Yes I'm pretty sure you are talking about the very little camp I was referring to. It's on the prison island right? Right around the very first area that you start in when you are given control of your character? The 3 people in the little tents, with that one female...I think it was a lizardkin? Tending to them? That's the spot where it happened for me, and I was just totally surprised by it. Happily surprised.
What are you currently playing?
- Thread starter Nick Calandra
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Been playing Pursuit Force: Extreme Justice.
Played and enjoyed the first game way back when it released but never got around to the sequel. The gameplay is still solid and simple fast paced action, though there aren't many huge differences between the two in terms of gameplay. The fact that you can cycle between weapons is a welcome feature, but the new sniper missions are crap. Precision aiming with the PSP stick is not exactly great.
Played and enjoyed the first game way back when it released but never got around to the sequel. The gameplay is still solid and simple fast paced action, though there aren't many huge differences between the two in terms of gameplay. The fact that you can cycle between weapons is a welcome feature, but the new sniper missions are crap. Precision aiming with the PSP stick is not exactly great.
- Apr 1, 2009
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I wish those games would come to console or pc. I remember having a lot of fun with them.
Stared playing PREY last night.
Wow I totally slept on this one. I saw it come out, and heard a lot of buzz about it, but....I dunno, it didn't catch my attention at the time. I think maybe my brain was like "oh it's going to be like Alien Isolation" or something, which kind of dropped my interest.
But, shit, this is "Hey We Really Love Thief/Deus Ex/System Shock" the video game really. I mean so many easter eggs from those games, I just smiled to myself so broadly when I saw the first reference to the Looking Glass technology. This game is right up my alley. Haven't progressed too far yet. Got a few upgrades, nothing major. Still just poking my nose around trying to figure out what's going on via the plot. Exploring as well, but keep running into walls of "you must be this Hackey to progress" or "You must be this swol to progress" I've found a few workarounds but, for now I find myself mostly annoyed at being given an optional objective system of "find the various survivors" right at the start of the game, but then they go to a LOT of trouble to not let you get to any of the people still alive early on.
I also had ZERO idea to use the goo gun to make my own paths around the map, but the game was really nice to give me a visual aid on that, watching someone using it to run away. I was totally shocked, my brain going "oh! so THAT'S what this thing is really useful for!" Because it's combat utility is fairly minimal, but damn, making my own platforming system to get into previously blocked areas? Hell yes.
Wow I totally slept on this one. I saw it come out, and heard a lot of buzz about it, but....I dunno, it didn't catch my attention at the time. I think maybe my brain was like "oh it's going to be like Alien Isolation" or something, which kind of dropped my interest.
But, shit, this is "Hey We Really Love Thief/Deus Ex/System Shock" the video game really. I mean so many easter eggs from those games, I just smiled to myself so broadly when I saw the first reference to the Looking Glass technology. This game is right up my alley. Haven't progressed too far yet. Got a few upgrades, nothing major. Still just poking my nose around trying to figure out what's going on via the plot. Exploring as well, but keep running into walls of "you must be this Hackey to progress" or "You must be this swol to progress" I've found a few workarounds but, for now I find myself mostly annoyed at being given an optional objective system of "find the various survivors" right at the start of the game, but then they go to a LOT of trouble to not let you get to any of the people still alive early on.
I also had ZERO idea to use the goo gun to make my own paths around the map, but the game was really nice to give me a visual aid on that, watching someone using it to run away. I was totally shocked, my brain going "oh! so THAT'S what this thing is really useful for!" Because it's combat utility is fairly minimal, but damn, making my own platforming system to get into previously blocked areas? Hell yes.
The gloo gun is absolutely amazing in combat, it shoots very fast, start to slow down enemy from the first hit and freeze them on the 4th or 5th which allow you to hit them with a wrench power attack, which knock enemy down letting you wail on them. It's ammo are also plentiful so you don't have to worry about missing shoot.
I don't think there's a single situation in the game that has only one solution, outside of a few locked chest that must be hacked for minor reward. You don't really have to worry about survivor, there's very very few survivor and you'll meet them as you progress.
- Feb 7, 2011
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Been playing the Back 4 Blood beta with some friends.
Not going to lie, it's kind of rough. It uses Easy Anti-Cheat which never plays well with my computer, and I had to fuck around with it for like 40 minutes to even get the game to boot because it kept throwing up error codes that don't seem to actually exist anywhere online.
Once I finally managed to boot the game my first campaign was really laggy, like 300+ ping laggy. On easy mode that was still playable, but I would often shoot enemies that would then hit me and die after hitting me, which is frustrating. Looks like this is a pretty common complaint online. The later matches I did were better though.
There's one campaign in the beta, but it's quite long. Left 4 Dead campaigns used to be 4 maps. This campaign is 8 maps, but each map is much shorter. I haven't been able to finish a campaign in less than an hour though, so it's a time commitment to play.
The game is much more complicated than Left 4 Dead was.
The different weapons use different types of ammo, and ammo pick-ups aren't universal. If 2 people are your team run weapons that use the same ammo type you're going to be competing with each other for ammo. Some of the ammo doesn't make sense. For balancing purposes the revolver uses assault rifle ammo, which I didn't notice, so I was running an LMG and a revolver and didn't notice that they used the same ammo type until I ran out and was screwed. I had assumed it was using pistol ammo the whole time.
You also have weapon attachments to consider, and weapon rarity when picking up weapons in the world. These things aren't necessarily an issue, but they do slow down the pace of the game because sometimes you have to stop, examine weapon stats, talk to your team about who is using what ammo type to make sure you're not overlapping, and it's just not as straight forward as grab your favorite gun and set off into the apocalypse with your buddies.
Good things:
- Weapons feel pretty good. All of the different weapons feel unique and most feel pretty viable.
- Card system makes every run feel pretty different
- Movement and shooting feels good.
Bad Things:
- Enemy designs aren't very interesting or distinct. There are some designs where I have trouble telling enemies apart.
- The card system can completely fuck you by making certain maps impossibly difficult. Difficulty in general needs tuning as the easy mode is way too easy, while the next difficulty up feels basically impossible to do if you have any bots on your team.
- The bots are terrible. They hoover up health and ammo, but they won't carry objective items or heal themselves.
- Map designs aren't visually interesting enough.
Worries about the future:
- The card system seems set up for monetization and any new weapons and cards added to the game may feel very pay to win. Given Turtle Rock's past issues with monetization *cough* Evolve *cough cough* I don't really have a lot of confidence in them not doing this.
Anyone who was planning on getting the game, I really recommend playing the beta. I've had some fun with my friends, and may end up getting the game once it comes out, but I'm definitely not going to be pre-ordering. I want to see what their monetization plan is before I actually put money down.
Not going to lie, it's kind of rough. It uses Easy Anti-Cheat which never plays well with my computer, and I had to fuck around with it for like 40 minutes to even get the game to boot because it kept throwing up error codes that don't seem to actually exist anywhere online.
Once I finally managed to boot the game my first campaign was really laggy, like 300+ ping laggy. On easy mode that was still playable, but I would often shoot enemies that would then hit me and die after hitting me, which is frustrating. Looks like this is a pretty common complaint online. The later matches I did were better though.
There's one campaign in the beta, but it's quite long. Left 4 Dead campaigns used to be 4 maps. This campaign is 8 maps, but each map is much shorter. I haven't been able to finish a campaign in less than an hour though, so it's a time commitment to play.
The game is much more complicated than Left 4 Dead was.
The different weapons use different types of ammo, and ammo pick-ups aren't universal. If 2 people are your team run weapons that use the same ammo type you're going to be competing with each other for ammo. Some of the ammo doesn't make sense. For balancing purposes the revolver uses assault rifle ammo, which I didn't notice, so I was running an LMG and a revolver and didn't notice that they used the same ammo type until I ran out and was screwed. I had assumed it was using pistol ammo the whole time.
You also have weapon attachments to consider, and weapon rarity when picking up weapons in the world. These things aren't necessarily an issue, but they do slow down the pace of the game because sometimes you have to stop, examine weapon stats, talk to your team about who is using what ammo type to make sure you're not overlapping, and it's just not as straight forward as grab your favorite gun and set off into the apocalypse with your buddies.
Good things:
- Weapons feel pretty good. All of the different weapons feel unique and most feel pretty viable.
- Card system makes every run feel pretty different
- Movement and shooting feels good.
Bad Things:
- Enemy designs aren't very interesting or distinct. There are some designs where I have trouble telling enemies apart.
- The card system can completely fuck you by making certain maps impossibly difficult. Difficulty in general needs tuning as the easy mode is way too easy, while the next difficulty up feels basically impossible to do if you have any bots on your team.
- The bots are terrible. They hoover up health and ammo, but they won't carry objective items or heal themselves.
- Map designs aren't visually interesting enough.
Worries about the future:
- The card system seems set up for monetization and any new weapons and cards added to the game may feel very pay to win. Given Turtle Rock's past issues with monetization *cough* Evolve *cough cough* I don't really have a lot of confidence in them not doing this.
Anyone who was planning on getting the game, I really recommend playing the beta. I've had some fun with my friends, and may end up getting the game once it comes out, but I'm definitely not going to be pre-ordering. I want to see what their monetization plan is before I actually put money down.
No what I mean is, sure there are multiple ways to get at various problems, but very often, at least when it comes to the "locate other crew members", those various solutions are all outside of the realm of a starting character. Sure, I could hack, or lift a box, or some other thing...if I had Rank 2 of any of those. If it was just a few of them, it would be fine, but this was literally one of the first things I tried to do. Within the first what..30-60 minutes of the game, they tutorialize "hey, you can use security terminals to find other survivors" so I think "great! Let me go do that! This must be something I can do, since they made it one of the first things they teach me." But...no, if the person is alive, they are gated behind Rank 2 of pretty much everything. Or hidden behind a door that will only open to a keycard that I don't have...because it's in another section of the station....that I can't access...because I don't have Rank 2 of whatever. It just felt very contrary to the first pop up that says "Ok so you now have free roam of the entire base! Explore!....*small print* ....but not really because we've heavily curated where you can go behind a lot of barriers that you will need to find a TON of neurodyne to upgrade to access" My brain almost always defaults to casualty control in any game with life/death situations. I try and make sure NPCs survive, even if it's not an optional objective. I don't like letting people die in games. So for the game to give me a system, where I am uniquely suited to play search and rescue, and then heavily block me from doing that immediately after providing that mechanic....it's jarring, and frustrating. Again, if it was only a sometime thing, I would be fine with it. Some are just blocked due to circumstances, ok, fine. But, EVERY living person, is intentionally gated from you, from the moment they give you the ability to know they are there. I find that a poor design for the mechanic.
Also did anyone else have a problem with the game getting stuck on invisible terrain when sneaking? I've noticed this a LOT in the first few areas, particularly when you are using a maintenance tunnel. For some reason, that little 2 inch lip at the ground level confuses the game's movement and thinks I'm against an immoveable surface. I have to move backwards, sometimes even pressing the jump button like I'm mantling over the lip of the tube. It's weird. I've also had it on flights of stairs. No threat, no weirdness, just sneaking along in a reasonably cleared area, going down a single flight of stairs to go to the other side of the room and *screeching tire noises* I'm stopped dead by....nothing. I back up, move to the side or hop, and I'm fine. I normally wouldn't call it a big problem, but since it seems to be unique to stealth movement, the fact that I might randomly find myself trapped in the open due to clipping is a bit frustrating. Anyone have that issue? Because mechanically, it's the only real problem I'm having with the game. It runs just fine, the rest of the mechanics are familiar and smooth, though I don't like the point camera to press button interface with consoles. I'd much rather it let the mouse go free so I could click faster.
I like how the sequel's manual has an ad on the back for a PS2 port along with "Coming soon to the big screen". Any day now I guess...
On PC or console? I only ask because - not having played it myself mind you - the PC version is apparently a remarkable improvement over 8th gen consoles to the point they feel shoehorned in.
Prey is a love letter to the PC gamer
The die has been cast for the current generation of gaming - multi-platform games are built from the ground up with con…
www.eurogamer.net
The lip collision issue might be a universal bug though as it sounds purely geometrical.
PC, and yeah it's getting pretty untenable at this point, the lip collision thing. I got stuck for a solid minute on a vent hatch, that lead to a panel I needed to turn off, and it just would...NOT, let me go through. I had to back up and finally I think sprint/sliding got me through it. It seems to be an issue if you are like flush up against the surface when you trigger it, and it hasn't gone all the way up when you start to press forward? I dunno. In a game where I'm spending a lot of time sneaking through pipes to bypass threats, and sometimes only have a few seconds to slip through the gap unnoticed, invisible walls on the exit points is REALLY a problem.On PC or console? I only ask because - not having played it myself mind you - the PC version is apparently a remarkable improvement over 8th gen consoles to the point they feel shoehorned in.
Prey is a love letter to the PC gamer
The die has been cast for the current generation of gaming - multi-platform games are built from the ground up with con…
The lip collision issue might be a universal bug though as it sounds purely geometrical.
The full station open up once you go trough psychotronic, until then you're limited to lobby, neromod and hardware lab (which you can all fully explore with 0 talent except for 2 closet in lobby). After that you'll be able to reach some of the survivor. But really rescuing survivor is really not the point of the game, your first real main quest is to blow up the station so survivor don't really matter. The point of being able to locate people is because corpse are essentially treasure chest and if you miss some you can locate the corpse to find out what you missed exploring a section, it's also used in a couple of quest here and there.
I just finished Dragon Age Origins - Awakening
I definitely enjoyed the more concise story and focused story - instead of travelling around the country fixing each area's specific and unrelated problems - but my biggest issue is the characters, and the lack of time that they have in the spotlight.
Like the Mass Effect games, the worst DLCs are the ones which do not feature your companions. With Awakening, (almost) your entire roster of companions is replaced with new faces - but the DLC isn't long enough to allow them to be really fleshed out. There are notable standouts, like Anders and Nathaniel, but the rest of the cast don't really make much of an impression.
I did really like the decisions that I made as the Arl (Lord) of the surrounding region though, but I don't really think that any of my choices had any significant impact; if any at all. Im glad that they revisited this concept in Dragon Age Inquisition, though.
Otherwise, it is a fine, but underwhelming story, which would have been drastically improved if more of your previous companions would have joined you.
I also just finished the Dragon Age Origins - Witch Hunt DLC
Wow, this was anticlimactic
Literally every single area that you visit is just lifted from areas found in the base game, or its DLC. And it was short, too. Clocking in about about 1h+ - though this did only cost about £4.50 at the time, so im not really sure what I expected.
At least the characters were well written, and well acted, even if their appearance was brief
Anyway, onto DA2
I definitely enjoyed the more concise story and focused story - instead of travelling around the country fixing each area's specific and unrelated problems - but my biggest issue is the characters, and the lack of time that they have in the spotlight.
Like the Mass Effect games, the worst DLCs are the ones which do not feature your companions. With Awakening, (almost) your entire roster of companions is replaced with new faces - but the DLC isn't long enough to allow them to be really fleshed out. There are notable standouts, like Anders and Nathaniel, but the rest of the cast don't really make much of an impression.
I did really like the decisions that I made as the Arl (Lord) of the surrounding region though, but I don't really think that any of my choices had any significant impact; if any at all. Im glad that they revisited this concept in Dragon Age Inquisition, though.
Otherwise, it is a fine, but underwhelming story, which would have been drastically improved if more of your previous companions would have joined you.
I also just finished the Dragon Age Origins - Witch Hunt DLC
Wow, this was anticlimactic
Literally every single area that you visit is just lifted from areas found in the base game, or its DLC. And it was short, too. Clocking in about about 1h+ - though this did only cost about £4.50 at the time, so im not really sure what I expected.
At least the characters were well written, and well acted, even if their appearance was brief
Anyway, onto DA2
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Awakening was a bit weird but I like the idea of expansion pack rather short byte size DLC, although I think it's greatly improved if you play it a long time after DA:O rather than back to back and treat it more as stand alone rather than expansion. It does introduce some interesting story idea here and there, but almost none of those are taken up by future game to the point that it feel like awakening is non canon.
Coming back into Dragon Age 2, and yeah, I like it.
The first thing that I notice is just how snappy the combat feels. In DA:O, as a mage, I just vaguely wave my staff in the direction of an enemy, or use one of 3 animations for all of my spells. In 2, im spinning my staff around like a ninja, and fireballs explode the enemy's torsos. It really activates the 4 year old side of my brain. I know it sounds dumb, but I really cannot understate how dull it was visually, to play as a mage in DA:O.
That said, whilst I never really had an issue with it in previous playthroughs, it is quite frustrating to set up your party so that you have your melee characters in front, with your ranged companions in the back, only for a group of enemies to just appear out of thin air behind you - especially as they are coming from a path that you literally just cleared out.
Cooldown timers are also much longer, too. In DA:O, my Heal spell had a cooldown of 5s. In DA2, it is 40s. Fireball goes from 10s, to 20s. Winter's Grasp from 8s, to 20s. I definitely have to be much stingier with when I choose to use my abilities.
Otherwise, I really don't mind the changes to the dialogue. I like having a voiced protagonist - though it is always odd when the text says one thing, and your character says another - and having spent a significant amount of time with ME this year, the dialogue wheel feels right at home. Im not going to deny that it is a downgrade vs DA:O, but I really don't mind it.
Overall, there have been quite a few mechanical changes, which makes the game feel quite different. I am still enjoying it, though.
The first thing that I notice is just how snappy the combat feels. In DA:O, as a mage, I just vaguely wave my staff in the direction of an enemy, or use one of 3 animations for all of my spells. In 2, im spinning my staff around like a ninja, and fireballs explode the enemy's torsos. It really activates the 4 year old side of my brain. I know it sounds dumb, but I really cannot understate how dull it was visually, to play as a mage in DA:O.
That said, whilst I never really had an issue with it in previous playthroughs, it is quite frustrating to set up your party so that you have your melee characters in front, with your ranged companions in the back, only for a group of enemies to just appear out of thin air behind you - especially as they are coming from a path that you literally just cleared out.
Cooldown timers are also much longer, too. In DA:O, my Heal spell had a cooldown of 5s. In DA2, it is 40s. Fireball goes from 10s, to 20s. Winter's Grasp from 8s, to 20s. I definitely have to be much stingier with when I choose to use my abilities.
Otherwise, I really don't mind the changes to the dialogue. I like having a voiced protagonist - though it is always odd when the text says one thing, and your character says another - and having spent a significant amount of time with ME this year, the dialogue wheel feels right at home. Im not going to deny that it is a downgrade vs DA:O, but I really don't mind it.
Overall, there have been quite a few mechanical changes, which makes the game feel quite different. I am still enjoying it, though.
Been playing Hollow Knight. I like it enough to keep going but at the same time it's really pushing my buttons with some of the shit it does. I feel like some of the charms should just be on by default - such as the compass(which tells you where you are on the map), and the money absorbing one.
There's basically never a save point next to the boss, so you typically end up fighting a boss without an optimal loadout.
There's enough platformy bits and money tends to fly absolutely everywhere that it's an absolute chore to manually collect. Not having the money collecting charm means you'll probably have to end up farming it separately to afford stuff.
Two charm notches is less of a big deal later on I guess once you start getting more notches but eh. Still feels weird.
Having to find the mapmaker and buy it off him is kinda a pain, but I guess there's some tension of being absolutely lost the first time you enter an area. I sorta get it but I don't completely agree either.
Some of the spikey platformy puzzles I feel are always just one or two segments too long. Since you lose life every time you fuck up, you end up having to go back and restart the whole shebang once you're down to your last. Unless you wanna risk your corpse being somewhere weird and having to collect it. But I'm not much of a platforming fan, each to their own. I feel like wall jumping is a bit twitchy and imprecise enough that you can end up skipping into spikes and stuff too so it ends up feeling frustrating.
There was the whole "push button to attack" nonsense they tried to force onto the console players, which did earn the developers a lot of mockery. Having to spam a button to autoattack does not an action game make.
It does have a lot of issues though. Dungeons are way too blatantly copypasted. Some areas just have unceasing hordes of chump enemies swarming you for no good reason. Just taking a walk through Kirkwall can get you accosted by a battalion of random ass bandits. I think DA:O had much better level and encounter design. Whereas DA2 had a lot of here's the same cellar, just rotated 90 degrees and its full of the fantasy equivalent of storm troopers.
Fundamentally the gameplay isn't that much different from DA:O. I still felt at home with it. Whereas DA:I completely alienated and annoyed the shit out of me such that I didn't play past the first few hours.
I feel like every game should have the "smug asshole" dialogue option if you don't want to go with either alignment.
There's basically never a save point next to the boss, so you typically end up fighting a boss without an optimal loadout.
There's enough platformy bits and money tends to fly absolutely everywhere that it's an absolute chore to manually collect. Not having the money collecting charm means you'll probably have to end up farming it separately to afford stuff.
Two charm notches is less of a big deal later on I guess once you start getting more notches but eh. Still feels weird.
Having to find the mapmaker and buy it off him is kinda a pain, but I guess there's some tension of being absolutely lost the first time you enter an area. I sorta get it but I don't completely agree either.
Some of the spikey platformy puzzles I feel are always just one or two segments too long. Since you lose life every time you fuck up, you end up having to go back and restart the whole shebang once you're down to your last. Unless you wanna risk your corpse being somewhere weird and having to collect it. But I'm not much of a platforming fan, each to their own. I feel like wall jumping is a bit twitchy and imprecise enough that you can end up skipping into spikes and stuff too so it ends up feeling frustrating.
I really enjoyed DA2 myself, in some ways more than DA1. The improved animations are definitely great, I like how Mages are basically kinda like staff wielding jedis in close combat.
There was the whole "push button to attack" nonsense they tried to force onto the console players, which did earn the developers a lot of mockery. Having to spam a button to autoattack does not an action game make.
It does have a lot of issues though. Dungeons are way too blatantly copypasted. Some areas just have unceasing hordes of chump enemies swarming you for no good reason. Just taking a walk through Kirkwall can get you accosted by a battalion of random ass bandits. I think DA:O had much better level and encounter design. Whereas DA2 had a lot of here's the same cellar, just rotated 90 degrees and its full of the fantasy equivalent of storm troopers.
Fundamentally the gameplay isn't that much different from DA:O. I still felt at home with it. Whereas DA:I completely alienated and annoyed the shit out of me such that I didn't play past the first few hours.
I feel like every game should have the "smug asshole" dialogue option if you don't want to go with either alignment.
I've never really had too much of an issue with DA2's reuse of dungeons. Sure, you will visit the same warehouse, and the same cave, 5 or 6 times during a single playthrough, but at least you are only in there for about 10 minutes, tops.
In Dragon Age Origins, sure, the settings are unique - well, about as unique as you can make a grey stone hallway - but each dungeon far outstayed its welcome. Areas like the Deep Roads, the Tower of Magi, and the Tower of Ishal really tested my patience.
Honestly, if was a choice between spending an hour running through a samey dungeon all at once, or an hour spread across a 30+ hours, I'd take the latter.
Of course, im not really defending DA2's approach. More variety would have been nice, and these repeated dungeons were often differentiated in hilariously lazy ways, but I never really saw it as the game-crippling flaw that many others do. It just really shows how rushed the game was (18 months?).
I'm back on Blood Bowl 2, taking my Chaos Team through a league in a storm of violence.
Finally finished Plague Tails: Innocence! Ta for the upped framerate, devs: those rat technologies look impressive especially late game. What a journey. Escalation between elements of narrative, options and challenge plays an interesting balance I don't see often. On the hard difficulty at least, perhaps it's different for the others. Not sure if I dreamt it, but the announced sequel should be quite intriguing indeed if it was real at all. Not wanting to spoil anything, but hmmm squeeee! (If real!)
That's one of those games I want to play but kind of just stopped playing about 2-3 hours in, and never picked back up. Not sure why, I can't really say anything was bad about it. It just didn't really grab me.