What video game are you playing?

[Irishokie]

Ulukinatme, so much yes. I hold your game posts (well, all posts) in high regard and LotD is one of my favorites. Lloyd was a Sephiroth rip-off. “Lavvvvviiiiitttttzzzzzzzzzz!!!!” That fight blew my preteen mind away and hooked me in. There’s no telling how much my mom paid renting this game for me from the local movie/game rental store. Luckily for her, I got a job freshman year and eventually bought it. A lot of repetition for the battles (I can still hear “double slash!”) and some bad translation. Rose and her menstrual attack was... something else. Having to watch it over and over, traumatizing.

 

[IrishLion]

I downloaded the Halo: Master Chief Collection, which includes Reach and ODST, so I'm attempting a quick playthrough of the games in chronological order. I want to grind and get frustrated by the older software/gameplay and then eventually be amazed by Halo: Infinite, since it seems to be getting pretty good reviews.

I've also dipped into the new CoD: Warzone - Pacific, which is good fun, but I don't think the map is quite as strong as the original map... and it's going to take weeks of consistent gameplay to truly git gud, and since I'm not a teenager on holiday break with nothing to do for the next two weeks, that's not realistic. So I'll just keep plugging away and trying to sneak into top-5 action at the end of games, and hope I get lucky at some point lol.

One issue I have bouncing from Halo to CoD is the control layout... I need to get into the menu on Halo and see if I can make the button layout mirror the CoD layout.

 

[ACamp1900]

Downloaded Dead Rising 3 and 4 on the X,… really liked the first 2 so,..

 

[NDdomer2]

Been playing Hitman 2 since it was a previous months PS+ Freebie. Def was an improvement from what I remember playing the original hitman but still a bit clunky. Not bad for the limited time I game anymore.

 

[ACamp1900]

Got Forza 5 from the wife,… dang these games are fun

 

[ACamp1900]

Dead Rising 4,… I like not having the countdown timer like the first three games,… really fun

 

[greyhammer90]

Got Forza 5 from the wife,… dang these games are fun

Forza Horizon games are basically just pure distillations of fun.

 

[greyhammer90]

Halo Infinite. Not mindblowing, but I think the campaign is a good time and the multiplayer is the best since Reach.

 

[calvegas04]

Anyone playing Warzone?

 

[ACamp1900]

Dead Rising 4,… I like not having the countdown timer like the first three games,… really fun

not surprising to anyone who has played this series but goodness some of the combo weapons and vehicles are just hilarious,… I’d have loved to had been a designer for this game. I’m sure they had a blast with it

 

[IrishLion]

Anyone playing Warzone?

I just got back into it. A few top-10 finishes by being a coward and waiting patiently mostly, but two top-5 finishes when I've been aggressive at opportune times.

My hangup is not having the full version of the game, so I'm way out of practice on my favorite loadout drop weapons, and it's hard to get enough practice when playing just Warzone solos.

 

[calvegas04]

I just got back into it. A few top-10 finishes by being a coward and waiting patiently mostly, but two top-5 finishes when I've been aggressive at opportune times.

My hangup is not having the full version of the game, so I'm way out of practice on my favorite loadout drop weapons, and it's hard to get enough practice when playing just Warzone solos.

You should play plunder and use that for practice and leveling up weapons

 

[ACamp1900]

I just got back into it. A few top-10 finishes by being a coward and waiting patiently mostly, but two top-5 finishes when I've been aggressive at opportune times.

My hangup is not having the full version of the game, so I'm way out of practice on my favorite loadout drop weapons, and it's hard to get enough practice when playing just Warzone solos.

I always find a nice spot after I get some weapons etc,… guess I’m a coward lol

 

[ulukinatme]

Looking through my Steam list recently, despite the fact I've got dozens of games in the backlog, I figured 7 years was too long to go without playing Fallout: New Vegas again. I replayed Fallout 4 not that long ago, like within the last few years, so I wondered if New Vegas was as good as I remembered it in comparison or if I've been looking at it with nostalgia goggles. I'm about 30 hours in again and it's still clearly the best of the 3D Fallout games imo.

The game is just so clean and focused compared to Fallout 4, and yet it's far more complex in it's quests and factions. Fallout 4 is plagued with a never ending list of the dreaded Radiant quests, which basically allow you to repeat many quests as many times as you want for xp. It's great for leveling, but it's crap for story telling, plot advancement, or character building. They get kinda old after awhile too, as we've seen with the old Preston Garvey "Another settlement needs your help" trope. Instead of endless Radiant quests the more focused and unique quests of New Vegas just mean more and are more entertaining. While Settlements in FO:4 were occasionally fun for a bit, there were just way too many of them and maintaining/upgrading/protecting them became a real chore...I don't miss them.

So NV isn't bogged down with boring Radiant quests, which is the clean and focused part, and yet it manages to be complex because there's so many different factions and options on how to complete quests. You may get a quest to retrieve a certain item for a repair, or if you've dumped enough points into the Repair skill you may be able to jury rig something to achieve the same result, or you can use a Science skill to hack a machine and reroute the process, or you can use a Speech skill to convince someone that they should go a different route, or you can betray the guy by killing him or sabotaging his position so he gets kicked out of the group. There's so many damn options and even after replaying this game a number of times I still haven't found everything. The removal of Karma was a horrible move in FO4, it kind of killed the evil character play throughs a bit. One of my favorite FO:NV playthroughs was actually siding with the Legion, the Powder Gangers, and the Khans. You don't get that same experience joining the Institute in FO4, and there's less choices/options with factions. In FO:NV I'm constantly making decisions based on what I think my character would or should do given his Karma and what factions he's sided with, and the morally gray options really make you think. That's one reason the game has such a high replay factor.l

I've used FO:4 as a comparion to FO:NV quite a bit and some may wonder why I haven't mentioned FO:3. Tbh it's decent, but just about everything FO:3 did...FO:NV did better. The combat, the quests, the companions, the plot...all were as good or far better in NV. The humor in NV was a far cry from 3 as well, it was definitely closer to the original games in that way. Even the DLC was better in NV, Dead Money was so deep and unique compared to everything else, and Old World Blues was hilarious with the jokes. Mothership Zeta was decent and probably one of the better DLCs, but it almost felt a bit out of place. I think the only area where FO:3 outshone FO:NV was the vaults. There was Vault 112 with the Tranquility Lane simulation, Vault 101 with Liam Neeson and the Tunnel Snakes, Vault 106 with the trippy hallucinations that actually scared the crap out of me, and then of course there was Vault 108 with all the Garys running about. It's hard to top a list like that.

I could go on and on about NV, but seems like beating a dead horse since it's a game that's been out for 12 years now. If there's one thing that's missing in the game that we have in FO:4 it's being able to pickup bodies/objects and move them...unless they've put it under a different keyboard key and I've forgotten. This seems like a small thing, but the Legion are so damn sneaky that they like to hide Frag Mines underneath dead bodies which makes it really tough to disarm them or even see them! More than anything though this is just a testament to how much thought was put into this game, some traps are really well hidden like that.

I just finished with Black Mountain. I completely forgot that I had created a mod on the Nexus site that allows you to restore the Radio station after the quest is complete, that's probably one of my favorite parts of the game. There's just something meta about a confused super mutant with multiple personalities carrying on a radio show while dressed in a wig and funny glasses while they discuss their fears of "the battle cattle." The wasteland just felt empty without Tabitha and Rhonda on the airwaves.

 

[ACamp1900]

Waiting on Indiana Jones news playing Castlevania new games

 

[ACamp1900]

And nhl be a pro is still really fun

 

[ulukinatme]

Turns out that New Vegas did have a button to drag/move items, it was just a different button than I remembered. Still the best of the 3D Fallouts. I'm nearly finished with my playthrough of the original game again, looking forward to diving back in to Dead Money after and I've been looking at mods to enhance a Legion playthrough after that.

 

[IrishLion]

Playing Dante’s Inferno via Xbox Gamepass…

It feels kind of therapeutic to just button-mash after playing God of War and the newer Assassin’s Creed games, where you have to play more defensively and strategically.

Let me harvest some souls, absolve some tortured souls of their sins, purchase some combos, and button-mash my way through Hell!

 

[arrowryan]

I play the hell out of Warzone if anyone ever wants to play

 

[ulukinatme]

I ended up finishing my replay of New Vegas and the DLC on my standard character.

I loved the Dead Money DLC, it was just as good as the first time around. It legit creeped me out a bit, the atmosphere and those "tourists" kinda get in your head. Then there's the Cloud and the ticking of your bomb collar to worry about too, it's a rush. The party members all have backstories and are really well done, and Elijah is an antagonist you can't help but hate. Just a top notch DLC from top to bottom, love it to death.

I didn't remember much of Honest Hearts, and mostly because it's a pretty short DLC. It's okay for what it is, there's not much story and even less dialogue, but there's a fair amount of combat and it's probably a better DLC to take on early because the enemies are mostly lower level and easy outside of Yao Guai. I should point out that I also made my own mod replacing almost all of the background music in game with the soundtrack to "The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly" which fits in very well in both Zion and the Mojave. There's something about gunning down Raiders while the Trio is playing:


Old World Blues was just as good as I remember too. The robot personalities crack me up, lots of old school Interplay/Black Isle style humor with this one. Some of the dungeons are pretty fun and unique too.

Finally I went through Lonesome Road again. I never really cared for this DLC, and it's hard to put a finger on why. The only thing I can come up with is the Ulysses character is just not good. The whole premise that he too was a Courier and may or may not have followed you through the Divide...the whole thing is just convoluted. It's too open ended, and when it's not they push this narrative that you caused the destruction which I don't like. It's implied that you cause this destruction of the Divide, either on purpose or unintentionally. It's up for interpretation because you don't have those memories after the shot in the head. To get to Ulysses you have to launch some nukes, unbeknownst to you at the time, causing even more destruction. Ulysses then pushes this devastation and responsibility off on you despite the fact he told you to push the damn button. I dunno, there's just a lot of stupid logic, there's a lot of Ulysses whining about your part in the Divide...and then when you finally meet up with him you can convince him he's wrong with just one Speech check after you've spent 10 hours or so listening to him ramble on about how you're responsible for the Divide's demise. I mean, at least if/when you use your Speech skill on the Legate Lanius it takes three Speech checks and there wasn't a big build up prior to your meeting unlike Ulysses. More than anything though I think it's the voice actor that they used for Ulysses that rubs me the wrong way. His speech pattern is so monotonous and devoid of emotion that it makes those long ramblings sometimes incoherent and boring. They're often hard to hear too, I had to turn on Subtitles sometimes and turn off the in game music to understand what he was saying. Despite the misgivings with Ulysses at least the ending wasn't anti-climatic. There's a nice big fight as you're trying to stop (or allow) the nuke launch. I don't dislike this DLC, in fact the combat is some of the satisfying. I rarely go with Explosives builds in Fallout just because they can be expensive, the munitions themselves can be hard to find, and sometimes the blast radius is so large you can't even use them in dungeons. However the Red Glare rocket launcher is fun as hell to use. It's the perfect weapon for the Divide, and there's plenty of ammo for it. The other weapons are fine too, the Arc Welder in particular is nice against robots, but there's just something about those rockets. There's other redeemable points, like the story with ED-E and whether you let him sacrifice his existence or not at the end. The Courier Mile was a nice challenge too.

Once I finished the DLC I went ahead and fired up a new New Vegas file already with the intention of playing an evil character on the side of the Powder Gangers and Legion. I'm already several hours into that, and I've downloaded some additional Legion mods like added quests, Legion favorable companions, and the like. I'm doing pure melee/stealth build, in addition to a Low Intelligence build with the added Idiot/Low Int dialogue choices for shits and giggles. In a lot of ways it's like playing a whole new game because most of the quests are very different. I'm still early in this playthrough, but I saw a Steam sale brewing and I thought I'd try out the next game I'm going to post about below.

 

[ulukinatme]

There's a Steam Lunar sale going on for one more day. I've had this game in my Wishlist for awhile. It was early access for a bit I think and was released last August. It's called Mecha Knights: Nightmare. It's an Action Shooter set in an apocalyptic war. You're shooting Chinese/Russian military vehicles in addition to Resident Evil like monsters. Here's the details from the game page:

Overview​

In the year 2049 at the peak of the Second Cold War, an all-out conflict between N.A.T.O and the Russia-China alliance is about to break out. In the midst of the tension, an enigmatic incident sends the world into an apocalyptic war. Nightmarish creatures of unknown origin suddenly begin to appear, plunging the world into terror and chaos. A young American pilot, Ethan, is caught in the middle of it all, as untold horrors break out on the surface of the planet. He will have to battle endless hordes of monsters in his Mobile Armor, a powerful customizable Mech.

Single-Player Campaign​

See the story through the eyes of an ace pilot. Fight for humanity’s survival through 20 campaign missions, working as a part of the N.A.T.O forces. Be part of large-scale operations, pushing your Mobile Armors to the brink of their capabilities. Choose your Mech and engage hundreds of bizarre creatures in epic battles, gaining weapons, equipment and resources along the way to upgrade and customize your Mech.

Deep Mech Customization​

Engage the enemy on your terms! Develop an all-round Mech, built to do everything at once, or specialize it, allowing for devastating long-range barrages of high-velocity guns, or get up close with double-gatling guns. Choose from among a wide variety of mechs and weapons. Customize over 20 elements of your Mobile armour. Equip unique parts such as mine throwers, air support modules or weapon cooling systems.

About the developer​

This is a one-man passion-project. Mecha Knights is my attempt to create the Mech game I always wanted to play. I've wanted to combine the elements from games like Armored Core, Front Mission, Earth Defence Force and even Resident Evil, in an apocalyptic war theme that could be seen in anime series such as Muv:Luv and Blue Gender. A game where it's not just you, the player, that is winning the whole war as a one-man army, but rather that you take part in larger operations – where you and your allies fight hundreds of enemies. A game where extensive customization and progression allows you to develop your own Mech, while the game keeps you engaged with the story of the soldiers.

I'm pretty early into the game right now so I can't give a fair estimate of if the game is good or not. I haven't noticed any glaring issues, and the game has a "Very Positive" rating in Steam which is a good sign. The nice thing is the game is just $11.99 on sale right now, so even if you don't like it there's not a big loss to the wallet...the sale is on until noon on 2/3 and then it goes back to $16 which isn't that expensive either. The game definitely feels a lot like Armored Core, which is a series I played the hell out of from the late 90s through 00s. I love customizing killing machines, whether it's mechs, starships, whatever. Played some Front Mission 3 as well, and of course Resident Evil, you can certainly see those influences in the game. Again, obviously haven't touched the game too much yet, but as somebody that enjoys the occasional Mech action game I'm liking this title thus far...and the price sure ain't bad.

 

[greyhammer90]

MLB The Show coming to Switch is dangerous. Nothing that addictive should be made mobile. I won't be buying it there since it's coming to Gamepass again though.

 

[IrishLion]

I couldn’t help myself… Pokémon Legends: Arceus jumped the rest of my gaming to-play list. I was too curious about the new gameplay.

So far, I’m about 1.5 hours in and still kind of in the hand-holding stage with tutorials, but loving it anyway. The open-world mechanics aren’t too shabby, and the change to the core gameplay to use Pokémon how you would *actually* use them in real life is fun so far.

I really like the overhaul to research/Pokédex. It’s easy to see how they used Pokémon Go as a jumping-off point for the new direction. Blending those mechanics with some of the original gameboy ideas is a winner. It already feels more satisfying to “research” than it did to just try and catch ‘em all.

Can’t wait to be done with the introductory stuff and get out into the wild.

 

[ulukinatme]

I ended up buying 6 games during the Steam Sale, for a total of $57...and it really only cost me $7 cause the Mrs. gave me a Steam card for Christmas lol.

One of the games I got was Pacify for $3.50. The comments in the Steam reviews got me. Even if it's a stinker I should get at least an hour or two of enjoyment out of it which is money well spent. Just some of the comments:

Chased a bunch of little kids around a house and burnt them. Then did it in the game as well

For the first time a woman is after me ~.~

I've lost my virginity to the tutorial boss... also i smashed chicken with a pan and burned baby in the oven 10/10

got stuck on a pot. i slapped the girl and she turned me into a baby.

lots of pee in my pants, but we made it!

Before I played this i had a small penis, no girlfriend and no will to live. None of these things have changed, but the game is pretty good.

 

[NorthDakota]

Best part of New Vegas was Caesar's legion.

 

[BeauBenken]

I'm just out here playing CFB Revamped with updated rosters and Marcus Freeman as the HC at ND.

Game still has plenty of mechanics that piss me off but it's good enough to get you through the snow days.

 

[dublinirish]

I'm just out here playing CFB Revamped with updated rosters and Marcus Freeman as the HC at ND.

Game still has plenty of mechanics that piss me off but it's good enough to get you through the snow days.

i downloaded NCAA06, 07 and 11 on a PS3 emulator on my laptop and its been fun rolling with Brady Quinn, Zibby etc

 

[IrishLion]

I'm just out here playing CFB Revamped with updated rosters and Marcus Freeman as the HC at ND.

Game still has plenty of mechanics that piss me off but it's good enough to get you through the snow days.

How do you get updated rosters these days?

I downloaded CFB Revamped, but now I can't connect to the PS3 servers since my PS3 is jailbroken for CFB Revamped, which means I can't get into the EA locker for updated rosters.

Did they find a way to update the rosters with their file downloads?

 

[GATTACA!]

I couldn’t help myself… Pokémon Legends: Arceus jumped the rest of my gaming to-play list. I was too curious about the new gameplay.

So far, I’m about 1.5 hours in and still kind of in the hand-holding stage with tutorials, but loving it anyway. The open-world mechanics aren’t too shabby, and the change to the core gameplay to use Pokémon how you would *actually* use them in real life is fun so far.

I really like the overhaul to research/Pokédex. It’s easy to see how they used Pokémon Go as a jumping-off point for the new direction. Blending those mechanics with some of the original gameboy ideas is a winner. It already feels more satisfying to “research” than it did to just try and catch ‘em all.

Can’t wait to be done with the introductory stuff and get out into the wild.

I’m shocked by how much I’m loving it. It is hand holdy but it’s miles better than SuMo and SwSh.

Love the open world. Being able to get lost and find random new Pokémon is just the best. The alphas are legitimately intimidating and pose a real challenge. I was walking around and turned around into an alpha rapidash and almost shit my pants.

Lots of great QoL changes. Swapping out moves is so much better than TMs and HMs. Crafting is awesome. Love the way they’re layered. Like how you make regular potions as a component of super potions.

Only criticisms I have are that I wish there were more trainer battles, I with the Pokédex was a bit bigger, and the graphics are just ok.

This is a great game though and a good step for a franchise that was honestly getting pretty stale. Sword was the first mainline game I didn’t even bother finishing. I can see myself dumping 100-150 hours into this one.

 

[IrishLion]

I’m shocked by how much I’m loving it. It is hand holdy but it’s miles better than SuMo and SwSh.

Love the open world. Being able to get lost and find random new Pokémon is just the best. The alphas are legitimately intimidating and pose a real challenge. I was walking around and turned around into an alpha rapidash and almost shit my pants.

Lots of great QoL changes. Swapping out moves is so much better than TMs and HMs. Crafting is awesome. Love the way they’re layered. Like how you make regular potions as a component of super potions.

Only criticisms I have are that I wish there were more trainer battles, I with the Pokédex was a bit bigger, and the graphics are just ok.

This is a great game though and a good step for a franchise that was honestly getting pretty stale. Sword was the first mainline game I didn’t even bother finishing. I can see myself dumping 100-150 hours into this one.

To me, it just feels so much more satisfying that they upgraded the realism (lol realistic Pokemon) with exploration, research and encounters.

Rather than walking around in the grass until an auto-encounter starts and your Pokemon is automatically called out... you have to select which item you're throwing off of your satchel. Do you have a Pokemon at the ready to battle the wild Pokemon you're about to encounter? Is it the correct Pokemon for the situation? Or do you have a Pokeball selected to try for an immediate capture?

In the old games, if you've already got one of the common Pokemon captured and in storage, there is no reason to catch that Pokemon again, or even follow through with an encounter if you're over-leveled. I really like the research and merit points aspect of leveling up your status, that way you have a reason to go for different approaches to even the most common Pokemon in the first wild area.

And the smallest, stupidest thing might be my favorite so far: throwing a Pokeball with one of your Pokemon at a tree or other various resource points to collect items for crafting. It's quick and easy and satisfying, but still different enough from most RPG mechanics to not get old so quickly.