Playing Hearthstone for the first time. My wife gifted me 60 packs of cards, so I've got a pretty good mage deck already. Good light-hearted and well-designed fun.

Red Dead Redemption 2...far more akin to Witcher 3 than, say, Fallout 4. More of a "need to be in a certain frame of mind, pay attention, serious" vibe to it. Every two steps forward are followed by a big one back for me. Rockstar controls and I don't really get along, so I'm near terribad at gunfights. Mostly on the significant delay between aiming/hitting shoot and the reload/shot fired actually occurring. Movement is, like Witcher 3, a bit odd, and the controls all too often have me accidentally hitting the wrong button/doing the wrong thing. Imagine I'll improve over time, but for early on it is frustrating. Riding around is fun, hunting is fun.

Causing chaos has all sorts of issues. Was scouting a target's house when someone passed me on the road and talked shit. So I shot him. Bang.

(Cue Yakkety Sax/Benny Hill theme)

And was spotted. So had to chased down and kill the witness.

And that was witnessed, so had to chase down and kill this new witness.

And THIS murder was spotted so had to hunt down and kill another person.

I can ride for 30 minutes without encountering more than one person, but the moment I do something nefarious, everyone in the territory is using that backwoods path for their morning commute.


I somehow escaped all that chaos with out getting identified, but a short bit later I happen on a train robbery, someone calls for help... so I start shooting the robbers. And suddenly I'm wanted for murder..

So as a whole I just play 30-40 minutes at a time, trying to explore new things but avoiding any quests (you get locked in once they start) like the plague. I want to feel more adept at what Im doing before it really "counts."

And thus the wife gifted another 60 packs of cards to her husband in Hearthstone, resulting in the man losing a few games less. But still mostly getting his ass handed to him because he makes the wrong moves and always runs out of patience.

I love Hearthstone.

After many years of meaning to play it, I finally got through the horrendous Temple of Trials tutorial of Fallout 2. Emboldened, I, the Chosen One, set out from the Temple, spoke to the village Shaman who entrusted me with an important task. I embarked on a journey of at least 5 metres and was unceremoniously cut down by a plant in his garden patch. War. War never changes.

Isn't it depressing? The current state of AAA games I mean, we have RDR2 but that's it. Battlefield V is such a mediocre game. Activision is shitting on both Diablo and Call Of Duty fans (nothing new in that regard tho). Ubisoft as always treads their PC users like garbage with their ridiculous anti-piracy system. Bethesda delivers their worse game in years with Fallout 76. Valve more focused on a fucking card game. Etc. etc.

Not sure why everyone has their panties in a twist with Fallout 76. bugginess? sure. I can get that. i've rather enjoyed it on PS4. granted, I didn't expect FO5, which is apparently why a majority of the haters are up in arms. was a one off side adventure to give the new studio they bought in Austin a test drive.

from my perspective, playing on a shit Colombian connection...

1. Some lag, but nowhere near the rubberbanding of Battlefront2, Mass Effect Androgynous multiplayer (4 players, small map) or even fucking Strong Bad's Cool Game (PS3 release) streaming. Disco'd maybe twice in 30something levels. Including playing during prime evening hours when I wouldn't even bother with BF2 or ME:A

2. Bugs - one resource center couldn't be claimed because an enemy was invisible/ghost. I couldn't complete one quest for a whopping one day before it was fixed. Third and worst I had was one stretched out hostile dog at my spawn point near my camp that couldn't be killed and chased me forever. That was annoying. Ran like hell the third time, died far enough away to spawn elsewhere, grab my dropped shit and moved my camp.

3. Mode of storytelling. Lack of PC's bothers some. Sure, I get that. On the other hand, the story is intriguing (through my current progress) despite being delivered in Bio Shock style.

4. Massive map plus #3 means I can roam around for hours on end without "Another settlement needs your help!" or, worse, being knee-deep in a campaign quest to save my son - say chasing Kellogg - without having to bail out some settlement of useless people who can't farm a carrot without my express direction, let alone defend their homestead while being armed with combat armor, laser weapons and an obscene amount of turrets in said settlement.

5. Storage does suck on a "save everything and break it all down to components" kinda game. Seems I am regularly questing for adhesive, aluminum or ballistic weave.

not the greatest game ever, sure, not horrible either. easy to pick up and just explore and blow shit up for a while without having to worry about consequences (a la 4, RDR2, or Witcher 3) ... at 31 or 32 or whatever, still feel happy about surviving an encounter with a legendary, looting it to find a missile launcher... was "fuckin wow!" and because of weight/space limits, as well as condition, rather than just dumping it in storage like I do with dozens of Fat Men, Gatling guns, laser Gatlings and missile launchers in FO4, I stripped some stuff to get under my weight, went back to something that annoyed me and rocketed the hell out of it.

I am rather enjoying it and will get a hell of a lot more out of it than the $60 or whatever I spent on it. hell, even based upon US minimum wage, not what I make, easily already cleared value out of it.

Written by Maco on 26.11.2018 at 03:38

Isn't it depressing? The current state of AAA games I mean, we have RDR2 but that's it. Battlefield V is such a mediocre game. Activision is shitting on both Diablo and Call Of Duty fans (nothing new in that regard tho). Ubisoft as always treads their PC users like garbage with their ridiculous anti-piracy system. Bethesda delivers their worse game in years with Fallout 76. Valve more focused on a fucking card game. Etc. etc.

I guess that Spiderman game turned out pretty well though, as well as kind of everything on the Switch (though that seems to be mostly ports).

Tbh though I don't think I've really got into any games that came out this year, I never did finish PoE II and Ni No Kuni II, though I plan to at some point. Death's Gambit seemed disappointing, and Sinner: Sacrifice for Redemption ended up being an 8-boss Souls-rush game that can be finished in 2 hours, so didn't bother with those. The ony games that interest me on the immediate horizon (i.e. 2018) are non-AAAs: Mutant Year Zero: Road to Eden, Narita Boy, Ashen, Disco Elysium, and maybe Praey for the Gods, but not sure those last four will even make it for this year. Guess I'll try and push on with Fallout 2, even though it's kind of an ugly slog.

Maybe 2019 will be better, there seems to be a lot to like coming next year.

Written by Mercurial on 26.11.2018 at 13:33

Guess I'll try and push on with Fallout 2, even though it's kind of an ugly slog.

I tried to start FO1 twice and gave up before I decided to pick up FO2 and just finish it. Turned out to be really good, but you do kinda need to play it long enough to forget how much smoother the gameplay/controls/interface could be these days.

There's a supposedly pretty good New Vegas total conversion mod, Fallout: New California that's out just now. New campaign in a new region:
https://www.moddb.com/mods/falloutprojectbrazil

I might just pick that up once I finish with my current games. Although I did buy Dark Souls 3 finally, from the Steam sale, so I may just try that first. I'm also really interested in RimWorld.

Written by IronAngel on 26.11.2018 at 18:59

I tried to start FO1 twice and gave up before I decided to pick up FO2 and just finish it. Turned out to be really good, but you do kinda need to play it long enough to forget how much smoother the gameplay/controls/interface could be these days.

There's a supposedly pretty good New Vegas total conversion mod, Fallout: New California that's out just now. New campaign in a new region:
https://www.moddb.com/mods/falloutprojectbrazil

I might just pick that up once I finish with my current games. Although I did buy Dark Souls 3 finally, from the Steam sale, so I may just try that first. I'm also really interested in RimWorld.

Yeah I learned from BG2 and PS: Torment etc that a lot of these legacy CRPGs need a bit of momentum before I'm fully sucked in. I'll get there. I'll definitely give the New California mod a shot too, at some point anyway.

I tried an earlier beta / alpha iteration of RimWorld and was so perplexed that I couldn't figure out what to do, but it does look engrossing. I assume there's probably a more robust tutorial now it's fully out.

Does anyone know if they ever fixed some of the issues that Mass Effect Andromeda had? I never played it so I don't exactly remember what the problem with it was, but apparently a lot of people were disappointed.

I see that it's 7? used now, so I'm tempted to buy it. I've always been a huge fan of Mass Effect 1 and 2, and even liked 3 a lot despite the final few minutes being some of the least satisfactory conclusory moments in gaming.

Heck, can it be that bad that 7? would be a waste of money?

Written by Zap on 29.11.2018 at 14:06

Does anyone know if they ever fixed some of the issues that Mass Effect Andromeda had? I never played it so I don't exactly remember what the problem with it was, but apparently a lot of people were disappointed.

I see that it's 7� used now, so I'm tempted to buy it. I've always been a huge fan of Mass Effect 1 and 2, and even liked 3 a lot despite the final few minutes being some of the least satisfactory conclusory moments in gaming.

Heck, can it be that bad that 7� would be a waste of money?

at 7 probably worth a play.

they "fixed" the faces, apparently - hooray.

combat can be fun and the game itself is largely beautiful, at least the planets are. They got that right from the start if far too few.

they made it so you can buy 'answer keys' or whatever so you don't have to fuck around with Space Sudoku anymore, which was nice.

the single biggest drawback is you can't fix the story. didn't like it. didn't care about the protagonist, didn't care about almost any of the squad mates. not enough exploration, only a few planets to actually go to. one of them was a confusing clusterfuck mess trying to navigate compared to the others.

the game sucks at the beginning, didn't like it for maybe an hour or two. the story did get better much later on, enjoyed it enough to finish it, but not enough to do a Game+ from the beginning and chase a few more achievements.

i described it thusly to a friend when it came out... if Mass Effect are the Star Wars original trilogy, then Andromeda is The Phantom Menace. 7e, sure. 17e maybe. full price - swerve hard.

Written by BitterCOld on 29.11.2018 at 16:30

at 7 probably worth a play.

Thanks for the in-depth reply. Seems like it still has enough enjoyable aspects for the price I'm paying. I don't have high expectations, but I'm in the mood for a space-themed RPG so if the combat and scenery is adequate I can live with it. I'll pick it up later today

Quote:
the single biggest drawback is you can't fix the story.

Haha, they actually tried once (with the Mass Effect 3 extended ending) and unfortunately you are right.

Written by Zap on 30.11.2018 at 09:55

Thanks for the in-depth reply. Seems like it still has enough enjoyable aspects for the price I'm paying. I don't have high expectations, but I'm in the mood for a space-themed RPG so if the combat and scenery is adequate I can live with it. I'll pick it up later today

Prepare to grit your teeth through the Havari world though. It's just awful.

Written by Mercurial on 30.11.2018 at 14:14

Prepare to grit your teeth through the Havari world though. It's just awful.

Yeah, cheers, I look forward to it.

Written by Zap on 30.11.2018 at 23:14

Yeah, cheers, I look forward to it.

Written by Mercurial on 30.11.2018 at 14:14

Prepare to grit your teeth through the Havari world though. It's just awful.

that the blacklight jungle one? hated that. got lost so many times as finding the path was a PITA. i think i took a week break at one point before buying a 12'er of cerveza and figuring it out.

Written by Zap on 30.11.2018 at 09:55


Haha, they actually tried once (with the Mass Effect 3 extended ending) and unfortunately you are right.

well, ME3's final ending sequence was horrible (and soooooo drawn out without f'in saves.) but at least they had the House Party DLC with all your amigos and one of my fave scenes in any Mass Effect.



and you had the great characters. there maybe a couple I didn't like but you had a good stable of squadmates who you cared about. Given my choices, love how Jack turned out protecting the biotic students, Garrus was awesome. Liara's arc. Each of the Krogan.

So beyond story, it's missing that appeal. There is some amusing dialog while bouncing around in the Mako, but outside loyalty missions, don't think any of the new gang would make the rotation if all the companions were lumped into some bizarre mash-up story. None are top 12.

Written by BitterCOld on 02.12.2018 at 22:53


that the blacklight jungle one? hated that. got lost so many times as finding the path was a PITA. i think i took a week break at one point before buying a 12'er of cerveza and figuring it out.

Yeah it was an absolute arse ache. Managed to power through it and was glad to be done. Trees and plants everywhere. I enjoyed the other worlds though, though that last desert one was a bit barren.

Written by BitterCOld on 02.12.2018 at 23:09

So beyond story, it's missing that appeal. There is some amusing dialog while bouncing around in the Mako, but outside loyalty missions, don't think any of the new gang would make the rotation if all the companions were lumped into some bizarre mash-up story. None are top 12.

As I said, I liked Mass Effect 3 a great deal. Just those final few minutes, but I don't find it all that hard not to focus on that. The rest of the game was great with some amazing moments from time to time.

I played quite a lot of Andromeda over the weekend because I had nothing to do for once and was actually pretty hooked from the start. Whether that's because I realized I haven't played a Mass Effect game for too long or because the game is just that addicting I don't know, but I dig the game overall. The combat is nice and fluid and it's fun shooting collectors-- err, Kett. The visuals are stunning. Makes me wish I could replay the old trilogy with updated graphics and combat.

The game seems huge though. It's a bit daunting; all the little details, optional stuff like sidequests, striketeams, planets, etc. I'm never too inclined to check everything out, but I can't stand feeling like I will miss something good. Other Mass Effect games were huge as well of course, and there was always a lot of optional stuff, but since the main story and characters were so great, it always felt natural to explore everything and immerse myself in the amazingly detailed world.

The squadmates are indeed uninteresting, that's the main problem so far. They're generic and boring, I can't remember any of their names, I wouldn't care if any of them died, and they make me miss my old pal Garrus. The story, though not the most intriguing one I've seen in a video game, isn't bad so far. If it doesn't get worse I'm fine with it. It's serviceable.

Obsidian's new first first-person RPG actually has me excited and looks like New Vegas in space.

Written by Mercurial on 07.12.2018 at 10:39

looks like New Vegas in space.

First time in a long while someone made me watch a trailer. Looks fun.

Some rambling thoughts on Mass Effect: Andromeda so far (SPOILERS)

Positive: combat is fun, visuals are stunning, the world is full of life --as usual with Mass Effect-- and fun to explore, some good sidequests that don't slow down the main game, etc.

Negative: What bugs me the most is the teammates, as mentioned earlier. Not going into detail on that since I already have to some extent. Here's something else that bothers me though:

The whole first contact with the Angaran was pretty bad. Mass Effect 1 had the advantage that by the time the story begins humanity had already made first contact with alien lifeforms. So them being integrated in a galactic society and communicating isn't weird. You're told about it in the prelude and that's enough for your mind to fill in the blanks on the first contact.

In this game you make first contact with an alien lifeform you've never seen before, and it goes waaaaaay too smoothly.
First off, they immediately understand each other. Yeah, sure there is technology that translates on the go, and since they are both highly advanced civilizations they both have this technology. Still, it didn't even take one second for them to start speaking to and understanding each other. You would think it should take at least a second for the devices to analyse their language and make sense of it. I would be willing to let it pass if the rest didn't go equally as smoothly though. But you basically arrive on their planet, introduce yourself, and while the Angarans are extremely distrusting of aliens --since they have only made contact with one other species who they have been at war with since-- they immediately trust you enough to start working together. Well, maybe not immediately, but still pretty quickly. And one of them immediately joins your team... What?!

And then there is the way humans and Angaran interact immediately after making contact, and this is really my biggest annoyance. They talk as if they have known about each others' species for years. You say "pathfinder" or "milky way" and they immediately know what you mean. You raise your hands and they immediately know you're trying to communicate that you're not hostile (again something I'd let slide if the whole was better.) Jaal is telling you about their species after a few minutes of knowing him, but he speaks as if he has compared it to many other species. He couldn't have since we're the first fucking aliens he has met that aren't trying to kill or capture him ("We Angarans speak freely of our emotions, blabla")
Not to mention the Angaran design is boring and uninspired and basically just a mix of some of the other Mass Effect species both aesthetically and psychologically. Nothing unique.

I actually thought the first encounter with the Kett was way better. There was a lot of confusion, you couldn't understand each other, and you didn't know if they were hostile or not. By the time you did know what was going on people had died on both sides! Holy cow, that did not go as planned.

And then there was the "twist" (again; spoilers) that the Kett were Angaran. Really... which Mass Effect fan could not see that one coming? I mean, remember Mass Effect 2? "Holy shit, the collectors are Protheans?! I have so many questions..."
I'm still waiting for the reveal that the Reapers are behind it all...

Last but certainly not least; Bioware missed a glorious opportunity to make the other Milky Way species playable in this game. In the original trilogy it makes sense that you play as a human. You get introduced to all the other species and can live through it from a familiar perspective. This time though, you have a much larger perspective, that of the entire Milky Way, as established in the previous games. Since you're going to Andromeda, your background can be whatever, as long as its origins lie in the Milky Way. It would have been awesome to play as another race, the Andromeda galaxy would have felt equally strange, but long time fans would have been equally familiar with their character's origins...

Yeah, two races plus robots was garbage considering how much hopping around you do... and trimming away the existing races down to just human, Krogan, Salarian, Turian and Asari, while dumping even as NPCs Batarians, Elcor, Volus, Drell (a fave of mine) and freaking Quarians (not to mention others) is ridiculous. massive steps backwards.

Downloaded a ps1 version of CTR. Back to story mode once again.
Getting those platinuns is a bit harder than I remembered.

Anyone into this game? Rumour is there will be a new version for ps4 pretty soon. I hope they maintain the glitches so we can still use the buggy shortcuts

I played Fallout 76, it's horseshit period.

Written by Maco on 21.12.2018 at 18:40

I played Fallout 76, it's horseshit period.

Will disagree there.

My platform - PS4 - has been almost bug free. had maybe 5 annoying bugs in 110+ hours. Beyond that, didn't expect FO5. Expected a survival game with that Vault Tec flavor. Some of my favorite nights playing Witcher 3 or FO4 are just wandering and exploring. 76 has given me an awful large sandbox to explore without Preston chiming in every 4.6 seconds about another settlement incapable of doing a fucking thing for itself needing me to kill three raiders armed with pipe weapons and a sharp stick.

Depends what you expect going in, I guess.

And in that regards I pity anyone expecting FO5. It's a last gasp on the current platform/model before they take a 10 year hiatus on the next one. (See: Elder Scrolls Six, whenever that comes out...) Story delivery is different than past Bethesda, but works. Watch Oxhorn's vids on the stories, does a brilliant job. I did the Mystery Chicks Society or whatever plotline and found just the holotapes and computer entries as gripping as any questline in FO4 or Sky Rim. Frustrating that whatever I did was too late, but still emotionally gripping. Trying to do some of the later stuff - where grouping is expected - as a solo player is frustrating/intense at the same time.

Don't think it awesome, nor think it shit. A game I enjoy playing and will run through on several characters just to see differences in focusing on certain SPECIAL traits and abilities.

I have no place so much on PC I have that other hard drive, so if I uninstrall game from PC , whats on steam, can I use old key or I should buy for new?

If you bought it on steam, you own it on your steam account and can dl again and again. PS4 does this with me as well.

Written by BitterCOld on 28.12.2018 at 04:41

If you bought it on steam, you own it on your steam account and can dl again and again. PS4 does this with me as well.

¨
I bought on G2A site a code,. it was cheapest. I download and activate code. Game takes a lot of place on my PC. I have that othe rhard drive what has less space, but works faster, plus old PC hard drive 1 T is as extra and its full whit music.
If I uninstall from PC, but keep in steam libyer, I hope it will work. I have way to many games in my list, Sniper Elite and Sniper Ghost Warrior, Skygrim, MoH Afga and war fighter, maybe older as well, well basically huge list.

I play old Nintendo games now, Ice n Fire and Super Mario II, I am stuck whit those.

I played Mafia II Joes Adventures and Betrayer of Jimmy and Jimmys Vandeta,

Now mafia III,
Its like mix between Mafia I where you take life as medical issue.
I like a swamps, gators can eat you. I like shooting, a but hard and more realistic as other Mafia games, and lads dont die so fast. Music is super.
Cars and city graphic when drive can be much better, and map when you click tab can be better. seems there are to many videos as game. Whole game in some way is free ride. I dont like when you need go stasch your cash in a safe, if you die you lost. Super weapon list, mines. I have not tried those so far. Its like there are no starting point for new missions. Seems I write negative things, but I like it a lot, after som time I do.