December 2023 General Discussion Thread

[ZedClampet]

The Adventures of an Idiot
or
Who Needs Dark Souls When You're an Idiot and have Ranch Simulator?

deleted

Edit: The story was way too long. No one was going to read it. Was hilarious to me, though. I don't think I've ever had that many things go wrong in a single playthrough of any game before. It was almost on the level of my actual life.

 

[neogunhero]

I use Walmart a lot, too. I basically never go to stores anymore. The cool thing about them is that I'll order something and a short while later I'll get a text that it's been delivered, and, sure enough, it's on my porch.

Having physical stores all across the country definitely helps with that. I’ve ordered from Walmart plenty of times and it’s usually here in less than 2 days if it’s something they don’t have at my local store. It might be the same for Amazon if you lived near a distribution center, but Walmart stores are much more common across the country.

 

[ZedClampet]

Having physical stores all across the country definitely helps with that. I’ve ordered from Walmart plenty of times and it’s usually here in less than 2 days if it’s something they don’t have at my local store. It might be the same for Amazon if you lived near a distribution center, but Walmart stores are much more common across the country.

Amazon is opening up 2 distribution centers here, strangely enough. One of them is going to be next to the airport, and the other one is going into a huge, defunct mall. I'm hoping for drone service . Maybe it will be like Watch Dogs 3, and I can hop on top of one and take a ride.

 

[Colif]

Amazon is great for convenience especially when you live 2 hours from the closest Best Buy and 4 hours away from the closest MicroCenter. You can’t depend on Walmart for everything in my specific case, not even just PC hardware.

I live entire countries away from both of those. The closest useful PC shop is probably 4 hours away... I don't know, I always have to order anything I want from another city. The only PC stores here worth buying off don't have anything but are franchises so can get it within a few days. Ordering off Scamazon wouldn't reduce the delivery time, they don't do the same day delivery here.

 

[DXCHASE]

Amazon is opening up 2 distribution centers here, strangely enough. One of them is going to be next to the airport, and the other one is going into a huge, defunct mall. I'm hoping for drone service . Maybe it will be like Watch Dogs 3, and I can hop on top of one and take a ride.

As someone who lives roughly 5 minutes from an amazon distribution center (the center is outside of the residential area i live in) alls it means is that i dont get any packages from them until 4-5pm or later and they dont offer drone service lol.

 

[Zloth]

Do you guys have a weird quirk that you like to do in games?

Whenever some NPC says how wonderful I am for completing their quest, I do a little jump. That's as close to a "you're welcome" as most games let me get.

 

[Sarafan]

Someone else may have said it here as well, but it seems Epic would have been way better off funding and publishing succesful original games and developing the stores features. Rather than giving away a load of games that loads of people claimed and proceeded to ignore.

That would probably be wiser, if we're talking about financials. Epic generates big losses every year. It appears that giveaways don't encourage people to buy things on the platform. The company should gradually end this policy and focus on the things that you mentioned. They can't cope with the losses forever.

 

[Pifanjr]

Someone else may have said it here as well, but it seems Epic would have been way better off funding and publishing succesful original games and developing the stores features. Rather than giving away a load of games that loads of people claimed and proceeded to ignore.

Isn't that exactly what EA and Ubisoft tried? I'm pretty sure most of their games are now available on Steam again because it's just not worth it to try to force people to use their store.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Isn't that exactly what EA and Ubisoft tried? I'm pretty sure most of their games are now available on Steam again because it's just not worth it to try to force people to use their store.

Youre right they did try and fail to do just that for a long time already, but with their own internal franchises. I'd be willing to bet the majority of EA and UBIs biggest selling franchises sell most of their copies on consoles. On top of that I bet a significant portion of big franchise gamers dont care much about other games at all.

I would have definitely bought Alan Wake 2 from Epic Store if it was only available there. I was thinking if they used all that money to help fund and publish some well respected third party studios without interference, they might come up with a bunch of really good highly praised games of different types to have as permanent exclusives, and no one would have blamed them for it. They might even have been praised, especially if they developed the store at the same time to near to Steams standard.

Better than becoming known as the company who bought off devs after the fact to pull games out of Steam like with Metro Exodus, and others I'm probably forgetting. And now the company that binned off huge numbers of its staff because of the egos of upper management.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Played a couple of hours of Lies of P today on Gamepass. Stuck at the second boss for the moment. Game feels good, its not hiding its inspirations. Never played Bloodborne but its definitely Souls like with a few of its own twists that will take some getting used to. The parry system is a bit more involved than DS/ER, theres a couple of extra steps to it I havent got down yet but its fun.

 

[ZedClampet]

Someone else may have said it here as well, but it seems Epic would have been way better off funding and publishing succesful original games and developing the stores features. Rather than giving away a load of games that loads of people claimed and proceeded to ignore.

It's astonishing that, while the store has gotten much better, making it the best it can be doesn't seem to be a priority for Epic.

Personally, if they continue to refuse to add user reviews, I'm simply never going to use them regularly no matter what games they tie up with exclusives. Games are regularly just too bad for me to want to roll the dice on them.

Furthermore, the game descriptions are too brief. You get vastly more information on the game in Steam. Epic is as bad as looking at the box in a physical retail store. Between no user reviews and bad game information, they can just buzz off. If I wanted that experience, I could get a console and shop at GameStop.

Edit to add that they don't have most of the games I want to buy anyway.

 

[neogunhero]

Suffering from a horrible affliction I named “Bored Of Every Game Syndrome”. Symptoms: not knowing what to play, spending money on games you don’t need, scrolling the Steam store and Game Pass catalogue for hours, not having the will to play the games you’ve already started. It’s horrible.

Yesterday I bough DUSK and the new Vampire Survivors x Among Us DLC, ended up being less than $10. I played a bit of both last night. Starting with the VS DLC, I have never played Among Us but I am familiar with its style and I must say, this new level is great. I like VS levels with covers, walls, and lots of different zones, rather than some of the huge open levels they have. This new one is exactly what I like in VS levels, and it’s full of secrets and unlockables. One of the new main features of the DLC is that you pick up little Among Us spacemen (do the character have official names?) that float nearby you and do different stuff. They take up your item slots, and they’re scattered throughout the level, so the best thing to do is to max out your item slots then go pick them up so you can effectively have 12 items and 6 weapons. I only played a few rounds and didn’t get very far, the enemies here seems a slight bit harder than normal. For $2 it’s a steal, Poncle truly blesses us each time they have a new update or DLC.

DUSK on the other hand was busting my chops last night. Playing on second to hardest difficulty, I did not know what I was in for. Those chainsaw guys who run at you really close the gap quickly and you need to be fast with them. I’m playing on the new DUSK HD official mod, but after watching a side by side comparison, I’m going to switch back to the original graphics. The main difference is all the character and item models look more like an early Serious Sam game rather than a mid-late 90s shooter. They don’t look bad, but I think the new models look just ever so slightly out of place when most of the levels didn’t get touched up the same as the models.

I’m going to force myself to stick with DUSK for a while. However, the Steam Winter Sale starts in a few hours…

 

[ZedClampet]

Coin is hard to come by in the original campaign of Medieval Dynasty, and you need a ton of it. I need to make a Medieval Dynasty OnlyFans, but they don't seem to have the Internet yet.

I got frustrated with my solo game. Not just because of the coin, but I also got tired of wooing my potential romantic partner, and then completely lost where she went when winter came. The only reason I want a wife is because she'll be a new worker in my town and I won't have to spend one of my precious buildings on housing her since she'll live with me.

SO, I sort of edited my save file a little bit. I was getting ready to abandon the game, so I don't feel badly for cheating. In order to keep it from being too cheaty, instead of giving myself more money, I just leveled up my villagers a little so they get me a few more resources. Then I gave my girlfriend 100 affection and set it back to autumn so I'd know where she was.

 

[ZedClampet]

Suffering from a horrible affliction I named “Bored Of Every Game Syndrome”. Symptoms: not knowing what to play, spending money on games you don’t need, scrolling the Steam store and Game Pass catalogue for hours, not having the will to play the games you’ve already started. It’s horrible.

I was in this boat as well a couple of months ago, and out of desperation I took a chance on some games I wouldn't normally have bought and ended up loving them, so I bought more games like them, and now I have too much to play.

 

[neogunhero]

Personally, if they continue to refuse to add user reviews, I'm simply never going to use them regularly no matter what games they tie up with exclusives.

What’s mind-boggling to me is that on game pages, there is a User Review Score, but no user reviews. Where are they getting that information from? Can you anonymously rate games on Epic and I’m just unaware of it?

If I wanted that experience, I could get a console and shop at GameStop.

I’m not sure about Playstation, but the Store on my Xbox One is a lot better than EGS. You can actually see and read user reviews, though most of the time they are incredibly unhinged or not well written at all. I suppose that’s what you get when having to use a controller to type.


Epic is only good for the free games. I have only bought 2 games on Epic, both of which are on Steam now (Saints Row 3 Remastered and Journey To The Savage Planet). If you’re a Patient Gamer, everything that is exclusive to EGS will come to Steam eventually, with the exception of a very small handful of titles.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

It's astonishing that, while the store has gotten much better, making it the best it can be doesn't seem to be a priority for Epic.

Personally, if they continue to refuse to add user reviews, I'm simply never going to use them regularly no matter what games they tie up with exclusives. Games are regularly just too bad for me to want to roll the dice on them.

Furthermore, the game descriptions are too brief. You get vastly more information on the game in Steam. Epic is as bad as looking at the box in a physical retail store. Between no user reviews and bad game information, they can just buzz off. If I wanted that experience, I could get a console and shop at GameStop.

Edit to add that they don't have most of the games I want to buy anyway.

I'd forgot they decided against having user reviews. Probably because they didnt want their exclusives bombed with complaints about Epic. Havent even been in it until Alan Wake 2 when I didnt have a choice, at least they have a wishlist now and achievements seem to be working.

What’s mind-boggling to me is that on game pages, there is a User Review Score, but no user reviews. Where are they getting that information from? Can you anonymously rate games on Epic and I’m just unaware of it?

Epic Games Store introduces rating system designed to stop review-bombing

But it does sound a bit annoying.

www.pcgamer.com

They have a survey of randomly selected players who have played at least 2 hours and just show a number. I forgot about that as well

 

[ZedClampet]

They have a survey of randomly selected players who have played at least 2 hours and just show a number. I forgot about that as well

Yes, and not only is that completely unhelpful, but every game I checked (I only looked at a handful) had stellar reviews, which seems like complete BS to me.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Yes, and not only is that completely unhelpful, but every game I checked (I only looked at a handful) had stellar reviews, which seems like complete BS to me.

Yea everything seems to be 4.5+. The tags are pretty funny. Red Dead 2 is 'Great for Beginners' so I'll put the kid on it later. Also Witchfire is 'Extremely Fun' which is good to know I suppose.

 

[BeardyHat]

Suffering from a horrible affliction I named “Bored Of Every Game Syndrome”. Symptoms: not knowing what to play, spending money on games you don’t need, scrolling the Steam store and Game Pass catalogue for hours, not having the will to play the games you’ve already started. It’s horrible.

Yesterday I bough DUSK and the new Vampire Survivors x Among Us DLC, ended up being less than $10. I played a bit of both last night. Starting with the VS DLC, I have never played Among Us but I am familiar with its style and I must say, this new level is great. I like VS levels with covers, walls, and lots of different zones, rather than some of the huge open levels they have. This new one is exactly what I like in VS levels, and it’s full of secrets and unlockables. One of the new main features of the DLC is that you pick up little Among Us spacemen (do the character have official names?) that float nearby you and do different stuff. They take up your item slots, and they’re scattered throughout the level, so the best thing to do is to max out your item slots then go pick them up so you can effectively have 12 items and 6 weapons. I only played a few rounds and didn’t get very far, the enemies here seems a slight bit harder than normal. For $2 it’s a steal, Poncle truly blesses us each time they have a new update or DLC.

DUSK on the other hand was busting my chops last night. Playing on second to hardest difficulty, I did not know what I was in for. Those chainsaw guys who run at you really close the gap quickly and you need to be fast with them. I’m playing on the new DUSK HD official mod, but after watching a side by side comparison, I’m going to switch back to the original graphics. The main difference is all the character and item models look more like an early Serious Sam game rather than a mid-late 90s shooter. They don’t look bad, but I think the new models look just ever so slightly out of place when most of the levels didn’t get touched up the same as the models.

I’m going to force myself to stick with DUSK for a while. However, the Steam Winter Sale starts in a few hours…

DUSK is an absolute favorite of mine; I absolutely adore that game, but perhaps it's just because it was the first of the new generation of Boom Shoots and it was a revelation when I first played it. After years and years of the same Call of Duty type stuff, it was so nice to get back to where the genre began. You've reminded me I need to give DUSK HD a go. At any rate, all that said, much as I adore DUSK, I think Cultic is better and has supplanted DUSK for me.

I get in that funk now and again and usually (not always successful here) I try to just take a break completely until I feel inspired to play something in particular. Usually just end-up watching TV or working on my other hobbies, which is a nice change of pace.

With PC Gamer talking about System Shock remake being their top of the year, been thinking maybe I ought to give that a go again. I put in 11-hours when it first released, but never finished it, in spite of loving the original. All that said, I think I'm also in a bit of a gaming funk, so...

 

[DXCHASE]

Started playing Lethal Company yesterday with my son. First time in a while where 4-5 hours went by like nothing on a new (to me) survival game instead of the usual stuff we play together. @ZedClampet you were right! The game is enjoyable. I dont like how SO MANY ROOMs are just dead ends but, i get it. Its fun and there were def. some good jump scare "RUN RUN RUN" moments.

Heres a pic of a quota i just barely got on the last day after dieing several times in the days before the quota was due lol. Good times. Longest survival date so far (after playing 1 day). 21 days. So im happy with that.

Suffering from a horrible affliction I named “Bored Of Every Game Syndrome”. Symptoms: not knowing what to play, spending money on games you don’t need, scrolling the Steam store and Game Pass catalogue for hours, not having the will to play the games you’ve already started. It’s horrible.



DUSK on the other hand was busting my chops last night. Playing on second to hardest difficulty, I did not know what I was in for. Those chainsaw guys who run at you really close the gap quickly and you need to be fast with them. I’m playing on the new DUSK HD official mod, but after watching a side by side comparison, I’m going to switch back to the original graphics. The main difference is all the character and item models look more like an early Serious Sam game rather than a mid-late 90s shooter. They don’t look bad, but I think the new models look just ever so slightly out of place when most of the levels didn’t get touched up the same as the models.

I’m going to force myself to stick with DUSK for a while. However, the Steam Winter Sale starts in a few hours…

I feel the first part of your statement here. I go through that often, except for recently but thats because im "borrowing" a 4070 and im using it to play games i dont really play on insane settings because i can now lol. But i get into that when my 'forever' games just get boring too quickly for me to play atm.

Also, love DUSK and have a playthrough started with the new HD pack, but i like it personally (the HD look) i probably wont finish it though because i played it through on the original style, but i like the update.

 

[ZedClampet]

Started playing Lethal Company yesterday with my son. First time in a while where 4-5 hours went by like nothing on a new (to me) survival game instead of the usual stuff we play together. @ZedClampet you were right! The game is enjoyable. I dont like how SO MANY ROOMs are just dead ends but, i get it. Its fun and there were def. some good jump scare "RUN RUN RUN" moments.

Heres a pic of a quota i just barely got on the last day after dieing several times in the days before the quota was due lol. Good times. Longest survival date so far (after playing 1 day). 21 days. So im happy with that.

I feel the first part of your statement here. I go through that often, except for recently but thats because im "borrowing" a 4070 and im using it to play games i dont really play on insane settings because i can now lol. But i get into that when my 'forever' games just get boring too quickly for me to play atm.

Also, love DUSK and have a playthrough started with the new HD pack, but i like it personally (the HD look) i probably wont finish it though because i played it through on the original style, but i like the update.

Glad you are enjoying it. It took me awhile to come to grips with the fact that locked doors are just doors that happen to be locked and don't actually lead to anything in particular.

My kids have been busy this week, so I haven't gotten to play. Thinking about either teaming up with randoms or maybe just seeing how many days I can go solo. That will require a good bit of luck, though. After just a few quotas, dying on anything other than the first day would be tough to overcome.

 

[neogunhero]

Also, love DUSK

DUSK is an absolute favorite of mine

I’ve known about DUSK since it first came out but it took me this long to pull the trigger. This year I’ve also gotten big into “boomer” shooters, so it was a culmination of that plus being bored with my current library. This has been a good year for those kinds of shooter, my favorite to release this year is definitely Slayers X. Quake 2 had an amazing update a few months back, as did Half-Life, and I’ve also been playing DOOM for its 30th anniversary. So with those classics seeing new life in 2023, I thought it would make sense to play a game inspired by those classics. Also, another thing that made me suddenly really want DUSK is the new modding tools they just put out. The trailer for the update said something about supporting original Half-Life and Quake maps within DUSK, so that was very interesting. I can’t wait to see the modding community blow up after this update.

EDIT: I also have to point out how cool of a dev David Szymanski seems to be. DUSK HD was the work of two other developers at New Blood and all profits made in December will be split amongst those two for their years of hard work to make the HD mod possible. That is so cool to me and is such a welcoming thing to read in an industry that typically sees developers as disposable items. The new update can detect compatible games for maps and models, right now we only know of Half-Life and Quake 1 that supports DUSK’ mod tools.

 

[Pifanjr]

Suffering from a horrible affliction I named “Bored Of Every Game Syndrome”. Symptoms: not knowing what to play, spending money on games you don’t need, scrolling the Steam store and Game Pass catalogue for hours, not having the will to play the games you’ve already started. It’s horrible.

I'm having a bit of this now, though I don't have the money to buy games I don't need.

I started Stellaris this evening with some apprehension and when I had to stop playing I knew I had to find another game. The first game I played I was really immersed and I read all of the descriptions, but now I barely skim events, only taking a quick look at the reward (which isn't very interesting most of the time). Without that immersion the exploration is unsatisfying.

A 4X game where the exploration is boring, the extermination is tedious, the expansion is slow and the exploitation isn't particularly interesting isn't much fun to play.

I don't really feel up for learning an entirely new game though and I don't have anything I feel like replaying, so I'm not sure what to play next. Something short and easy maybe, like the Epic freebie of today.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Steam sale is live! And, meh. Same deals I was almost tempted by that were already on. Theres a lot of stuff I was semi interested in a long time ago on big sales, but no point picking them up if theres other stuff I want to play.

Resident Evil 4 remake is still half price. Might bite, but not yet. Against The Storm is only €20 might buy it just to spite Brian and Zed.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

I'm having a bit of this now, though I don't have the money to buy games I don't need.

I started Stellaris this evening with some apprehension and when I had to stop playing I knew I had to find another game. The first game I played I was really immersed and I read all of the descriptions, but now I barely skim events, only taking a quick look at the reward (which isn't very interesting most of the time). Without that immersion the exploration is unsatisfying.

A 4X game where the exploration is boring, the extermination is tedious, the expansion is slow and the exploitation isn't particularly interesting isn't much fun to play.

I don't really feel up for learning an entirely new game though and I don't have anything I feel like replaying, so I'm not sure what to play next. Something short and easy maybe, like the Epic freebie of today.

Im still kind of into it. I had the same feeling about events almost immediately. there are so many and the Situation Log fills up so full I'm not even trying to keep track. Science ships on auto explore and just take the rewards as they come in.

I still dont understand a lot, maybe once I've figured out everything properly I'll lose interest, hard to say.