The Currently Playing & Random Game Thoughts Thread (March 13 to 19)

[ZedClampet]

I might be gone for a bit, so i'm posting this a little early. by the way, my shift keys--both of them--aren't working at the moment, so there will be no capitalization.

friday, they predicted we'd get snow overnight, but i ignored it because it was 73 degrees at the time. woke up this morning to 4 inches of snow, which is the most we've had in 20 years. pretty awesome if you aren't used to it.

don't think i'll get to play anything this week, which should cause serious gaming withdrawal symptoms. if i do manage to play anything, it will be either total war warhammer 3 or dying light 2.

 

[COLGeek]

I really need to find a new game to play. Thought about Halo Infinite, but the reviews (mostly for technical issues) seem abysmal.

I enjoyed Doom (2016), but not Doom Eternal (not a fan of all the parkour hooey). I have played WAY too much Diablo III (Demon Hunter L70, Paragon L173, only killed a mere 288, 826 monsters to date).

Thought I would like Baldur's Gate 3, but the mechanics and turn based play is just too slow and awkward for my taste.

Any recommendations for a FPS or RPG?

 

[Brian Boru]

recommendations for a FPS

You prefer open world or closed?
FPP or TPP?
Run n Gun or Walk n Stalk™?
SP or multi?
Solo or squad?
Mash or hash browns?

 

[COLGeek]

Closed. Either. SP. Solo. Hash browns.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

@COLGeek The later Wolfenstein games are really good linearish FPS games, Wolfenstein : The New Order, and New Colossus and the expansions. Metro Exodus also, if you dont mind a semi open world. The first two Metro games are great and more linear, but more like survival horror shooters in that ammo can be a bit scarce and there's a fair amount of sneaking around required at times.

I'd say give Titanfall 2 a try as well, it doesnt have parkour as such but there's some wall running. Its very fast paced a bit like Doom 2016, most fun I had in an FPS campaign in a long time.

Control is a really good third person game too, not a pure shooters but has a lot of shooting in it.

If you want an old school original Baldurs Gate style RPG theres Pillars of Eternity, I think I might have recommended that before though. I dont really play ARPG's like Diablo much.

 

[Sarafan]

Thankfully I had more desire to play games than in the last two weeks. Still playing Tiberian Sun. It's a really wonderful RTS. Apart from the AI which doesn't present a satisfying level, it's one of the best games in the genre IMHO. Given the trouble I had with making it run properly, I was wondering how Red Alert 2 along with Yuri's Revenge will perform on my current hardware. Of course the vanilla version is barely playable, but this time the community patch (which allows for online play as well!) did its job fantastically. If someone plans to run Red Alert 2 in the future, I highly recommend using it: https://cncnet.org/yuris-revenge. The description says only about online play, but the patch modifies the game engine for single player purpose as well.

I also continue playing Mass Effect 2 from the Mass Effect Legendary Edition collection. I expect for it to last for several dozens of hours and I'm still fairly early in the game. BioWare did a good job remastering the whole series. It's not a graphical shift of Diablo 2 Resurrected proportions, but still a good job nonetheless.

Also I decided to return to Total War: Empire. Probably my favorite installment in the series. I'm currently preparing for online battles with my friend.

Any recommendations for a FPS or RPG?

Do you like old school FPSs? There's a great Humble Bundle offer which includes 8 wonderful titles from this genre: https://www.humblebundle.com/games/...ner=pcgamer&data1=pcg-row-2827460402511066000.

 

[COLGeek]

Thanks for the recommendations, guys. Much appreciated.

 

[Zloth]

Closed. Either. SP. Solo. Hash browns.

Trying to resist the temptation to report this post and random words coming from a bot.

You want speed? Here's some classic shooting in a modern engine.

Overload on Steam

A new six-degree-of-freedom shooter with intuitive controls, amazing lighting and graphics. From the creators of Descent, Overload is the best zero-gravity robot-blasting combat ever.

store.steampowered.com

Or, if you want a little less twitch and more brain:

Save 80% on Prey on Steam

In Prey, you awaken aboard Talos I, a space station orbiting the moon in the year 2032. You are the key subject of an experiment meant to alter humanity forever – but things have gone terribly wrong. The space station has been overrun by hostile aliens and you are now being hunted.

store.steampowered.com

 

[COLGeek]

Trying to resist the temptation to report this post and random words coming from a bot.

You want speed? Here's some classic shooting in a modern engine.

Overload on Steam

A new six-degree-of-freedom shooter with intuitive controls, amazing lighting and graphics. From the creators of Descent, Overload is the best zero-gravity robot-blasting combat ever.

store.steampowered.com

Or, if you want a little less twitch and more brain:

Save 80% on Prey on Steam

In Prey, you awaken aboard Talos I, a space station orbiting the moon in the year 2032. You are the key subject of an experiment meant to alter humanity forever – but things have gone terribly wrong. The space station has been overrun by hostile aliens and you are now being hunted.

store.steampowered.com

IRL I very often have to address very large audiences. Occasionally, I get asked a "yes/no" question. I have been known to provide the one word response and move to the next question. Blows the audience away when I do that.

They expect the normal answer followed by a long explanation. I do that too, but only when truly warranted.

 

[WoodenSaucer]

I'm still chipping away at A Plague Tale and Halo: CE. A Plague Tale just keeps getting better and better. That game is a gem.

 

[Zloth]

I finished my first proper game of Age of Wonders: Planetfall last night. Definitely good stuff! People keep comparing it to XCOM because of how the combat plays out, but it really felt more like Endless Legends to me with the ability to modify units and taking over entire sectors instead of building cities in specific spots. As I mentioned in another topic, this deserves to be a lot more popular than it is.

 

[Pifanjr]

[Mod edit: this is re Warhammer 2.]
Yesterday I got to continue my Direfin campaign. I got to the final battle on turn 122 and 30+ minutes in the battle, at the final wave , I paused to help my wife with something and managed to unplug my computer.

I tried it again in the evening and it went a lot better. The final wave turned out to be absolutely trivial with the amount of firepower I brought.

I immediately bought the Greenskin DLC and started a new Vortex campaign with Grom. It's a bit strange, as Grom boosts the earliest units so much that it's not really worth upgrading them, but the change from a defensive ranged focused faction to an aggressive melee focused faction is really nice.
I also ended the Direfin campaign with only two settlements, whereas I'm now just conquering everything around me as fast as possible. And where the battles at the end of the Direfin campaign had become pretty much trivial, every other battle as Grom is stacked against me and it's been very satisfying winning almost all of them.

 

[Frindis]

PUBG & Elden Ring for the most part. Have to jump into Dying Light again, it is such a good game! @ZedClampet Throwing in a tip that you can use the Windows On-Screen keyboard for capitalizing.

 

[Pifanjr]

Continued with the Grom campaign today. I set up an ambush against some Lizardmen and the autoresolve gave me a win while losing two units. I decided to try it myself and got slaughtered.

I reloaded and took the autoresolve. It felt wrong, but I really didn't want to do the battle again nor did I want to risk losing a settlement and prolonging the war when I had beat them back to their last settlement.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Grabbed an hour of Elden Ring this morning, unsure where to go after Raya Lucaria Academy as both Altus Plateau and Caelid are a bit of a difficulty spike from Liurna of the Lakes. Trying Caelid, the Erdtree sentinel there causes scarlet rot and I dont have a recipe for any resistance to it yet. On the main road the Tyrannosauras Doggos & Crows are also brutal.

Found my way into a mine hopefully next time I can pick up some smithing stones and then a level or two for my weapons. Still loving it, cant find enough time to play.

Crusader Kings on and off as its relatively child friendly, just need to grab an extra level of fame on the current character to form the empire of Alba. Its a bit slow now there is nowhere close that threatens me. Also have high partition now so when the PC gets old theres not so much of a fuss about the succession. Going to see the game to the end, its usually at this point I tail off with and move on, I've never really pushed into the late game because the challenge hasnt been there once the realm is a certain size Maybe something else will come up to keep it interesting, it has so far this time around.

 

[flashn00b]

I'd like to play a game with you all called "What's wrong with this picture"

 

[Zloth]

Only one has a cute horsey on it!

 

[Johnway]

OMG! free Chivalry 2 weekend! the game has been eating at my sanity for the past few months wondering whether to get the game or not. Was the last free weekend all a dream? do i really want it? who knows? Best i play the hell out of it over the weekend right? Right?!

Actually, i don't know. For some reason even with this golden opportunity (to finally decide whether to buy it) i'm not entirely sure i want to. The rational side of me reminds me how little time i have to play, get gud, i have a massive steam/epic/gog backlog to contend with, the limited number of maps, how angry i get playing pvp and life commitments makes me pause and think about whether i really want it.

Don't know about you guys, but i torture myself wanting something and when the opportunity arrives i suddenly don't want it. its like being offered something you want, the end to your pain and misery and all you have to do it reach out and get it... yet i don't want to....

 

[flashn00b]

Actually, i don't know. For some reason even with this golden opportunity (to finally decide whether to buy it) i'm not entirely sure i want to. The rational side of me reminds me how little time i have to play, get gud, i have a massive steam/epic/gog backlog to contend with, the limited number of maps, how angry i get playing pvp and life commitments makes me pause and think about whether i really want it.

I'd say get it anyways cuz it's a much better Bannerlord multiplayer than the actual Bannerlord multiplayer.

 

[Johnway]

I'd say get it anyways cuz it's a much better Bannerlord multiplayer than the actual Bannerlord multiplayer.

The problem is time atm. I can easily afford the game but i'm thinking rationally when it comes to games. i don't even know if i will have time to play it! i have a massive backlog of games that needs to be dealt with and i just don't see the game holding my interest for that long. Comparing it with like Path of Exile; which is constantly improving adding additional content and features every quarter, Chivalry 2 seems to have few significant updates. I'll probably get my money's worth (£1 an hour), but it feels like pointless time sink in some ways. Am i going to play it to have fun or am i just doing it because i don't want to feel like i wasted money?

The second harsh reality is that for the money i could use to buy chivalry 2, i could buy older/indie, cheaper games. Like spiritfarer.

 

[Brian Boru]

i have a massive steam/epic/gog backlog to contend with

Only help I can offer for your various conundrums is don't fret about backlog. Play what you want to play today, what you will enjoy today—and of course, tomorrow too Backlog will be there whether you torture or enjoy yourself.

the game has been eating at my sanity for the past few months

Looks to me like you got to take advantage of the free weekend. I can almost guarantee you'll be driving yourself even crazier next week if you don't

 

[WoodenSaucer]

Did anyone see the Stand with Ukraine Humble Bundle? There are a ton of really great games for $40.

Stand with Ukraine Bundle

Support vital humanitarian crisis relief for the people of Ukraine with an all-to-charity bundle featuring games, books, and software.

www.humblebundle.com

 

[Pifanjr]

Did anyone see the Stand with Ukraine Humble Bundle? There are a ton of really great games for $40.

Stand with Ukraine Bundle

Support vital humanitarian crisis relief for the people of Ukraine with an all-to-charity bundle featuring games, books, and software.

www.humblebundle.com

I came here to mention it. I definitely considered buying it for a moment, but we can't really spare the money when realistically I'm only going to play 1 or 2 games from the entire bundle and I have plenty of games in my backlog.

 

[Brian Boru]

Stand with Ukraine Humble Bundle

Is there a breakdown somewhere of how much of the donations actually make it to those in need? I'm not familiar with any of the organizations mentioned as beneficiaries.

 

[Pifanjr]

Is there a breakdown somewhere of how much of the donations actually make it to those in need? I'm not familiar with any of the organizations mentioned as beneficiaries.

Razom for Ukraine:
Unknown.

International Rescue Committee:
According to Charity Navigator, in 2019, more than 87 cents of every $1 received by IRC went to programs and services that directly affected their clientele.[56]

International Medical Corps:
Charity Navigator says 86% of donations are going to those in need.

Direct Relief:
Charity Navigator says 99.6% of donations are going to those in need.