June 2025 General Game Discussion Thread

[Zed Clampet]

Next Fest and Summer Sale Incoming!​

The design of the new PC Gamer World Headquarters was a collaborative effort:

I had a funnier idea for a Baldur's Gate 3 Sex Camp and "peak gaming" post, but thought better of it

 

[Zimbaly]

It looks like something I'd draw. 🤘

 

[Zed Clampet]

Is 800 pixel width about right for these posts? I don't want all the 1080p folks to have to scroll right/left, but it may be too small for higher resolutions.

 

[Johnway]

Alright yesterday afternoon we finally finished the last of Doom 2 community Wad Ramp 2024! They were acceptable maps with nothing outstanding but some deserve some honorable mentions.

Homecoming - the final part of a small collection of maps we've seen throughout Ramp2024. The lighting and aesthetics were quite pleasing. Has plenty of Quake like stylings.

Fist of the Doomed Star - a parody map that takes the premise of Fist of the northstar. So plenty of punching action. Nothing outstanding, but on the whole quite refreshing to play.

AntiStatic 3: revenge of the moving - The final map i played and the hardest of the bunch and of course... its a slaughterfest map. Besides the initial starting area, this map was mercifully lenient with plenty of opportunity to save scum, megaspheres and ammo. To top it off, there are a few invulnerabilities available so you can maximize as much damage as possible.

i did have a quick blast at another Doom wad, the journey home. The premise being that doomguy is going home after winning in doom2. Nice idea, but the maps themselves are lacklusture tbh. Might give it a miss.


Asscreed Valhalla wise, not much on that front. Still playing the dawn of ragnaraok content and whilst i have found all the quick travel points, i've still got a lot of things to do in some of the regions.

 

[Pifanjr]

I don't know if I mentioned this before, but I got given Dune: Awakening for my birthday, so I guess I'm playing that this month. I kind of just wanted to continue with Baldur's Gate 3, but now that I already own the game I do want to check it out.

Is 800 pixel width about right for these posts? I don't want all the 1080p folks to have to scroll right/left, but it may be too small for higher resolutions.

On my 1080p screen the width of the posts is slightly less than 800 pixels and the smaller titles are pretty small, but they are still legible to me.

 

[Zed Clampet]

I don't know if I mentioned this before, but I got given Dune: Awakening for my birthday, so I guess I'm playing that this month. I kind of just wanted to continue with Baldur's Gate 3, but now that I already own the game I do want to check it out.


On my 1080p screen the width of the posts is slightly less than 800 pixels and the smaller titles are pretty small, but they are still legible to me.

I still have no idea what you even do in Dune Awakening.

 

[Pifanjr]

I still have no idea what you even do in Dune Awakening.

Your standard survival crafting stuff of managing meters, exploring, gathering resources, building a base and crafting items. It's a MMO though, so you'll see a lot of other bases dotted around and occasionally meet other players. Enemies also respawn pretty quickly.

There's supposedly a late game that involves more player to player interaction, but I'm not sure what that'll be like.

 

[Colif]

top sellers week 22. Makes me wonder, is it a sale if its free?
4 on list are free, hard to compete against that price
I assume they just count downloads then.

Steam deck is hardly a game. Its a handheld console.

That is just the Steam store... nice if there was a site that combined all platforms into a total to show how games really go... and which is really top seller per week. Sure would cut through the hype.

 

[Zed Clampet]

top sellers week 22. Makes me wonder, is it a sale if its free?
4 on list are free, hard to compete against that price
I assume they just count downloads then.

It's not counting downloads. It is counting all sales related to the game that go through Steam except for DLC, so for the free-to-play games, it is counting all the microtransactions.

Steam deck is hardly a game. Its a handheld console.

In fairness, it never says the list is just for games.

That is just the Steam store... nice if there was a site that combined all platforms into a total to show how games really go... and which is really top seller per week. Sure would cut through the hype.

Not sure what "cut through the hype" means in this case. Steam is the primary store for PC gaming, which is why it is of interest here. Epic, even if they allowed this data to get out there, hardly sells anything other than Fortnite stuff.

Anyway, here are the top 10 video games by sales for consoles this year:
1: Monster Hunter Wilds
2: Assassin's Creed Shadows
3: Oblivion Remastered
4: MLB The Show
5: Call of Duty: Black Ops 6
6: Kingdom Come Deliverance 2
7: WWE 2K25
8: Civilization 7
9: NBA 2K25
10: PGA Tour 2K25

Doesn't really look like a list that would eliminate hype. Console gamers and PC gamers are two completely different types of gamers. You would almost never see an indie game in the console top 10, for instance.

If you added PC to that list, Assassin's Creed would drop out of the top 10, and that's in 2nd here, so the console sales might not significantly shake up the list. They just don't sell nearly as many games as PC.

I can probably find an analyst out there that combines the lists monthly. The site that used to do it hasn't updated since 2018.

 

[Colif]

I didn't think of dlc

 

[Frindis]

I do wonder if Dune: Awakening with only have sand and rocks. I guess it is not likely you will find any Oasis of sorts. If it is only sand and rocks, how will they change up the scenery, to make it inviting and fun to play in? Perhaps it is not supposed to be fun, fun, but more harsh survival. @Pifanjr mentioned crafting/building, so perhaps building homes will be how you paint the world to look more lush?

 

[Pifanjr]

I do wonder if Dune: Awakening with only have sand and rocks. I guess it is not likely you will find any Oasis of sorts. If it is only sand and rocks, how will they change up the scenery, to make it inviting and fun to play in? Perhaps it is not supposed to be fun, fun, but more harsh survival. @Pifanjr mentioned crafting/building, so perhaps building homes will be how you paint the world to look more lush?

The little bit I played mostly had sand and rocks, but there were also several desert plants, as well as raider camps, shipwrecks, (human-made) caves and a friendly outpost. It's definitely not lush, but I didn't find it boring or ugly.

The homes I saw were mostly just grey boxes, so those don't really help. Even the ones that had a little bit more effort put into it didn't look very pretty.

 

[Frindis]

@Pifanjr Sort of sound like the Mad Max game. That game also had much of the same and it worked quite well since it was fun driving around and I think the combat was not to bad either. You could also customize the cars and getting a more armored and powerful car was a major carrot.

Mad Max on Steam

Play as Mad Max, a reluctant hero and survivor who wants nothing more than to leave the madness behind and find solace.

store.steampowered.com

 

[Zloth]

Is 800 pixel width about right for these posts? I don't want all the 1080p folks to have to scroll right/left, but it may be too small for higher resolutions.

The forum resizes it to fit in the column width. Just the width, so tall & skinny pictures are big while a typical screenshot is much smaller. Column width depends on the width of the browser. For whatever reason, it's smaller when the browser is over about 1000 pixels wide than it is when under it! Just play with your browser width and you'll see it go through a few layouts.

 

[Zed Clampet]

The forum resizes it to fit in the column width. Just the width, so tall & skinny pictures are big while a typical screenshot is much smaller. Column width depends on the width of the browser. For whatever reason, it's smaller when the browser is over about 1000 pixels wide than it is when under it! Just play with your browser width and you'll see it go through a few layouts.

One thing is for sure: I need to crop out all the empty space in the wider parts

 

[DXCHASE]

Moving to a new house so my gaming will probably be limited this month but itll be nice to have to re-wire 3 different pcs to be hardlined to my router again /s. Nah, but my new spot has a cheaper internet that provides me the same bandwith (1gig). Paying 115usd now for that and this new price has it at 90 and im getting a switch, 6 months of yt premium free and some kinda bt speaker. So not bad. The house already had the service installed so no installation fee either.


Helldivers 2 newest update is that we saved our planet! I got nothing for it but at least our planet was saved!

Playing anything i can sit down to atm, Tainted Grail, Doom and now this new boomer-shooter Project Warlock 2. But again, between work and moving, not sure this month will entail too much else.

 

[Pifanjr]

Moving to a new house so my gaming will probably be limited this month but itll be nice to have to re-wire 3 different pcs to be hardlined to my router again /s. Nah, but my new spot has a cheaper internet that provides me the same bandwith (1gig). Paying 115usd now for that and this new price has it at 90 and im getting a switch, 6 months of yt premium free and some kinda bt speaker. So not bad. The house already had the service installed so no installation fee either.

I decided to check if there are any cheaper internet providers available for me after reading this. Turns out there aren't, but I did go from €50 to €40 in the month just for extending my current plan by two years.

 

[Zed Clampet]

My 1 gig costs $70/mo, but I pay $60 because of a discount for having my payments automatically withdrawn. We need to just get rid of television service. That also costs $70. Actually, I'm not sure if my wife watches it on her phone or not, but I average 0 hours per week, and we never turn on the television at all.

 

[Zed Clampet]

So the problem with JDM: Japanese Drift Master (besides the fact I'm terrible at drifting) is that they launched the game with lousy wheel support. I don't have a wheel to test it, but everyone with a wheel is complaining about it. Controller support is great, but you've got to get wheels right or you are going to struggle. They seem to be working on it, but how do you launch a racing game on PC with terrible wheel support?

 

[BeardyHat]

My 1 gig costs $70/mo, but I pay $60 because of a discount for having my payments automatically withdrawn. We need to just get rid of television service. That also costs $70. Actually, I'm not sure if my wife watches it on her phone or not, but I average 0 hours per week, and we never turn on the television at all.

We're paying $99 a month just for 1Gig internet with a 1.2Tb cap. It's certainly not an amazing deal, but I don't think we have any other providers around here for the sake of competition.

Comcast has continually tried to get us to subscribe to TV service at a discount, but I flatout refuse, because we don't use it and I've never wanted to contribute to their subscriber numbers.

Played a bit of Turtle WoW over the weekend with my friends, which was nice. Also just a tiny amount of Hell Let Loose and Arma: Reforger. I like Hell Let Loose, if only because it's WW2 themed, but it's definitely a game I don't have much patience for; it doesn't mark enemies, so you're required to spot them visually and shoot them, which can be an exercise in frustration. Most of the time you're getting shot out of nowhere and can't make heads or tails of why you died.

Arma: Reforger is similar, but somehow less frustrating? I'm not sure why, but it's way easier to see enemies and generally feels a little less deadly, so you're sometimes able to escape death by hitting the deck and getting behind cover.

Did also play some Yakuza: Like a Dragon and ended-up playing a lot of the property management game within. That game is just so baffling, yet amusing and fun to play; it's extremely goofy, while also able of being sincere when it needs to be.

 

[Zed Clampet]

We're paying $99 a month just for 1Gig internet with a 1.2Tb cap. It's certainly not an amazing deal, but I don't think we have any other providers around here for the sake of competition.

Comcast has continually tried to get us to subscribe to TV service at a discount, but I flatout refuse, because we don't use it and I've never wanted to contribute to their subscriber numbers.

Played a bit of Turtle WoW over the weekend with my friends, which was nice. Also just a tiny amount of Hell Let Loose and Arma: Reforger. I like Hell Let Loose, if only because it's WW2 themed, but it's definitely a game I don't have much patience for; it doesn't mark enemies, so you're required to spot them visually and shoot them, which can be an exercise in frustration. Most of the time you're getting shot out of nowhere and can't make heads or tails of why you died.

Arma: Reforger is similar, but somehow less frustrating? I'm not sure why, but it's way easier to see enemies and generally feels a little less deadly, so you're sometimes able to escape death by hitting the deck and getting behind cover.

Did also play some Yakuza: Like a Dragon and ended-up playing a lot of the property management game within. That game is just so baffling, yet amusing and fun to play; it's extremely goofy, while also able of being sincere when it needs to be.

I will say this for Comcast. They are expensive, and their customer service can be infuriating, but their services are actually better than the other people I've ended up using. If I actually watched TV, I'd probably go back to Comcast.

 

[BeardyHat]

I will say this for Comcast. They are expensive, and their customer service can be infuriating, but their services are actually better than the other people I've ended up using. If I actually watched TV, I'd probably go back to Comcast.

It's mostly reliable, which my wife needs, since she's working from home. Occasional hiccups here and there, but usually solved by resetting the modem.

 

[DXCHASE]

I will say this for Comcast. They are expensive, and their customer service can be infuriating, but their services are actually better than the other people I've ended up using. If I actually watched TV, I'd probably go back to Comcast.

Yea, my ISP is limited here to Spectrum mainly. The service im switching to is Verizon Fios (its either that or spectrum). Theres another service around here called Greenlight Networks. They offer up to 2 gigs for the same price i was paying for 1 roughly but its in such a small small area and unfortunately the place im moving from had that service available and wouldnt you know it, within 3 days of finding a new place and beginning to pack, i get an email saying they are finally coming to install. I signed up roughly this time last year because they said itd be installed before 2025.

With that, Verizon Fios stated they have 2 gig as well but its not available in the area im at. Im planning on being here roughly the length of where ive been at unless i wind up actually buying a house which is the ultimate goal, so maybe ill get to use 2 gig at some point.

 

[neogunhero]

(Replying to posts from the May thread.)

Hey @neogunhero, got any commentary about this website?

Ships - Roberts Space Industries | Follow the development of Star Citizen and Squadron 42

Roberts Space Industries is the official go-to website for all news about Star Citizen and Squadron 42. It also hosts the online store for game items and merch, as well as all the community tools used by our fans.

robertsspaceindustries.com

A game only Elon Musk can afford to play.

I unfortunately bought into the $60 standard edition tier during their original Kickstarter. I say unfortunately because that was what, 12 years ago? It kind of baffles me how they’ve made so much money from the Kickstarter then sell these ships at such high prices. I wonder if there is a way to get these ships in game without paying. I would be interested in trying the game again as it really has been updated a ton over the years, some of the latest gameplay I saw looked pretty decent. I’m also very excited for the single player game Squadron 44, but I have no idea if I’ll get it or not though.

I'm going to put you on ignore. Every time you mention a game I end up buying it.

Well I can tell you one game to stay away from, that’s I Am Future. It’s a “cozy post apocalypse survival game” that takes place on the rooftops of a flooded city. Great premise, but gameplay was so incredibly slow and boring. If your idea of cozy is extremely slow gameplay, then it could be fun. I bought that over Dysmantle and I’m a bit disappointed.

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Besides all of that, I dabbled into some more S&box over the weekend. It's essentially the successor to Garry's Mod, being made by Garry himself and his team at Facepunch. The studio is still mainly focused on Rust, but S&box gets regular updates too. It's currently in developer preview only, but you can get access to it via the Facepunch website and it sends a copy to your Steam account. It's still very early in development but there is some fun to be had.

Garry's Mod largely helped found the model for user-generated content being the main feature of a game, and with S&box they are looking to do a full revamp of that system. In a way, it is trying to go the same route as Roblox and Fortnite did, with monetization features for content creators and such. The main basis is that users can create entire games, gamemodes, skins, weapons, props, all sorts of things to use and play with in game. Facepunch is wanting to monetize this and pay it's community creators just like how Roblox and Fortnite do for their creators.

So far it's got a lot of promise, a whole lot more than another similar game, EVERYWHERE by Build A Rocket Boy. I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that Garry Newman himself (no, not Numan) and Facepunch are working on it, as well as being on Source 2, perhaps that lowers the bar for entry and modding expertise compared to Unreal 5 that Everywhere uses. I have not used any mod editor for Source 2, but I can image it being quite similar to Source 1, so with that there are tons of people with lots of experience using it. I'm excited to see where it goes, and hope that they can fully realize their dream of being a major competitor among user generated content-centered games.

 

[Frindis]

A game only Elon Musk can afford to play.

Or this guy (old article, so imagine what some have spent now):

Meet a fan who has spent $30,000 on Star Citizen ships

Why one Star Citizen fan has spent $30K on the game, and plans to spend more.

www.pcgamer.com

I unfortunately bought into the $60 standard edition tier during their original Kickstarter. I say unfortunately because that was what, 12 years ago?

Around 2013 I bought the Pathfinder edition (65USD) which included a ship called 315P.

It kind of baffles me how they’ve made so much money from the Kickstarter then sell these ships at such high prices. I wonder if there is a way to get these ships in game without paying.

They have stated that all ships will eventually be included whenever that is.

I would be interested in trying the game again as it really has been updated a ton over the years, some of the latest gameplay I saw looked pretty decent.

I played it last year when they did the yearly free fly event. Looked waaaay better than some years ago, especially the different ports and orbital stations.

I’m also very excited for the single player game Squadron 44, but I have no idea if I’ll get it or not though.

SQ42 looks really good and hopefully we'll get a release in 2026. At least Chris Roberts said he was confident with the release window, but they also originally planned for it to release in 2016, soooooo.