What are you currently playing?

[SupahEwok]

and not just because they really want to rescue former president dude who is also really important.

AC4, 5, and 0 are the main favorites of the series, and 7 makes a LOT of callbacks to 4 and 5 in particular. The "former president dude" was a major character in 5, so a longtime fan of the series will have more of a buy-in to the motivation of rescuing him than you do.

 

[Dalisclock]

AC4, 5, and 0 are the main favorites of the series, and 7 makes a LOT of callbacks to 4 and 5 in particular. The "former president dude" was a major character in 5, so a longtime fan of the series will have more of a buy-in to the motivation of rescuing him than you do.

Fair enough. I knew he was a big deal in one of the earlier games but not having played them I'll take your word for it. I browsed the timeline on the Ace Wiki and I think I got the gist of all the big events up to this point....all 30 years of it.

Also, while the quality of the cutscenes are top notch from a technical viewpoint, I recently saw the one with the Princess landing at the desert airstrip. I know it's supposed to be moving but it comes across as unintentionally weird looking, both due to the photoshopped golden lab in the scene and the head scientist who spends a lot of time glaring at the 10 and 15 year old girls who are hanging around the seedy bar/hanger waiting for grandpa to finish up(in a way that I hope isn't a prelude to him getting busted on "To Catch a Predator"). Yeah, a minor issue for sure but one of those things that distracts from the intended affect.

I am really enjoying the game so far, though it's hard to take it nearly as seriously as it wants me to take it for reasons like the above. There's also the Rescue mission where you need to Sneak up to the Lighthouse past gaps in the radar fields in a supersonic military fighter jet, which are well known for being quiet and inconspicuous /Sarcasm.

 

[SupahEwok]

I am really enjoying the game so far, though it's hard to take it nearly as seriously as it wants me to take it for reasons like the above.

The series overall (by which I mean, the PS2 trilogy of 4, 5, and 0, which were the smash hits of the franchise) is Gundam by way of Topgun. The story is melodramatic and thematic, rather than grounded or analytical. You can either buy into it or laugh at it, and get the same amount of enjoyment either way.

That said, the story for 7 is a bit of a mess. The cutscenes have a rather severe case of separation from the story of the gameplay, since the story of the cutscenes focuses on a cast of side characters who only occasionally have a role in the story told through the missions. And I feel that the emotional buy-in of the player is going to be focused on the cast used during the missions due to that being what the player is actually playing through and investing in.

 

[Chimpzy]

Fahrenheit aka Indigo Prophecy for you yanks.

Well, it sure is a David Cage game. Dude's in the tutorial, being a ponce stuck up his own ass. I wanted to punch him so bad. Then actual game, which is ok so far. My owly other experiences with Quantic Dream games are Omikron and Heavy Rain, and this comes across kind of like a slightly more gamey proto-version of the latter. Voice acting's decent, music is kind of nice. Controls are ok, when they don't seem to randomly change at the least opportune time (not that there's any good time for controls to randomly change). Might be down to me using a PS4 controller for it tho.

 

[Dalisclock]

Fahrenheit aka Indigo Prophecy for you yanks.

Well, it sure is a David Cage game. Dude's in the tutorial, being a ponce stuck up his own ass. I wanted to punch him so bad.

Glad I'm not the only one. That Tutorial annoyed the shit out of me, mostly because of him.

I like the idea behind the game but some of the ideas are cool(like a morale meter that changes based on what happens around you) but the whole game is a mess....probably not a spoiler, you'll get to a point where it feels like (at least) a couple hours of gameplay literally vanished and the game proceeds as if nothing happened. Apparently Cage planned for a much longer game and budget issues or something caused cuts...but his solution was just to cut out like the back half of the game so a lot of the late events feel like they just happen without making any sense or having any real impact other then "WTF?".

Xenogears was at least nice enough to give you the rest of the plot in cliff notes and cutscenes when faced with a similar scenario, which caused it's own problems but at least you could say you understood what was going on(even if it was batshit anime all the way down).

 

[Dalisclock]

The series overall (by which I mean, the PS2 trilogy of 4, 5, and 0, which were the smash hits of the franchise) is Gundam by way of Topgun. The story is melodramatic and thematic, rather than grounded or analytical. You can either buy into it or laugh at it, and get the same amount of enjoyment either way.

That said, the story for 7 is a bit of a mess. The cutscenes have a rather severe case of separation from the story of the gameplay, since the story of the cutscenes focuses on a cast of side characters who only occasionally have a role in the story told through the missions. And I feel that the emotional buy-in of the player is going to be focused on the cast used during the missions due to that being what the player is actually playing through and investing in.

Didn't 6 have a whole bunch of cutscenes about an Air Force wife having the worst day ever(presumably) juxaposed with the actual gameplay? I remember seeing some of that and feeling kind of the same way. Yeah, it does feel like the cutscenes are only tangentially related to the game I'm actually playing, even if they are well produced and generally interesting. All I know about Trigger so far is what people say during the missions because he's never shown on screen and he doesn't talk during the missions(so far at least).

 

[MetalDooley]

Vikings: Wolves of Midgard

It's a Diablo style action RPG with a Norse myth story. Not the greatest game ever made but if you just want to mindlessly kill various mythological creatures and humans by the hundreds it does the job. Only negative I have is the hit detection is a bit iffy at times. Sometimes enemies will clearly miss but still damage you or you'll hit an enemy but it doesn't register. Other than that it's decent enough

 

[SupahEwok]

Didn't 6 have a whole bunch of cutscenes about an Air Force wife having the worst day ever(presumably) juxaposed with the actual gameplay? I remember seeing some of that and feeling kind of the same way. Yeah, it does feel like the cutscenes are only tangentially related to the game I'm actually playing, even if they are well produced and generally interesting. All I know about Trigger so far is what people say during the missions because he's never shown on screen and he doesn't talk during the missions(so far at least).

I wasnt able to play 6 because it ran strangely on my brother's xbox (something like 10 frames a second, and the game speed is timed to the frame speed so the whole game was in slow-mo).

I would call 5 the best told story simply because its cutscenes are a natural extension of what goes on in the gameplay, like a normal game. Many people prefer 4, but I found 4 inneffective for the same reasons as 7; 4 follows a couple of war refugees who meet and stay with an enemy squadron that you fight in the missions, and you furthermore didn't have a strong supporting cast for the standard audience-insert silent protagonist, so you have no real feeling attached to "your side". 0 was interesting, and the only case where I felt that not focusing on the main cast in the cutscenes worked. You followed a journalist who is researching the player character and the conflict at large many years after the fact, which frames the whole game as a massive flashback. There's also a branching narrative. The branches don't affect much, mainly it's the named enemy squadrons you face, but the journalist interviews those same squadrons in the "present day" of the cutscenes about the player character. It's a neat affect.

Overall, it's not a series strong on narrative cohesion. It's more about painting with big and obvious themes to provide atmosphere for the gameplay.

 

[Kae]

I finally managed to get into something, been playing Fallout: New Vegas for the past 20 hours, I'm a bit surprised as I normally don't get into open world games and I've mostly been exploring random places and bumping into the occasional quest, the world is fairly interesting though and I kinda like how the game strongly suggests you to side with NCR but still giving you the option not to, while so far at least strongly implying that NCR is as nice as they pretend they are, especially with all the hints about the Khans, but if I'm honest I haven't really engaged with the story all that much as I still need work out the kinks of the game and like I said I'm mostly just exploring.

This is the first time playing it for more than 2 hours BTW, so I don't really know which factions are join-able nor which endings are possible.

 

[Dalisclock]

. 0 was interesting, and the only case where I felt that not focusing on the main cast in the cutscenes worked. You followed a journalist who is researching the player character and the conflict at large many years after the fact, which frames the whole game as a massive flashback. There's also a branching narrative. The branches don't affect much, mainly it's the named enemy squadrons you face, but the journalist interviews those same squadrons in the "present day" of the cutscenes about the player character. It's a neat affect.

Overall, it's not a series strong on narrative cohesion. It's more about painting with big and obvious themes to provide atmosphere for the gameplay.

That actually does sound like an interesting Narrative Device. If/when I end up playing another one of these, I'll see if I can find Zero. Granted, I have like 15 more missions of this one left so one thing at a time.

Considring in 7, I only know the other characters I actually interact with from their chatter over the radio, it does a pretty decent job of letting me get to know them. The incesstantly dickish commentary from Spare Squadron command is an interesting touch, though considering the rest of the pilots in Spare Squadron I can't say I'm suprised at all.

 

[Chupathingy]

This is the first time playing it for more than 2 hours BTW, so I don't really know which factions are join-able nor which endings are possible.

There are four main factions which can be joined as part of the main quest. The game will make it very obvious who they are at a certain point in the main questline. Each of the four factions has their own main ending (with slight variations depending on the player decisions). Almost every other minor faction and major/supporting character has their own ending, which are often significantly or slightly altered by which faction you align yourself with.

That actually does sound like an interesting Narrative Device. If/when I end up playing another one of these, I'll see if I can find Zero. Granted, I have like 15 more missions of this one left so one thing at a time.

If you do end up enjoying AC7 and wanting to play more, make sure you at least play 4, 5 and 0 in release order. That way works best both mechanically and narratively.

 

[Kyrian007]

I finally managed to get into something, been playing Fallout: New Vegas for the past 20 hours, I'm a bit surprised as I normally don't get into open world games and I've mostly been exploring random places and bumping into the occasional quest, the world is fairly interesting though and I kinda like how the game strongly suggests you to side with NCR but still giving you the option not to, while so far at least strongly implying that NCR is as nice as they pretend they are, especially with all the hints about the Khans, but if I'm honest I haven't really engaged with the story all that much as I still need work out the kinks of the game and like I said I'm mostly just exploring.

This is the first time playing it for more than 2 hours BTW, so I don't really know which factions are join-able nor which endings are possible.

You're in for a treat. Definitely not wishing to spoil anything, the first faction I chose wound up asking me to do something in a mission... that I would not do. And it was a story mission, blocking progress. So I changed factions, and found out that faction would ask me to do the same thing. To get through the game without doing something my character would not under any circumstances do, I had to usurp the plan of a character I profoundly disliked. Its the kind of agonizing decision few videogames have presented to me. In one sense I became the villain, to save others I cared about. I hope you enjoy your first run through New Vegas as much as I did.

What am I playing now. I went back to My Time at Portia. They've added some new content so I started a new character. In the midst of a global pandemic and a more isolated and depressing time... I kind of needed some of its Disneyesque idyllic version of a post-apocalyptic world rather than just another game where I run around and shoot dudes. Fairly soon I'll probably tire of all the twee, maybe in time for the next Borderlands 3 DLC.

 

[Silvanus]

Finally finished Xenoblade Chronicles 2 today. It was the first game I got on Switch, at XMas 2017, but I took a year-and-a-half hiatus until lockdown finally gave me the push to pick it back up again.

Glad i did, ended up enjoying it quite a lot. They really needed to cut down the cutscenes, though, particularly in the last few chapters...

 

[Drathnoxis]

I've been playing a lot of Civ V, but I think when I'm done my current game that'll be enough.

Some people were talking about Crusader Kings II on Shamus' blog and it made me want to give it another attempt. So I booted it up and spent about 2 hours making a game, clicking through a billion menus trying to comprehend what I was looking at, before saying screw it and just letting the game run for a couple months with no idea what was really going on. I think that's about scratched my CKII itch again. I just don't think the game is for me. The map is so huge, there's about a thousand different characters I don't care about, and I'm terrible at coming up with my own fun. Also I'm not interested at all in history, which this game seems to be very big on.

 

[Kae]

There are four main factions which can be joined as part of the main quest. The game will make it very obvious who they are at a certain point in the main questline. Each of the four factions has their own main ending (with slight variations depending on the player decisions). Almost every other minor faction and major/supporting character has their own ending, which are often significantly or slightly altered by which faction you align yourself with.

I meant to say they aren't as nice as they pretend they are, but I guess that since I hadn't slept because I was busy playing Fallout NV my lack of concentration made me say exactly the opposite, also I haven't been doing any faction missions yet so I wouldn't know but I already found the Great Khan's camp so now I know they aren't as nice as they pretend to be.

As for the story, well I've liked Chris Avellone's work as lead writer in other games, primarily Planescape Torment & KOTOR 2 so really, I'm hoping I'll like it which is the reason why I'm playing NV rather than Fallout 3 or 4, I'll admit that I could've gone for Fallout 2 since that's also by the same staff as Planescape but even though I do like the 1st Fallout (The only one I've really played) I wasn't really in the mood to play a more traditional RPG, so Fallout NV it is.

I do know that Chris Avellone likes to go for really complex morals in his stories so I'm kind off expecting that.

 

[Anti-American Eagle]

I'm currently replaying Binary Domain, because it's a fantastic shooter with the satisfying feeling of blowing robots apart.

 

[Dalisclock]

I've been playing a lot of Civ V, but I think when I'm done my current game that'll be enough.

Some people were talking about Crusader Kings II on Shamus' blog and it made me want to give it another attempt. So I booted it up and spent about 2 hours making a game, clicking through a billion menus trying to comprehend what I was looking at, before saying screw it and just letting the game run for a couple months with no idea what was really going on. I think that's about scratched my CKII itch again. I just don't think the game is for me. The map is so huge, there's about a thousand different characters I don't care about, and I'm terrible at coming up with my own fun. Also I'm not interested at all in history, which this game seems to be very big on.

I am interested in history but I have much the same problem. I've tried a couple times to get into CK2 and it's so far eluded me. Trying to conquer your neighbors doesn't feel super initiative, trying to figure out how to manipulate the people in your family and court to get good things out of it and I don't really know what I'm doing for most of it.

Which is wierd because I picked up on Stellaris without too much trouble so maybe Stellaris was just easier to learn?

I keep thinking CK2 will no doubt be amazing once I figure out how to play it well....but trying to get there is a massive difficulty/curve hump and I haven't been able to put in the time lately to get there.

CIV5 I can figure out how it works fairly easily even if I'm not terribly good at actually winning games of CIV5. CK2 I feel like there's basic "How to do well at this game" concepts I'm just not aware of.

 

[Phoenixmgs]

I'm currently replaying Binary Domain, because it's a fantastic shooter with the satisfying feeling of blowing robots apart.

Binary Domain is such an underrated gem, it has its flaws but it's a game I will always fondly remember.

 

[Chimpzy]

Finished up Fahrenheit (aka Indigo Prophecy). Yeah, I think that'll be enough David Cage for a while.

I'll be playing Panzer Dragoon Orta now. It has something in common with Fahrenheit in that I have no idea wtf is going on, but at least I'm riding a sickass dragon and blasting shit with my zappy lasers instead of doing another creepy sex/shower/woman in her underwear scene (or a combination thereof).

 

[Drathnoxis]

I am interested in history but I have much the same problem. I've tried a couple times to get into CK2 and it's so far eluded me. Trying to conquer your neighbors doesn't feel super initiative, trying to figure out how to manipulate the people in your family and court to get good things out of it and I don't really know what I'm doing for most of it.

Which is wierd because I picked up on Stellaris without too much trouble so maybe Stellaris was just easier to learn?

I keep thinking CK2 will no doubt be amazing once I figure out how to play it well....but trying to get there is a massive difficulty/curve hump and I haven't been able to put in the time lately to get there.

CIV5 I can figure out how it works fairly easily even if I'm not terribly good at actually winning games of CIV5. CK2 I feel like there's basic "How to do well at this game" concepts I'm just not aware of.

Stellaris is definitely far easier to learn. Stellaris is pretty straightforward. Build ships, colonize planets, click on doom fleet and then click on who to kill. On Crusader Kings, It took me like 15 minute to even be able to figure out exactly what constitutes my property and what my capital city is. To be honest, I'm still not sure if the city my duke is living in is even considered the capital.