That daily game progress thread...

[Silent-Runner]

finished Endling: Extinction is forever. Well, that was a great game. Not for everyone, but i really liked it.

[twonha]

https://youtu.be/jHXbYX4ylXc?t=56 (there are spoilers to be found, of course, this is footage from probably halfway into the game).

So. You drive out to this farm for a mission. There are two goons outside attacking the farm, and you can kill them if you want, but the AI sentry has them covered if you don't.

You drive into the camp, walk up to this AI character. The two exchange a handful of words. Mission complete.

What's that I said about getting the feeling the developers ran out of creativity (and/or time) for this game?

[ugly]

I played through Valfaris.

It's a pixel art (more like Playstation era 2D graphics) side-scroller shooter with a heavy metal theme. So it plays a bit like a Contra style game. Not much to describe. You run around and shoot things. There are a few bosses, there is some platforming. You also climb from things and hang from things while shooting. It's fun.

As you progress you gain new weapons. You can upgrade each weapon with collectibles. There is a checkpoint system there is a consumable item to save the checkpoint. The more of the items you have, the more health you have. And at the end of each level you can convert a few extra checkpoint items to the upgrade collectibles. So there is a bit of a balance, but on your first playthrough you'll probably just save at every checkpoint.

The game uses a combination of a default weapon with unlimited ammo, a special weapon that consumes a power supply, and a melee weapon that restores the power supply as you hit enemies. So there's a balance in the combat.

The difficulty is reasonable. The first time through you'll die a lot. The second time through you can skip a number of checkpoints and will die a lot less. The game is never frustrating and doesn't suffer from a lot of cheap kills.

Only a few nitpicks. You don't have any idea of how many weapons you collect, or the number of upgrade items are available. You also have no idea how the weapons differ until after you upgrade them (there's a basic description but it doesn't help much). But once you upgrade, I don't think you can revert. It turns out you can only fully upgrade a few weapons, and if you use up the upgrades early on you kind of screw yourself.

There is limited dialog to give a basic plot. But there were a few times where I accidentally skipped a dialog box, and if you die and respawn the game doesn't repeat the dialog. Good for pacing on the game, but it sucks when you actually wanted to have a second chance to read something.

The game is fairly short. Beatable in under 10 hours. And probably like 3 on a second playthrough. The game has a 2nd harder mode that unlocks so it has a bit of replayability.

Overall, I liked it. Good for a cheap purchase on a game you don't need to spend a ton of time on.

[Spencer]

Still obsessing over graphics nods that improve the looks of Witcher 3 like HD Reworked, Phoenix Lighting and others. And waiting for next week's Next Gen Update.

[nutcrackr]

Playing Prodeus now. It's a pretty simple shooter but there are definitely aspects to appreciate, like level design.

[nutcrackr]

Finished The Quarry, and half of my characters died. Thought some were a bit random but whatever it was a decent game.

[twonha]

So, I get to the part in Days Gone where the game tells you: "This is it, buy your gear, there's no coming back from this point onward", as open world games do by the time you're on the final few missions.

...and then I ride into a whole new territory, large enough to look like I'm not on the final 5%, but 30%.

God damnit this nonsensical game drags on.

[Jaillum Malord]

just finished RE8 Village: Shadow of Rose DLC. Can now concentrate of finishing Horizon Zero Dawn.

[nutcrackr]

Finished Metal: Hellsinger and enjoyed it surprisingly. I'm not a big metal fan but it works fairly well here. Shooting with the beat is fairly satisfying. Definitely a decent short game

Played Choo-Choo Charles and thought it was terrible. Crude in many ways, boring, not that scary etc. Although I can kinda see a template here that would work with a lot of refinement.

Started A Plague Tale: Requiem and so far I have mixed feelings. It looks amazing, story seems fine, runs well, lots of great little touches. However so far the stealth feels clunky and annoying. It's often too rigid in what it wants you to do. And I had one section where the AI were literally cheating as I moved left and right behind a box...they mirrored my movements exactly. Also they didn't seem to return to to their normal patrols and I'm not sure if that's a bug or by design.

[twonha]

God damnit this nonsensical game drags on.

Made it to the credits in Days Gone. It's a cool game, but the writing really lets it down. Now that the campaign is finished, I'm actually looking forward to doing a few more side quests, just to enjoy the game's core mechanics.

[nutcrackr]

Vampire Survivors was pretty addictive for like 8 hours but I've probably played enough.

Eternal Threads is a cool concept and has okay characters etc but I found it mostly boring and a repetitive slog

Pentiment is quite an interesting and a neat dialogue RPG, Finished Act 1 and ready to dive in for more.

[KAC]

Finished Gotham Knights. A solid 7.5/10 from me. Batgirl's model is one of the best female models created in a video game.

[twonha]

So, got myself a MS Game Pass for €1 again - apparently I hadn't used the deal on the Ultimate version yet.

Installed:
* A Plague Tale: Requiem
* Prodeus
* Tunic
* Death Stranding
* Lego Star Wars: Skywalker Saga
* Mass Effect Legendary Edition

I think I'll start with Prodeus, as it's the shortest game of the bunch, and I could use something fun and quick after the long Days Gone campaign. And I might skip on Death Stranding for this month, if it's true that it's the Epic Store free game of the day.

[nutcrackr]

Playing NFS Unbound and it's basically just NFS Heat 1.1 but keeps me entertained and I'll finish it (playing via EA Play Pro)

Pentiment was quite a good adventure/RPG but I wasn't a fan of the ending.

I'm also spending way too much time playing DMZ in Modern Warfare II and have already ranked to 250 (max s1) and finished the battle pass. Battle pass is much less of a grind this year

[KAC]

Finished God of War Ragnarok. 10/10. FTR.

[nutcrackr]

Finished NFS Unbound. Pretty fun and much like Heat, took me 21 hours so decent amount of content

Started Elden Ring. Have yet to finish a souls game so who knows how far I'll get in this one. So far I'm going okay but don't really know what I'm doing.

[twonha]

So far I'm going okay but don't really know what I'm doing.

That's basically how I got to the credits.

A friend of mine gave me a lot of tips, and I used wiki's for just about everything ("wtf does this item do? Where do I go for this quest? Who am I talking to? What is this? Where am I? How do swords work? Pls send help"). I think Elden Ring is one of those rare games where spoilers are part of the fun, not something to avoid.

[Silent-Runner]

So, got myself a MS Game Pass for €1 again - apparently I hadn't used the deal on the Ultimate version yet.

Installed:
* A Plague Tale: Requiem
* Prodeus
* Tunic
* Death Stranding
* Lego Star Wars: Skywalker Saga
* Mass Effect Legendary Edition

I think I'll start with Prodeus, as it's the shortest game of the bunch, and I could use something fun and quick after the long Days Gone campaign. And I might skip on Death Stranding for this month, if it's true that it's the Epic Store free game of the day.

i'm almost sure you will like Tunic, don't be fooled by the cute graphics, the game is tough as nails in some parts. But overall i really loved it.

[KAC]

Finished High on Life. 6 pieces of crap / 10.

[twonha]

I've started playing Mass Effect (2007), through the Legendary Edition. I hardly know a thing about Mass Effect, just that it's an epic sci fi space drama RPG with guns.

It's easy to see this is a big game in a vast universe, but it's also very rough around the edges. Stiff animation, drab level design, some iffy voice acting. From what I remember, games like Half-Life 2, Assassin's Creed and Halo 3 least looked and felt a lot better. Hopefully, that means Mass Effect's strengths lie elsewhere, and I'll come across those soon enough.

[KAC]

Mass Effect are dope af games. ME1 is the roughest but also with the best story. ME2 has tighter gameplay and focused storyline but felt small (to me). ME3 was massive like my.. but overall has the weakest story, the most refined gameplay and an ending that made me want to break stuff and burn EA's headquarters.

ME Andromeda though was a tight game that got panned because there was no Sepherd and nerds lost their shite on that one. I loved it though and spent probably the most time in Andromeda.

[Lazy8s]

I’ve been working my way through Metro Exodus. It’s kind of bland and boring so far. The first game pulled me in much more than this is.

[nutcrackr]

I’ve been working my way through Metro Exodus. It’s kind of bland and boring so far. The first game pulled me in much more than this is.

Did you play Metro Last Light?

[KAC]

Probably because it doesn't have bosses with Alzheimer's temperament and you can crawl behind everyone and dick punch them to sleep.

[Lazy8s]

Did you play Metro Last Light?

I never finished it.

[Munkus]

Finished Uncharted 4, Mafia 2 Definitive Edition, and Plague Tale: Innocense

[ugly]

Timespinner

A competently made Metroidvania game. It's solid, it checks all the Metroidvania boxes. It's got nice pixel art graphics. Music is fine. I think one of the areas even pretty closely rips off the music from Bloodstained. There's a time travel element to it. It has a moderately interesting storyline, particularly with regards to war and recognizing that your side might not always be the good side. The game is good. For the most part, it suffers from being yet another indie Metroidvania game in a sea of Metroidvania games.

I enjoyed the game. I'll focus on the negative because iif you like Metroidvanias, you'll probably like this game. These are mostly nitpicks.

- The game is ridiculously easy. You can mostly just stand there and spam your attack and you'll do just fine. Even against the bosses. Some enemies have specific elemental weaknesses. It doesn't matter. You'll kill everything before you come close to dying. The game has the standard 'reverse dash' for dodge, and I didn't even know about it until I accidentally pressed a button. I never needed it. The game has a nightmare mode, but it's locked until you beat it once and it's kind of unbalanced. Early on you get killed in two hits, which is quite difficult. But once you get about halfway through the game is fairly easy again. But a more reasonable challenge where dying before reaching a save point is actually a concern.

- There's time travel as a story element, but I don't think they used it as well as they could have. You don't get a really good feel that you're changing things. And I think only in one spot did they have something you do in the past open up access to an item in the future.

- I think the game was a kickstarter or something. It's probably a perfect example of a game that likely overreached on stretch goals. They included a lot of concepts in the game, but even though they didn't feel half-assed, they just felt a bit shallow and didn't really help the final product. There's sort of a crafting system, but it's not necessary. You can shop, but there's not much to buy. You can have familiars fight alongside you, but they mostly do nothing (and the game is already easy). You attack using different types of orbs that have both different attack types and elemental attributes, but the enemies are so weak that it's not needed. And there are more orb types than you really even need to use. Your character has levels, your familiars level up separately, and so do your orbs, so it's all a but much. It just seemed like they crammed too many ideas in, and didn't really flesh them out.

- Like most Metroidvania games, enemies randomly drop loot and sometimes drop rarer items. So you can grind for them, but it's all pointless because no matter what type of items you get, you always end up wearing all the luck boosting gear so you have a better chance of getting all the rare drops.

As a side comment, in case it is something that bothers you, the game is super woke. It doesn't really start out that way. Then partway through there's a collectible note that mentions a female character having a wife. Then there are a few suggestive jokes, and one of your side-quests is setting up two male characters. But by the end there's a scene where all the characters sit around and talk about how they're all LGBTQ. Regardless of whether you care about inclusiveness or not, it was a bit ham-fisted and kludgey.

[Silent-Runner]

finished Ikonei Island: An Earthlock Adventure. A very relaxed survival island building game.

Got Dinkum for my wife, we're playing the co-Op part, it's also very laid back.

[twonha]

I've started playing Mass Effect (2007), through the Legendary Edition. I hardly know a thing about Mass Effect, just that it's an epic sci fi space drama RPG with guns.

It's easy to see this is a big game in a vast universe, but it's also very rough around the edges. Stiff animation, drab level design, some iffy voice acting. From what I remember, games like Half-Life 2, Assassin's Creed and Halo 3 least looked and felt a lot better. Hopefully, that means Mass Effect's strengths lie elsewhere, and I'll come across those soon enough.

Finished it. It's refreshing to play a AAA game with a big (semi-) open world, that has a campaign of under 20 hours. I skipped almost all sidequests, focusing on the main quest. Mass Effect 1's action gameplay is archaic, and Mass Effect 2 is said to be so much better, so I figured I'd get to ME2 as quickly as possible.

Overall, the draws are this whole new universe to engulf yourself in, and the story of the threatened Reaper invasion. The story was fun, but by 2023 standards I think it's clichéd. The Reapers felt very similar to Halo's Flood. I'm not sure how this was perceived back in 2007, but the parallels between these two leading franchises for the Xbox are too many to go by unnoticed.

Still, I had fun getting to know the Mass Effect universe, and look forward to starting ME2 some time soon.

[Lazy8s]

I started Jedi Fallen Order today. Quite the good looking game, solid gameplay too. Enjoying it quite a bit so far.

[ugly]

The key on my keyboard has finally orn out. Must be from alking forard in first person games all the time.

[Lazy8s]

The key on my keyboard has finally orn out. Must be from alking forard in first person games all the time.

At least you progressed?

[Silent-Runner]

almost done with Röki. A very dark adventure game. Loving it so far.

[nutcrackr]

Played through Detroit Become Human and really enjoyed it. Some aspects were a bit mehtacular, like I thought the android revolution was a bit overdone although at least it finished strong. I much preferred all the chapters with kara and connor., especially in the first half. The detective stuff is where I think it gets quite strong at times with setting and delivery. The QTEs are still dumb. The swipe actions are bleh. But the story is greats, characters are interesting, and it hits some emotional points and is probably the second best Quantic Dream game behind Heavy Rain.

[Silent-Runner]

finished Röki. Phew, that was a ride for sure, very dark, very adult themed. Great game overall, although not for the masses.

Played through the demo of Wigmund, a cool looking adventure game from a very small dev team. Worth a look and maybe worth the 15 bucks they're asking for the full game if you like what they offer.

[theshadowcult]

finished Röki. Phew, that was a ride for sure, very dark, very adult themed. Great game overall, although not for the masses.

Played through the demo of Wigmund, a cool looking adventure game from a very small dev team. Worth a look and maybe worth the 15 bucks they're asking for the full game if you like what they offer.

Adventure game? Isnt Wigmund a diablo clone with crafting and some survival throne in?

[Silent-Runner]

Adventure game? Isnt Wigmund a diablo clone with crafting and some survival throne in?

they called it an RPG, but yes, it has some Diablo vibes to it. Unlike Diablo though it has crafting, leveling and other stuff.

Defeat the evil Antiochus as you fight his malefic servants in this open-world fantasy action RPG with a unique, real-time combat game-play. Crafting, fishing, hunting, cooking, talents, professions and many other things are at hand.

Of course it's not an AAA game, but for what it is it's actually well done.

[twonha]

Friend of mine said "Wanna play Valheim?"

...and there goes another hundred hours of chopping trees, interior decorating and exploring the Viking seas.

[ugly]

Castlevania Dracula X

One of the games in the Castlevania Advance Collection. This was originally released on the SNES in 1995. It's a standard platformer, boss at the end of the level game and doesn't have any Metroid aspects. I remember thinking it was really good when I played it originally, but replaying it now, this was a pretty weak entry in the series.

Other than a backflip move to help dodge and a weapon crash special attack, there isn't much new (at the time) in this game. It didn't use the Indiana Jones whip swings or mutli-directional attacks that Super Castlevania IV did, or the multiple characters that Castlevania III had. The graphics do look good for the era.

The main problem with the game is how frustrating it is. For the most part it's pretty easy and short, and gives you passwords for each level and unlimited continues. But almost all of the difficulty in this game is cheap pitfalls, where enemies spawn mid-jump for the insta-kill. Even the final boss is a long slog of a fight on a series of platforms where you can easily fall to your death. The game has a couple of secret levels that you can take to get a better ending (basically just a different picture at the credits). And that, predictably, involves avoiding a pitfall in a particular level that sends you down an alternate path.

[nutcrackr]

Have played about 6 hours of Far Cry 6. I thought the first hour or so was pretty trash, the starter island is just meh. I feel like the game really just over complicates the formula with different ammo types and the supremo backpack and gear and mods. Some enemies are real bullet sponges if you don't hit their head. Even the movement feels clunky and slow. And my god the AI is atrocious sometimes. Having blue flowers on libertad trails is just so gamey and unnatural imo. Horse riding is crap. Tutorials pop up every few minutes because the game is literal garbage at explaining things otherwise ( blood dragon made a joke of popup tutorials and this does exactly the same thing). Even the wingsuit is clunky because the stupid parachute doesn't deploy if you;re close to the ground. I find the amigos to be bad because enemies will see them and go crazy, ruining stealth.

Now I'm on the main island things aren't so bad. Maybe I'm just used to all the trash gameplay decisions. Missions are okay, most at least let you stealth if you want and stealth generally is beneficial. It feels like Just Cause 3 + Far Cry 4 but it's nowhere near as fluent as JC3.

I'll keep playing and try to finish it but so far it's probably my least favorite game in the series.