July 2025 General Game Discussion Thread

[neogunhero]

Finally returned my buddy's PC last night. I took all the fans out and gave them a deep scrubbing, put some new thermal paste on the CPU, added a spare SSD heatsink I had lying around, and cleaned up the GPU really well. Wasn't in the mood to take apart the graphics card and repaste it, but it may have needed it. For a Walmart prebuilt gaming PC, it really didn't seem that bad. All components were from well-known brands, cable management was pretty good, though I do think he paid a bit much for his specs ($1000 for RX 6700 10GB, Ryzen 5500, 1TB SSD, 16GB 3200MHz DDR4 ~2 years ago). I even showed him my newfound PBO trick using Ryzen Master and turned on XMP for his RAM, it should make the PC ever so slightly faster. His RAM was running at 2333MHz, I bumped it up to 3200 because I wasn't sure if the Ryzen 5500 could handle the full 3600MHz or not.

 

[BeardyHat]

Finally returned my buddy's PC last night. I took all the fans out and gave them a deep scrubbing, put some new thermal paste on the CPU, added a spare SSD heatsink I had lying around, and cleaned up the GPU really well. Wasn't in the mood to take apart the graphics card and repaste it, but it may have needed it. For a Walmart prebuilt gaming PC, it really didn't seem that bad. All components were from well-known brands, cable management was pretty good, though I do think he paid a bit much for his specs ($1000 for RX 6700 10GB, Ryzen 5500, 1TB SSD, 16GB 3200MHz DDR4 ~2 years ago). I even showed him my newfound PBO trick using Ryzen Master and turned on XMP for his RAM, it should make the PC ever so slightly faster. His RAM was running at 2333MHz, I bumped it up to 3200 because I wasn't sure if the Ryzen 5500 could handle the full 3600MHz or not.

Honestly, not a terrible deal.
In 2023, I paid around $500-$525 for a 6700 XT 12Gb and Ryzen 5600 and that was just the CPU/GPU, so to get all the rest for just another $500 and no fussing about with components if you're not apt, doesn't seem unreasonable.

 

[Pifanjr]

@Pifanjr

That One Otter Game on Steam

That One Otter Game is a mischievous co-op adventure where two young otters take on a wild rite of passage to prove their worth. Complete silly park challenges to fill up your stamp card—catch a panicked penguin, race a hyped-up zebra, or haul a stolen radio to a mountaintop.

store.steampowered.com

Don't know anything about this except that it's free and local co-op and appears to be something that would appeal to children.

Thank you for the recommendation! My kid and I just played through it in a little less than an hour, ignoring most of the optional stuff. I can definitely recommend it for anyone who wants a casual coop game fit for kids.

 

[neogunhero]

Watched my wife play the first episode of Stories: Untold last night. I played this last back in 2020 and came across it in my library, and figured she would like it. Turns out I was right, it's a great mix of text-based gaming and horror with a bit of meta thrown in. This is her first text-based game she's ever played, and I think it is a good fit for it as it generally recognizes what you are trying to do without needing to be very specific, and can glance over typos and such. Other text-based games I've played make you type in very specific commands without any typos for it to register, this game is a bit more relaxed on that front. The first episode only took us about 30 minutes but it was getting late, we're going to play some more tonight.

 

[Zed Clampet]

Watched my wife play the first episode of Stories: Untold last night. I played this last back in 2020 and came across it in my library, and figured she would like it. Turns out I was right, it's a great mix of text-based gaming and horror with a bit of meta thrown in. This is her first text-based game she's ever played, and I think it is a good fit for it as it generally recognizes what you are trying to do without needing to be very specific, and can glance over typos and such. Other text-based games I've played make you type in very specific commands without any typos for it to register, this game is a bit more relaxed on that front. The first episode only took us about 30 minutes but it was getting late, we're going to play some more tonight.

I really enjoyed Stories: Untold. Wouldn't mind finding a few more like it.

 

[BeardyHat]

Think I messed up.

My wife and I upgraded our phones (my Mom and sister upgraded theirs, so we took their hand me down Pixel 7 Pros from 2022). Unfortunately, the games my wife usually plays (Carcassonne & Ticket to Ride) won't work on the newer version of Android (BS, I say.), so I installed Balatro for her.

She's never played it before, but she basically hasn't stopped since I installed it yesterday.

 

[Colif]

In the original version of Doom, they got the 10th digit of PI wrong. It had no effect as it was only 10th digit but this video shows what might have happened with different values

 

[dxchase]

Finally returned my buddy's PC last night. I took all the fans out and gave them a deep scrubbing, put some new thermal paste on the CPU, added a spare SSD heatsink I had lying around, and cleaned up the GPU really well.

Hope your buddy threw you somethin for all that hard work. I can barely stand to clean my own let alone someone elses lol



Killing Floor 3 launches tomorrow! Greenmangaming has all the editions 20% off for members so i snagged the 80 dollar one for the price of the 60 dollar one pretty much. Havent bought much this year but after playing all 4 open beta's/stress tests i can say ill get my moneys worth. Game is fun, looks good and its somethin my whole fam is playing.

Theres a lot of negativity around the game. The general discussions are just rife with toxic questions and complaints along with a lot of mis-information. Im not saying that there isnt anything to fix like most games these days but what is there is fun and im looking forward to playing tomorrow.

 

[neogunhero]

I really enjoyed Stories: Untold. Wouldn't mind finding a few more like it.

Yeah, I seriously like the mix of the 3D environments and the text-based gameplay, it adds a level of immersion that really helps pull you into the horror stories. I haven't looked into any other games similar to this, though I'm sure there aren't many. I was surprised to see this game get some negative reviews, but they usually just say "the gameplay is trash", which I assume just means they weren't aware it was a text-based game to begin with.

Hope your buddy threw you somethin for all that hard work. I can barely stand to clean my own let alone someone elses lol

He gave me a nice little tip, I definitely felt I deserved it after the crap he put me through lol. I took the entire PC outside and did everything out there, I didn't feel comfortable with the smell and grime being inside the house lol.

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More THPS 3+4 Remastered yesterday. Almost done with 3, I've only got two levels to finish and two competitions to get gold on. I'm not going to bother with collecting all cash, secrets and skateboards in the levels, though I am grabbing all the stat points.

This game is wearing down my controllers. My left joystick on my Xbox One controller is wearing out, so I ordered some replacement joysticks as the process seemed incredibly easy. Turns out it was, I was able to disassemble the controller, install the new joystick, and even deep clean the entire controller within 15 minutes. One major issue though... to get into the controller you must remove the sticker behind the battery compartment, and uh... one of the battery connectors must have gotten stuck to the sticker, and I threw it away... so now the controller doesn't work

I'll look into seeing if there is a replacement for that part. If anything, I have a much nicer Xbox Series controller that my wife uses mainly, I could always borrow that. Tried to save a few bucks, ended up messing it up, typical of me!

 

[Pifanjr]

Yeah, I seriously like the mix of the 3D environments and the text-based gameplay, it adds a level of immersion that really helps pull you into the horror stories. I haven't looked into any other games similar to this, though I'm sure there aren't many. I was surprised to see this game get some negative reviews, but they usually just say "the gameplay is trash", which I assume just means they weren't aware it was a text-based game to begin with.


He gave me a nice little tip, I definitely felt I deserved it after the crap he put me through lol. I took the entire PC outside and did everything out there, I didn't feel comfortable with the smell and grime being inside the house lol.

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More THPS 3+4 Remastered yesterday. Almost done with 3, I've only got two levels to finish and two competitions to get gold on. I'm not going to bother with collecting all cash, secrets and skateboards in the levels, though I am grabbing all the stat points.

This game is wearing down my controllers. My left joystick on my Xbox One controller is wearing out, so I ordered some replacement joysticks as the process seemed incredibly easy. Turns out it was, I was able to disassemble the controller, install the new joystick, and even deep clean the entire controller within 15 minutes. One major issue though... to get into the controller you must remove the sticker behind the battery compartment, and uh... one of the battery connectors must have gotten stuck to the sticker, and I threw it away... so now the controller doesn't work

I'll look into seeing if there is a replacement for that part. If anything, I have a much nicer Xbox Series controller that my wife uses mainly, I could always borrow that. Tried to save a few bucks, ended up messing it up, typical of me!

The last time I took a controller apart I tried to clean the buttons after someone spilled soda on it, but even after cleaning the buttons would get stuck frequently, so apparently I did something wrong.

The one before that still exists as a pile of loose components.

I just bought two new ones instead of trying to fix it again. The wire was starting to fall apart anyway, so I got some wireless ones instead.

 

[Johnway]

since i completed epistory, i decided to move on and play another game. This time to honor how the UK is becoming more authoritarian - demanding users to scan my face or my ID to confirm that i'm an adult - i decided to start Orwell. Where i work in a fictional country spying on people to solve a series of terrorist bombings.

It scratches my detective itch and see how it pans out.

 

[Zloth]

Carmack forgot the 10th digit of π!? Back then!? Oh yeah, it wasn't easy to look it up, which is why everyone mathy had it memorized! Somebody must have been smoking something mind altering in his vicinity, because there's no way Carmack forgot!

Troubleshooter has a nice "alert" mechanic that allows an enemy to call for other enemies in a neighboring group to come running. In one of the "violent" missions (missions on big maps with multiple bosses), I wasn't careful enough. One group called another. The second group immediately saw my folks and called yet another group - which was a sniper on alert at the top of a building, so he alerted ALL the other groups on the map! I had 7 bosses and their minions come down on me all at once! (The sniper stayed on his perch out of range.) My group mostly survived, but it was uuuuuugly!

 

[neogunhero]

Turns out I didn't break my controller, I simply made a mistake and one of the battery connectors when behind the plastic shell when I reassembled it. I'll just need to take it apart again and do it carefully a second time. Not a big deal, but taking it apart was the worst part, especially the handles, they snap in and out of place with these rigid plastic connectors that give you no confidence whatsoever that you're not breaking it as you do it. Shame because I just spent $8 to get some nice nylon braided micro-USB cables delivered to me, oh well. At least I have some high-quality cables that may or may not go obsolete in just a few years.

Besides that, the only other gaming news on my front is that I finally picked up an Anbernic RG28XX handheld emulation device. It wasn't the exact one I was looking at online, but someone locally was selling it for $40, it would have been closer to $80 if I ordered it online. Although it's a lot smaller than the one I wanted, the price was too good to pass up. I haven't had any time to mod it yet, just messing around with the stock OS and games. I will mainly play GameBoy Advance games on this, and so far they are working flawlessly with a nice, bright, sharp screen. There is a very noticeable lack of any Mario or Mario adjacent games, however they do have some older Zelda games on it.

The device is tiiiiiny. Like, smaller than a normal sized check small. Thickness wise it's got a decent amount of depth to it so it's not like you're holding a piece of paper, but the buttons and layout are very cramped. I can't complain too much though, once you get into the game you're playing you tend to forget about the size of it. The worst part is the shoulder buttons. There are two on each corner, with one of them being raised and the other flush with the back and corner of the device, that particular button is so hard to press sometimes. So far the GBA emulator is using those hard to press ones for the shoulder buttons, so I will need to reconfigure it to use the easier buttons.

This seems to be a decent entry point for handheld emulation devices. Most Anbernic handhelds around this price point have the exact same specs, it doesn't get better until you get into the $120+ devices, so the only difference between this and the one I wanted was it's smaller and lacks wifi/BT, not major dealbreakers for me. If and when I do get another handheld, I would want it to be a step up in terms of performance, preferably so it can play Gamecube, PS2 and Xbox games better. For now, I am very happy with it, and can't wait to mod it some. The stock OS is a bit clunky, now I know why so many people recommend to change it.

 

[Frindis]

What the actual KAKAPO! Collective Shout AND Credit Card companies are using their powers again..... Sooo, which company is next to be kakapoed over? GOG? Epic Games? I mean, why not just remove any violent games also? Just make games for children like FIFA does.

Update on NSFW content

Update July 28th, 2025 : Addendum FAQ Update July 31st, 2025 : Reindexing adult NSFW content We have “deindexed” all adult NSFW content from our browse and search pages. We understand this action...

itch.io

 

[neogunhero]

What the actual KAKAPO! Collective Shout AND Credit Card companies are using their powers again..... Sooo, which company is next to be kakapoed over? GOG? Epic Games? I mean, why not just remove any violent games also? Just make games for children like FIFA does.

Update on NSFW content

Update July 28th, 2025 : Addendum FAQ Update July 31st, 2025 : Reindexing adult NSFW content We have “deindexed” all adult NSFW content from our browse and search pages. We understand this action...

itch.io

GOG, Epic, Humble, Fanatical, Uplay, the list goes on... no one is safe from the powers of credit card companies.

What I find funny during this entire situation is the fact that these credit card companies are actually losing money when they don't need to. The PCG article said it best... these companies rarely ever have nuance in mind, so they go all scorched-earth mode on these platforms to remove games they deem unacceptable. Why that is funny is because if they put in just an ounce of nuance into what they are explicating banning and what is saved, they could stand to make more money by not banning games that have no illegal subject matter in them.

While I am entirely against these companies using their powers to censor platforms, if they are going to do it, maybe they should be a bit smarter about their approach.

 

[Johnway]

GOG, Epic, Humble, Fanatical, Uplay, the list goes on... no one is safe from the powers of credit card companies.

What I find funny during this entire situation is the fact that these credit card companies are actually losing money when they don't need to. The PCG article said it best... these companies rarely ever have nuance in mind, so they go all scorched-earth mode on these platforms to remove games they deem unacceptable. Why that is funny is because if they put in just an ounce of nuance into what they are explicating banning and what is saved, they could stand to make more money by not banning games that have no illegal subject matter in them.

While I am entirely against these companies using their powers to censor platforms, if they are going to do it, maybe they should be a bit smarter about their approach.

The worst part i hear is that even the games you purchased can't be retrieved. An interesting situation for SKG i guess. i suspect they will get uploaded elsewhere or be put up on the devs own website, using patreon or some other payment system.

The thing is, what are the reasons for the games being taken down beside being indecent? if they had illegal content, sure, but it seems more like moral complaints rather then actual illegal material? Moral outrage? n.a.r.l. , so who knows. I guess everyone draws the line somewhere and when strangers or those more sensitive to it dictate how others live it becomes an issue.

Personally i don't play em so i'm not affected, but its a slipperly slope. What if someone was morally outraged by violent games like Doom? or how its lack of moral values or whatever moral excuse they can think of.

i hear grumblings that GTA 6 is going to be targeted. Should be a spicy conflict...



Recently the UK government has implemented The OSA (the online security Act) for porn sites to implement more robust measures to prevent children from viewing porn. Thing is, there are concerns with privacy and its just a juicy target when people ask for real biometrics or IDs to scan. Sure its encrypted, but a lot of people aren't comfortable giving that stuff as the ashley madison hacks shows, we have more reasons NOT to provide it. Also its ineffective, use a vpn, pretend you're from a different country and you avoid it altogether!

I even heard stories people using someone elses ID on google images and tricking the system in reddit! The persona system is hosted in the US and to allow a foreign company to manage biometric / ID scans is just makes things worse. The whole thing has just been a massive marketing coup for people to use VPNs. So maybe the average house hold's internet/data security is now more secure...

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

I'm sure this is all very complicated, but someone, most likely EU needs to regulate payment. It shouldnt be up to any company within such an oligopoly to refuse to work with anyone, its too much power in the wrong hands. Any group of organized loonies can and will try exploit it this way now its been proven to work.

I do however believe there should be limits to what is allowed in games in the same way films and TV have always been censored. Again thats a really complicated thing to do and would upset some people whatever happens, but the idea of forbidding nothing leaves everything open to some pretty disgusting stuff. Thats a hard thing to organize and does jeopardize a lot of the freedom of indie devs, and a whole other conversation.

 

[Frindis]

Thankfully, we can do something about it:

Sign the Petition

Tell MasterCard, Visa & Activist Groups: Stop Controlling What We Can Watch, Read, or Play

www.change.org

 

[neogunhero]

The worst part i hear is that even the games you purchased can't be retrieved. An interesting situation for SKG i guess. i suspect they will get uploaded elsewhere or be put up on the devs own website, using patreon or some other payment system.

The thing is, what are the reasons for the games being taken down beside being indecent? if they had illegal content, sure, but it seems more like moral complaints rather then actual illegal material? Moral outrage? n.a.r.l. , so who knows. I guess everyone draws the line somewhere and when strangers or those more sensitive to it dictate how others live it becomes an issue.

Illegal content, yes, that should be banned. When we say "illegal content", of course we mean laws that are pretty much universally enforced like SA and minors. Beyond that, the rest seems subjective to the card companies and that anti-porn group. Things that they themselves deem indecent, shout about, fight for, eventually will get taken down. One of the major issues with this situation is how they have convinced the large card companies to comply with their demand. In a world where crypto is making the average Joe richer than ever, it shouldn't be hard to get a large collective of people against a certain topic then use that to pressure large companies to effectively shape the world to how you see fit. That's the scary part.

If only the parents against DOOM in the 90s were richer, louder, and had more sway. In an alternative reality, we would all be calling Chex Quest the blueprint of the entire FPS genre.

My point being, it has gone too far, and realistically this will not be the last we hear of it. I'm not just talking about this particular situation, this sort of thing will only continue to happen more and more. Just like you, these are not types of games I ever play, but the principal is what matters here. If it is that easy to get games removed from stores and effectively censoring freedom of speech, then everyone needs to be paying attention to it.

 

[Colif]

Someone might like the comparison

 

[dxchase]

Thankfully, we can do something about it:

Sign the Petition

Tell MasterCard, Visa & Activist Groups: Stop Controlling What We Can Watch, Read, or Play

www.change.org

Signed, thanks for the post



So, ive tried Killing Floor 3 and Wuchang: Fallen Feathers. Two games with huge sections of negative reviews focused on how terrible each one of these games runs. Wuchang is at an mostly negative on steam while KF3 sits at mixed.

Im here to tell you they both have been running perfectly for me. KF3 i had some ue5 crashes and 1 ue5 crash in Wuchang, but no stuttering, no huge drops in FPS, no pop-ins etc. So please, if you have somewhat of a decent set up and have the know-how to keep your stuff running smoothly, dont let optimization and performance issues deter you from these games.

I havent played Wuchang: Fallen Feathers long enough to give an in-depth review of sorts. Its a souls game set up exactly like every other soulslikes, walk 10 feet, fight a boss in the classic yet totally unchanged and boring gameplay of dodge/parry strike, dodge/parry strike. So i got there and stopped. Leading up to that point however the game looks beautiful and runs rather smoothly.

Killing Floor 3 is great, i dont get all the hate around the game, yes there are things to improve but also, yes a LOT of whats complained about the devs already stated they are working on a fix. Its bloody, its fun, hard and frantic. My wife and son play with me and we had a great time.








Oh yea, i still play a little Diablo 4. My Pulverize Druid is easy mode this season (finally). And my spiritborn class is fun, its an A-tier build not S but its just a fun build to run around. Only need to use 4 skills.

 

[BeardyHat]

Someone might like the comparison

Just skimmed it, but not much of a difference at all.

More performance would be nice, but the Trackpads and Steam Input are what makes the Deck incredible. Anything without that is just a gloried tablet.

 

[BeardyHat]

Still cracking away at Might & Magic 4, approaching the end of the "story", but there's still plenty of sections of Clouds of Xeen I haven't explored yet. Think that'll come though, soon as I start exploring the other side of the world, I'll get some more levels, as well as keys to access the inaccessable areas in Clouds.

Thought this was particularly amusing for some reason. It was a helluva lot of experience, though only leveled my party up once.

 

[Zed Clampet]

I pretty much agree with everyone's posts on content being forced off of systems by the credit card companies. However, I do want to point out that this has been going on for many years, and the credit card companies have, up to this point, always gone after content that involves either incest or children, both of which are illegal in many countries where Visa and Mastercard do business. To my knowledge, they have never gone after any other type of material.

However, the fact that they wield this type of power is concerning and needs to be addressed somehow. But even if we find a way of addressing this, they will still be allowed to refuse service for illegal content, so what they have been doing may not even change. You can't force a company to perform illegal acts, so the situation is more complicated than some of us are seeing.

 

[Johnway]

Illegal content, yes, that should be banned. When we say "illegal content", of course we mean laws that are pretty much universally enforced like SA and minors. Beyond that, the rest seems subjective to the card companies and that anti-porn group. Things that they themselves deem indecent, shout about, fight for, eventually will get taken down. One of the major issues with this situation is how they have convinced the large card companies to comply with their demand. In a world where crypto is making the average Joe richer than ever, it shouldn't be hard to get a large collective of people against a certain topic then use that to pressure large companies to effectively shape the world to how you see fit. That's the scary part.

If only the parents against DOOM in the 90s were richer, louder, and had more sway. In an alternative reality, we would all be calling Chex Quest the blueprint of the entire FPS genre.

My point being, it has gone too far, and realistically this will not be the last we hear of it. I'm not just talking about this particular situation, this sort of thing will only continue to happen more and more. Just like you, these are not types of games I ever play, but the principal is what matters here. If it is that easy to get games removed from stores and effectively censoring freedom of speech, then everyone needs to be paying attention to it.

yeah, the cats sort of out of the bag, if it happens in one situation theres a good chance it will happen in a other scenarios and games like Doom might be targeted. I'm all for banning illegal porn (CP, SA, underage etc, etc) but moral outrage on someones kink might be a step too far.

its scarier how they even managed to pull it off and convince these companies to do it. Perhaps different payment methods are in order. Which might lead to more shady dealings which will have the reverse effect. Case in point prohibition in the 30s. not the same thing admittedly, but its possible.

Unsurprisingly, in the UK the top search since the OSA was implemented was ... VPNs. Will the government now ban vpns? will we see a china style firewall n the UK? will we see restrictions on 18/15 movie trailers? or perhaps on games or even playing multiplayer games?

only time will tell. Right now, i'm going back to playing Orwell and putting my security analyst cap on. Need to stop another bombing on the glorious nation of bonton.