Chapter 3 or sooner you will start almost every boss battle where the boss already has 4 cards maxed to start the fight. This usually results in a boss 1 shotting even your well geared and leveled tanks, which is a bit ridiculous. On the flip side, those that may have found the original game to be easy if you overleveled will find more challenge in Reborn. Overleveling isn't a thing in the remake either, they cap you throughout the story at various levels, and you'll often find yourself capped while enemies you face will be 2-4 levels or more ahead of you. This adds additional difficulty, along with the fact you're typically outnumbered in every fight. The key to beating the odds is, unsurprisingly, using better tactics than the CPU opponent. This involves bringing a good group composition of tanks, healers, ranged and melee DPS. You must also focus certain enemies down sooner than others, determining the biggest threats. Sometimes this means focusing a boss down quickly to end a fight rather than whittling away at his minions, and the reverse is also true. So, the Card system is an interesting addition, but it can be really unbalancing at times and it made at least a few boss fights almost impossible given the fact certain already overpowered boss characters would start battles with 4 Cards on them. There were a few times the boss wiped my party before I could fight through his bodyguards. Eventually I was forced to restart and go around the guards to go straight for the boss and finish the fight early.

The plot and the characters were okay. As mentioned before, it's easy to see where Tactics Ogre walked so Final Fantasy Tactics could run. Both stories parallel each other in many ways, and the characters often do as well. Having played both now (Although Reborn getting the benefit of being remade) I tend to lean towards Final Fantasy Tactics doing a better job with the plot and characters. Tactics Ogre obviously did a lot of things very well to be a blueprint for FF:T, but at times the plot felt a little repetitive and vanilla. In almost every battle through the end the enemy barks out taunts as if you're the underdog and you stand no hope of winning, even when you're at the doorstep of the final boss having taken all his territory and crushed his army. I only did the Lawful path in this run, I didn't go back and do a Neutral or Chaos path which would have given me some extra characters and scenes I didn't see before. As a result there's a little bit of replayability, but I'm going to move on anyway as I've done 500 battles according to the Warren Report in the game and I feel like I'm pretty done.

As far as QoL in Reborn, I've mentioned some of them already. I haven't mentioned that there's a Speed Up option that shortens spell animations and attacks. That cuts down time considerably, taking a trash fight from 10-12 minutes down to 4-5. There's also an Auto Battle mode you can turn on. You can set various AI battle styles for each of your characters, like setting your Tanks to a Defensive style, Archers to Ranged/Spell AI, Healers to "Mending" AI, etc. The AI isn't super bright, but it's usually smart enough to win trash fights as long as you're geared properly, leveled properly (The new Training option is nice, basically quick leveling in towns), and you have the right group composition. For boss fights you're obviously going to want to control your characters manually, especially once you get out of Chapters 1 and 2. They've added a Chariot Tarot system, which allows you to rewind battles if things start going poorly. This can save some time if you made a mistake, rather than completely restarting a battle...but you can also game the system a bit by basically "rerolling" attacks or enemy treasure drops in this manner. Further QoL, they've removed random battles around the countryside as you go, which is really nice. To give you an outlet to make money when you're broke they added a forest type dungeon you can replay to earn cash from battles. They've added some other dungeons too, including the Palace of the Dead which has 115 floors...yes....115. Once you've been through once you can craft Guidebooks to skip 25 floors at a time...but it's definitely a slog. You can get a lot of great gear from said dungeon of course, but it's still an awful and boring grind. Of those 115 floors only about 5-7 advance a plot in any way and it's mostly a side plot. The other floors have nothing but loot and enemies. In truth, there's a lot of that in the end game that is just a pointless or tedious grind. There are a few shorter dungeons with other end game loot you can grind, but it's not terribly necessary. There's also an Epilogue where you can recruit some overpowered characters from the story, but by the time you get them you're already done with the game.

I could talk a bit more about this game, but I've said quite a bit as it is. I think Reborn is a decent remake, I might sit down and try the original again so I have a better frame of reference. I know that the new Card system did rub a lot of people the wrong way from what I saw online, it really changes the combat quite a bit and causes many balancing problems that I don't think were intended. The QoL changes were generally well received, although the various end game dungeons I found to be a bit of a chore and not that fun by the time I got to the endgame (I ended up doing a ton of Auto AI in those many throw away battles, and I've done a few more as I write this). Fortunately those dungeons are effectively optional and while the gear is good within it's not necessary. I think this is still one of the definitive Tactical games of the genre, and Reborn is probably the definitive version of Tactics Ogre although purists may prefer the original. I'd say Reborn is worth checking out if Tactical games are your thing. People generally say this remake helps bring the game to the modern era, while the original didn't hold up well over time. It still has it's flaws, but it's a decent game. I think I still prefer Final Fantasy Tactics when it comes to story, characters, and combat. For some reason the Reborn devs couldn't implement the Rogue class as a player available class, something about balancing issues...so there's no stealing in this game which feels like a big miss. I didn't spend the $50 retail on it, but I think it's worthy at a sale price.

 

[ulukinatme]

Alright, what do I play next? I added just a few games during the Summer Steam sale:

Avorion
Bravely Default II (New to the list)
Castlevania Lords of Shadow
Chronicon (New to the list)
Crystal Project
Divinity: Original Sin II (Started this one earlier this year, but put it down for Baldur's Gate III)
Dragon Age II
Dragon Age Inquisition
Ember (Got this cheap earlier in the Winter I think)
Epic Battle Fantasy 5 (New to the list, it looks both awful and hilarious)
Fell Seal: Arbiters Mark (New to the list, supposedly another great Tactical game. Not sure I'm crazy about the art)
Grim Dawn
Kenshi (Played around with this one earlier this year too, but it seemed deeper than expected and deserved proper time to get exposed to the system)
Mafia
Mech Armada
Mega Man X Dive Offline
Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor and Shadow of War
Monster Sanctuary (Got it cheap in the winter, good reviews)
Pathfinder: Kingmaker
Persona 4 Golden
Rebel Galaxy
RimWorld (Finally pulled the trigger on this one after it was in the Wishlist forever)
River City Girls (Loved River City Ransom back in the day and RCR: Underground)
Star Wars: Squadrons
Starbound
Stardew Valley (I had this on my list for quite awhile, but wasn't that interested until my daughter wanted to try it)
Tales of Arise (I've got quite a few Tales games, only played Berseria and the first 2 PSX Tales games to date)
The Vagrant
X3: Reunion, Terran Conflict, Albion Prelude

 

[IrishBryan77]

American Truck Simulator. Absolutely love this game as i used to drive a big box truck when I was younger and always wanted to be a big rig driver.

I'm on steam if anyone wants to play convoy (multiplayer). I haven't tried it yet but would be willing to. My steam account name is ShootinRopes77