January 2025 General Game Discussion

[isleepinabed]

Decided to replay games I already have this weekend.
Yesterday I gave Broken Reality and Hollow Knight another spin. I quite like Broken Reality but unfortunately it was giving me motion sickness. Hollow Knight has great charm but it's just not my kind of game I think.
This morning it's Creaks. I hadn't realised first time around how much of an hommage it was to games like Prince of Persia and Another World. I think this game suffered a bit from having a pretty bland human main character, which was not as zany or charismatic as the characters from Machinarium, Botanicula or Samorost. Nonetheless it's fab, visually, aurally with great puzzles and compelling gameplay.
There's the other thread here about the perfect starts, on this one in less than two minutes you're all set. Plus it's only WASD+Space so input could not be simpler.

 

[Pifanjr]

The warnings were true, Balatro is indeed as addictive as they say. I think I ended up falling asleep around 4:30 AM.

I'm making my way through all of the decks on the lowest difficulty. I can finish most of them in one run now, but the endless mode ramps up way too fast to make it much further. I am making progress though:

 

[BeardyHat]

I started playing the GTA V story mode, because I was just kind of craving an open world Rockstar game. I've played a decent amount of RDR2, but it just hasn't really grabbed me in the same way GTA has, as I just don't care about Cowboys, Horses or open spaces, which is funny given I grew up and reside in a Western US state and that's kind of "our thing."

The characters are still pretty obnoxious and hateful, I don't like them in the slightest, but I can at least put that aside for now and enjoy existing in the city.

I've also been cranking away at Dragon Warrior 3 on Gameboy Color. I don't like a lot of JRPGs, but Dragon Warrior/Quest just kind of does it for me. I'm super happy I picked up (from archive.org...) a Prima Strategy Guide for it. Where I previously felt totally lost, with the Internet being of minimal help, this thing has provided me with some new strategies and ways to go.

I also want to say, I really like how the Guide is imperfect or provides a more general guidance versus something like the internet. I was looking for something not easily found in the guide yesterday and I came across this entire internet screed (I mean, also a guide, I'm just being disingenuous) about how "x" is the best stat no matter what. I don't know what it is, but this stuff drives me nuts about internet guides and discourse; how one thing is objectively the best and everything else isn't worth doing or examining.

Just wanted to rant a little bit on that.

 

[isleepinabed]

I've also been cranking away at Dragon Warrior 3 on Gameboy Color. I don't like a lot of JRPGs, but Dragon Warrior/Quest just kind of does it for me. I'm super happy I picked up (from archive.org...) a Prima Strategy Guide for it. Where I previously felt totally lost, with the Internet being of minimal help, this thing has provided me with some new strategies and ways to go.

I also want to say, I really like how the Guide is imperfect or provides a more general guidance versus something like the internet. I was looking for something not easily found in the guide yesterday and I came across this entire internet screed (I mean, also a guide, I'm just being disingenuous) about how "x" is the best stat no matter what. I don't know what it is, but this stuff drives me nuts about internet guides and discourse; how one thing is objectively the best and everything else isn't worth doing or examining.

Just wanted to rant a little bit on that.

Some people dislike Dragon Quest for being always the same and not having the melodrama of Final Fantasy or the gameplay ideas that some other series put in. But the thing that makes Dragon Quest great is that everything has been honed for decades to consistently deliver the gameplay everyone knows and at the same time becomes comforting. Its greatest success is reliability and enduring appeal.

I also understand what you mean about that.
We've gone past the times when we were expected to read the manuals before starting a game. That is something that is lost in emulation. Most games these days don't even have manuals.
Prima strategy guides, while coming a bit later, were a bit part of the experience and maintained coherence with the gameworld. Something for the dedicated fan to really go into everything the game had to offer... and even then some stuff might still be hidden.
It wasn't written like a hack to exploit the game - because if you're exploiting the game you're kidding yourself, I think. A game (computer or not) is only worth what its rules define. If you can't win within the context of the game's rules, then you're not playing the same game.

 

[ZedClampet]

Gaming Cafe Simulator is crazy hectic, but it's one of my favorite shop sims from this year. Actually both of the ones made by Japanese devs are pretty good. Not sure this one won't be abandoned, though, as the sales haven't been very good.

 

[Johnway]

Decided to replay games I already have this weekend.
Yesterday I gave Broken Reality and Hollow Knight another spin. I quite like Broken Reality but unfortunately it was giving me motion sickness. Hollow Knight has great charm but it's just not my kind of game I think.
This morning it's Creaks. I hadn't realised first time around how much of an hommage it was to games like Prince of Persia and Another World. I think this game suffered a bit from having a pretty bland human main character, which was not as zany or charismatic as the characters from Machinarium, Botanicula or Samorost. Nonetheless it's fab, visually, aurally with great puzzles and compelling gameplay.
There's the other thread here about the perfect starts, on this one in less than two minutes you're all set. Plus it's only WASD+Space so input could not be simpler.

Ah broken reality, the vapourwave-esque walking simulator not exactly to everyone's tastes and there was one or 2 points in the game where i think i almost/did break the game to progress. For example the resort level near the top the stairs at the top are blocked and i think i just hoped over the edge onto some deck loungers and got round it. The other was in the city where i almost ran out of money and nearly soft locked the game. The ending i didn't quite understand as it was pretty trippy and ends on that (presumably i attained godhood or something). i was recommended it after i finished playing Hypnospace outlaw, where i completed it, didn't find it fun at all but i can't stop thinking about it and in fact excited for that sequel.

Hollow knight was one of my fav games i played back in 2023. i found the 2d souls-like metroidvania pretty fun. It does get brutally hard by the end (didn't finish some of the encounters or the end game content). Played it with a joypad as i suspected my kb+m wasn't going to cut it in games like this. it left a pretty good impression that i'm excited for silksong (christ devs, when is it being released? please tell me its soon right?)

 

[isleepinabed]

Ah broken reality, the vapourwave-esque walking simulator not exactly to everyone's tastes and there was one or 2 points in the game where i think i almost/did break the game to progress. For example the resort level near the top the stairs at the top are blocked and i think i just hoped over the edge onto some deck loungers and got round it. The other was in the city where i almost ran out of money and nearly soft locked the game. The ending i didn't quite understand as it was pretty trippy and ends on that (presumably i attained godhood or something). i was recommended it after i finished playing Hypnospace outlaw, where i completed it, didn't find it fun at all but i can't stop thinking about it and in fact excited for that sequel.

Apart from being both vapourwave-esque I don't feel the games are too similar. I also softlocked myself out of a level because of the lack of likes as I forgot to go for multipliers.
Hypnospace, while visually interesting felt to me a bit unnatural regarding how it was written. You know.. poseurish (if that's a word).. Felt the same with Orwell, which explored similar aspects in a similar way gameplaywise but with a different presentation.
As far as vapourwave goes, I'm sure you must have come across Paradise Killer, right?..
Apart from that there's two others I'm familiar with, both short experiences. One, The Immaculate Drag, is also a first person exploration game. the other is a wonderful short puzzle-ish game called OK/NORMAL, if you enjoy these sort of environments.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Ive been playing The Last Spell. This kind of thing is my jam now it seems. Strategy games with roguelike progression, this one blends turn based tactics rather than city building like Against the Storm.

I dont really have any nostalgia for 16bit styled tactics games, but there seems to be a lot of depth and variation in levelling up the heroes here. Skill sets are based on the equipped weapon, and you can have two sets equipped with no cost for switching mid turn. Levelling up also is down partially to RNG, you get to choose from several options to increase stats, and there are quite a lot of different stats.

Cant really throw out an elevator pitch for this one because theres a lot to it, but I've been playing a ton of it and the loop of building base and improving equipment during the day and smashing hordes of zombos at night is really compelling.

 

[JCgames]

In 2024 i...

... Added 64 games onto Steam includes games i bought or added for free. (epic and GoG excluded, but i didn't buy anything there and nothing added theree)
... The RRP cost of the games on steam was £1,343.36
... but spent only £95.71 to get those games.
... therefore saved £1,247.65
... I got the most games from Humble bundle
... The most expensive game i bought was assassin's creed valhalla complete edition at 19.83 from greenmangaming.

You are a person after my own heart. I'm only talking mt Stam account when I add in cost per game. I also count all dlc purchased in this. since getting steam in 2011, but not really using it till 2014, so 10 years I have just over 325 games, and at just over 1200 at last count. So a bit over 3 dollars a game but some are free, so I think it's about 3.50 per ib games I bought. Closer to 6 I'd you count games I've actually played

This year I only picked up about 10 games and some dlc for idle champions.
I have not added up total costs, but I typically buy things at 90%off. I budget 100 bucks a year to buy games. A few years I went a bit over by adding an extra 50. I splurged during the pandemic.

 

[JCgames]

Ive been playing The Last Spell. This kind of thing is my jam now it seems. Strategy games with roguelike progression, this one blends turn based tactics rather than city building like Against the Storm.

Have you played FTL, if so what do you think?

 

[Johnway]

Apart from being both vapourwave-esque I don't feel the games are too similar. I also softlocked myself out of a level because of the lack of likes as I forgot to go for multipliers.
Hypnospace, while visually interesting felt to me a bit unnatural regarding how it was written. You know.. poseurish (if that's a word).. Felt the same with Orwell, which explored similar aspects in a similar way gameplaywise but with a different presentation.
As far as vapourwave goes, I'm sure you must have come across Paradise Killer, right?..
Apart from that there's two others I'm familiar with, both short experiences. One, The Immaculate Drag, is also a first person exploration game. the other is a wonderful short puzzle-ish game called OK/NORMAL, if you enjoy these sort of environments.

i've got paradise killer but not played it yet. its on my backlog among all the other games...

not heard of The Immaculate Drag or OK/NORMAL so might add them to my wishlist and wait and see. Too many games for the time being.

i suppose Hypnospace is poseurish as its one of those games that tugs at my nostalgia of my younger happier years. Its mimics that loud geocities that makes both my ears and eyes bleed as to how garish it is. it's quite clever in some areas, but if you do focus on the objective (ie: do you job) the game is absolutely monotonous and boring. You don't get the chance to appreciate the stories or the work into making the sites and the story itself from various characters.

failing that, watch this video (assuming you haven't yet). It pretty much explains why hypnospace is special.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIkdvGMG4gY

 

[Pifanjr]

So far I've completed 11 decks on normal difficulty on Balatro, then completed the first one on the second difficulty. I'm trying to finish a run with the twelfth deck you unlock, but I just had two awesome runs get cut short because of a boss blind.

The worst one was where I had five jokers all about face cards, including the one that makes every card count as a face card, then got a boss blind that disabled all face cards.

 

[DXCHASE]

Still havent played anything yet. Might jump into Helldivers 2.

Its been a good break tbh. 6 days now no gaming, i guess its kind of a forced break, but i dont mind it, not that i wanted to do it because i got too sick to play but its been nice to take a step back, and see what i could fill my days with and its mostly sleeping and cleaning/doin laundry lol

Ive also lost ~10 pounds which has been kinda nice because i need to lose weight, so gotta take the good from the bad.

 

[Zloth]

Hey, the power is still on! W00T!

I don't know what it is, but this stuff drives me nuts about internet guides and discourse; how one thing is objectively the best and everything else isn't worth doing or examining.

Ugh, me too. The Last Remnant had that bad. Somebody found a way to cheese the game by avoiding almost all fights except the required ones until a certain point late in the game, then cheesing one of the side quests so you could do it over and over and make everyone powerful. Within a couple of months, that became "the best way to play." Anyone playing normally and asking for advice on how to beat a boss is getting told by a half dozen people that they have to start the whole game over and use the cheesy method. People started leaving negative reviews because the game "couldn't be won" unless you used those methods. Never mind all the people who beat the game before that tactic even came around.

 

[BeardyHat]

Some people dislike Dragon Quest for being always the same and not having the melodrama of Final Fantasy or the gameplay ideas that some other series put in. But the thing that makes Dragon Quest great is that everything has been honed for decades to consistently deliver the gameplay everyone knows and at the same time becomes comforting. Its greatest success is reliability and enduring appeal.

I've actually played a lot of Dragon Quest; haven't finished a lot of Dragon Quest (only 4, back when it released on DS), but definitely played probably a couple hundred hours of it and I love that it's generally very light on storytelling.

I quite loathe Final Fantasy. I've experienced quite a lot of its storytelling through completing 6 (which I hated) and playing a lot of 14 and it's exactly that, melodrama, just stuffed with it. I can't help but roll my eyes and sigh when folks talk about the deep storytelling in the series; it's utter nonsense.

I also understand what you mean about that.
We've gone past the times when we were expected to read the manuals before starting a game. That is something that is lost in emulation. Most games these days don't even have manuals.
Prima strategy guides, while coming a bit later, were a bit part of the experience and maintained coherence with the gameworld. Something for the dedicated fan to really go into everything the game had to offer... and even then some stuff might still be hidden.
It wasn't written like a hack to exploit the game - because if you're exploiting the game you're kidding yourself, I think. A game (computer or not) is only worth what its rules define. If you can't win within the context of the game's rules, then you're not playing the same game.

I really appreciate that the guides aren't just datamined, optimized walkthroughs. Funny thing is, I play quite a lot of retro games and it only just occurred to me to look at a strategy guide for them as part of that fun. I only ever had one or two them back in the day with my NES, so it's nice to revisit it and have some help for the game without needing to turn to the internet and get immediate answers and optimal builds.

i've got paradise killer but not played it yet. its on my backlog among all the other games...

not heard of The Immaculate Drag or OK/NORMAL so might add them to my wishlist and wait and see. Too many games for the time being.

i suppose Hypnospace is poseurish as its one of those games that tugs at my nostalgia of my younger happier years. Its mimics that loud geocities that makes both my ears and eyes bleed as to how garish it is. it's quite clever in some areas, but if you do focus on the objective (ie: do you job) the game is absolutely monotonous and boring. You don't get the chance to appreciate the stories or the work into making the sites and the story itself from various characters.

failing that, watch this video (assuming you haven't yet). It pretty much explains why hypnospace is special.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIkdvGMG4gY

Someday I'll finish Hypnospace Outlaw. I've played almost 16 hours of it through three playthroughs, each which end immediately following the time jump. It is great to revisit the 90's internet of my youth and the blogs many of us (my self included) used to create.

Hey, the power is still on! W00T!

Ugh, me too. The Last Remnant had that bad. Somebody found a way to cheese the game by avoiding almost all fights except the required ones until a certain point late in the game, then cheesing one of the side quests so you could do it over and over and make everyone powerful. Within a couple of months, that became "the best way to play." Anyone playing normally and asking for advice on how to beat a boss is getting told by a half dozen people that they have to start the whole game over and use the cheesy method. People started leaving negative reviews because the game "couldn't be won" unless you used those methods. Never mind all the people who beat the game before that tactic even came around.

I don't know what it is, but it's something I've observed in many different hobbies; people have this obsession with being optimal and, essentially, making things easy on themselves before they even get started.

I'm a (small) part of the offroading/Wheeling community and the general sentiment online amongst people is that you can't do anything without a bare minimum setup that far exceeds what is really necessary. Out on the trails, I've left people stupefied by doing things with my fairly basic vehicle that they insisted I needed a lot more to do; it's all part of that same internet culture where some sort-of "wisdom" gets passed down and circulated and it becomes fact.

Same goes for the Wargaming community. Don't use "x" unit because "x" unit is bad, rather than just playing what you have and learning how to use it effectively, even if it might be "suboptimal" *shock* *horror*.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Have you played FTL, if so what do you think?

Yea played it and liked it, but the last boss was frustrating and after failing to beat it maybe twice I stopped playing a while ago. The music was especially good.

Btw The Last Spell is by Ishtar games who made Dead In Vinland, I remember you liked that one.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

The warnings were true, Balatro is indeed as addictive as they say. I think I ended up falling asleep around 4:30 AM.

I'm making my way through all of the decks on the lowest difficulty. I can finish most of them in one run now, but the endless mode ramps up way too fast to make it much further. I am making progress though:

What kind of strategy do you go for mostly? I played a good amount more over Xmas, still love it.

 

[Pifanjr]

I managed to beat ante 11, but my deck was too messy to beat ante 12. I very early got the legendary joker that copies a consumable and used that on the tarot that creates two random tarots, which worked pretty well, but I never managed to trim my deck down far enough to consistently get the hand I was trying to get. I probably should have tried to get the card that lets you remove cards instead.

What kind of strategy do you go for mostly? I played a good amount more over Xmas, still love it.

I've only had the game for two days, so I don't really have a set strategy yet, but I'm starting to get more serious about editing my deck by removing, adding and changing the cards to more consistently get the hand(s) I'm specialising in. Especially at the higher antes you can't really afford to waste plays on hands that don't give you massive amounts of points.
Also, opening regular card boosters is the best way to get special editions, like foil, holographic or, most importantly, polychrome, as well as cards with seals. Since you can stack those with the enhancements you can (more easily) get from tarot cards it can make your hands a lot more valuable as well.

This requires a lot of money though, so at the start of the game I'll grab anything that lets me win blinds in a single hand, so jokers that add a bunch of chips or a large, flat modifier, as well as jokers that give more money. The main trick is then to switch those jokers out at the right time while trying not to overspend.

 

[ZedClampet]

SHADOWBOX: Mausoleum of Natural History on Steam

Experience the story of life on Earth like never before with SHADOWBOX: Mausoleum of Natural History, a virtual, interactive, and free-to-play museum featuring 3D scans of real fossils.

store.steampowered.com

Free paleontology museum with scans of fossils you can manipulate and examine.

It runs poorly, but you aren't fighting anything so it doesn't matter.

 

[neogunhero]

Started playing Stardew Valley with my girlfriend this past weekend. I’ve played a bit before but not much. We’ve gotten pretty far already and it’s been kind of fun. I say kind of because I’m starting to dislike the daily grind, but my gf says it’s just the early game, eventually we will have a lot of that automated, so I’ll tough it out for now. Not much to say about it besides the fact that we’ve been making bank, it’s been enjoyable overall.

Besides that I’ve played a ton of Vampire Survivors. Getting back into it again and I’m glad I did. I read some guides and found out some things I needed to do. I finally found the Yellow Sign which shows you all hidden items in each level which is so helpful. With that I was able to craft an item to defeat the grim reaper that appears at the end of the timer on each level. You can defeat him to unlock a grim reaper character who is super fast and strong. I’ve been having a blast unlocking all this stuff. The guides came in handy to point me in the right direction, now I’m able to unlock so much more stuff especially with the Yellow Sign item. Super useful.

 

[Pifanjr]

My kid just completed her first Hearthstone Tombs of Terror run. She had helped me while I was playing a couple of times by playing the cards I told her to, but she wanted to try it all by herself. I helped her a bit during the first 2 or 3 fights, but she just beat the final boss in a single try.

Started playing Stardew Valley with my girlfriend this past weekend. I’ve played a bit before but not much. We’ve gotten pretty far already and it’s been kind of fun. I say kind of because I’m starting to dislike the daily grind, but my gf says it’s just the early game, eventually we will have a lot of that automated, so I’ll tough it out for now. Not much to say about it besides the fact that we’ve been making bank, it’s been enjoyable overall.

I think it is important to remember with Stardew Valley that there is no need to grind daily. There is no time limit for anything unless you choose to give yourself one. The only thing that degrades over time that you can't prevent is your relationship level with the other people in the town, but it takes a full year of ignoring them completely to lose just a single heart. Some tips:

• Don't enjoy watering your crops every day? Plant the crops that take the fewest days to fully grow and let them get irrigated by the rain. You might just have to water them one or two days near the end of the season if it was particularly dry.
• Don't like interacting with villagers or giving everyone two gifts every week? Just give them a loved gift on their birthday. Even if you ignore them the rest of the year you'll still increase your relationship by 1.5 hearts per year.
• Don't like petting and feeding your animals? Just don't. Let them eat grass outside until they've made you enough money to upgrade their coop/barn and get an auto-feeder. They cannot starve, they just don't produce anything on days after they weren't fed.

By working like this you can sleep away days at a time, only emerging occasionally to throw a birthday gift at someone and to plant/harvest your crops and clear the coop at the start and end of the seasons.

 

[ZedClampet]

I think it is important to remember with Stardew Valley that there is no need to grind daily. There is no time limit for anything unless you choose to give yourself one. The only thing that degrades over time that you can't prevent is your relationship level with the other people in the town, but it takes a full year of ignoring them completely to lose just a single heart. Some tips:

• Don't enjoy watering your crops every day? Plant the crops that take the fewest days to fully grow and let them get irrigated by the rain. You might just have to water them one or two days near the end of the season if it was particularly dry.
• Don't like interacting with villagers or giving everyone two gifts every week? Just give them a loved gift on their birthday. Even if you ignore them the rest of the year you'll still increase your relationship by 1.5 hearts per year.
• Don't like petting and feeding your animals? Just don't. Let them eat grass outside until they've made you enough money to upgrade their coop/barn and get an auto-feeder. They cannot starve, they just don't produce anything on days after they weren't fed.

By working like this you can sleep away days at a time, only emerging occasionally to throw a birthday gift at someone and to plant/harvest your crops and clear the coop at the start and end of the seasons.

You should make a post called "How to Play Stardew Valley if you Hate Stardew Valley"

But you need to replace the word "villagers" with the word "bast**ds". For "animals" use "little bast**ds". It might help to increase how authentic the post sounds if you get drunk first.

It's amazing that it's still getting 100k plus concurrents as old as it is.

 

[ZedClampet]

Played Unrailed on Endless Mode Easy and didn't get very far. I made it past the first two biomes, but failed pretty quickly in the snow biome. Probably better in co-op.

 

[ZedClampet]

Today is a special day. I will, again, prove to the world that I am the Greatest Darktide Player in Existence!*




* Not counting needing to be revived, rescued, falling off of the map, completing objectives, getting lost, and killing things.

 

[Pifanjr]

Played Unrailed on Endless Mode Easy and didn't get very far. I made it past the first two biomes, but failed pretty quickly in the snow biome. Probably better in co-op.

It's definitely a lot better in co-op. I would say it's one of those games you can't play on your own without missing out on the majority of the intended experience.

I played it with a friend recently and we made it to the space biome, but with checkpoints enabled. I think we died twice.