Playing Hotline Miami 2. I had to pirate it since it's still banned in my country for a clip that's less offensive and explicit than shit in a Futurama episode. Which is a shame, because the game is good. Damned good.

I've also been playing Cities: Skylines, which is pretty much everything SimCity should have been and then some. It's kinda fantastic.

Also, Oddworld: New 'n' Tasty, which was pretty darned disappointing. I wrote a review here for those of you who care to read it: http://plus10damage.com/blog/2015/3/6/oddworld-new-n-tasty-review

Finally, I'm REALLY looking forward to Bloodborne, much like the rest of you. 8 Days to go!

Written by [user id=142921] on 13.03.2015 at 16:30

Written by Mad Arab666 on 12.03.2015 at 07:31

Thought it was. I'm really looking forward to bloodborne. I got 14 days and 18 hours to go before it gets released in the UK.

For now i'm just playing shadow of mordor and samurai warriors 3 to keep me busy.

eww SoM

----

to be fair I'm finding SoM incredibly boring. I mainly bought it because I'm a bt bit of a Tolkien fan and because of the hype. I'm probably going to trade it in for Bloodborne or MkX.

Currently playing Transistor after purchasing it a few months ago.

I was already a big fan of Bastion so, naturaly, I was pretty excited with SuperGiant's second game. Installed it and played 2 hours of it so far. While the gameplay is headed in a different direction, it still reminds me of Bastion, which is a good thing. The battle system is great and easy to use but equally challenging, it takes a few tries to get used to Real-Time fighting and even turn-based isn't that linear since there's a few combos to discover. Story-wise it's great, they're really mastering the art of storytelling. Visuals are awesome and the graphics are gorgeous.

I've heard the game is quite small which I don't doubt since Bastion was small as well, but there was some replay-value so I'm guessing they've gave Transistor some too.

So far so good,

Written by whatsacow on 17.03.2015 at 13:53

Playing Hotline Miami 2. I had to pirate it since it's still banned in my country for a clip that's less offensive and explicit than shit in a Futurama episode. Which is a shame, because the game is good. Damned good.

Hotline Miami 2 played me. Great isn't it ? fucking difficult too... ? only AFTER I finished the game did I discover they added a new feature to lock aim enemies - glad I didn't use it at all, because it's disabled anyway in Hard mode. MAN, HARD MODE. is Hard....

I first thought Hotline 2 was average when I finished it.. but I find myself going back to it so I guess it's better than I expected. Soundtrack is excellent though. It's just that some levels are too big and frustrating, and it's the wrong kind of frustration, not like Holtine Miami 1.

Written by ylside on 19.03.2015 at 16:53

Written by whatsacow on 17.03.2015 at 13:53

Playing Hotline Miami 2. I had to pirate it since it's still banned in my country for a clip that's less offensive and explicit than shit in a Futurama episode. Which is a shame, because the game is good. Damned good.

Hotline Miami 2 played me. Great isn't it ? fucking difficult too... ? only AFTER I finished the game did I discover they added a new feature to lock aim enemies - glad I didn't use it at all, because it's disabled anyway in Hard mode. MAN, HARD MODE. is Hard....

I first thought Hotline 2 was average when I finished it.. but I find myself going back to it so I guess it's better than I expected. Soundtrack is excellent though. It's just that some levels are too big and frustrating, and it's the wrong kind of frustration, not like Holtine Miami 1.

Yeah, that is my big gripe with it too. Some of the levels are just too darn big. When you have 6 or 7 levels you have to contend with in a row that you can't just save and quit and come back to later - that's infuriating.

So is Pillars of Eternity really the Second Coming? Do I need to blow 40e on it immediately or be sensible and wait for a discount? I'm in the middle of KotOR2 and Geneforge 1 atm, so it's not like I don't have shit to play, but damn it looks titillating. I still haven't bought Divinity: Original Sin either, so between those two and the upcoming Tides of Numenara and UnderRail, it looks RPGs haven't been this good since around 1999.

Loving bloodborne at the moment though I can't get past the first boss.

Only done two hours of gameplay though. I'm also playing fire emblem awakening on the 3DS. Really having fun with that.

Written by [user id=142921] on 30.03.2015 at 06:10

Written by Mad Arab666 on 29.03.2015 at 22:34

Loving bloodborne at the moment though I can't get past the first boss.

Only done two hours of gameplay though. I'm also playing fire emblem awakening on the 3DS. Really having fun with that.

Which boss? Cause some people accidentally fight the second boss first who's way more difficult.

It was the cleric beast but I finally beat him. I just love exploring yharnham. Like in dark souls there's just a certain sense of dread you get with every step.

Kinda disappointed with Bloodborne's Replayability. There aren't any builds and new game + doesn't change anything. All there is is the Challice Dungeons. Still, absolutely fantastic 80 hours.

Played a lot of Bloodborne and put up a review: http://plus10damage.com/blog/2015/4/15/bloodborne-review

Now I'm playing Scholar of the First Sin. The changes they made are pretty darn good and make the game more challenging, but also a bit fairer. Some areas aren't as bullshitty, and some just make more sense lorewise.

I've started playing GTA IV with my friend a lot, just beat the final heist and made $1.3 mil. It is the biggest pain in the ass waiting for the exact amount of players needed for missions, but once we start playing they're great. When we are hanging out we play horror games, at the moment its SCP: Containment Breach. We got stuck after it turned out the one place on the map where we constantly glitch and fall through is necessary to beat the game! After that its probably Amnesia: Machine For Pigs (we just beat the first game.)

I been playing the witcher 3 for a while now. Pretty awesome game. Anyone tried it?

Been playing Mortal kombat x as well but not as much. Still a good game.

Brutal doom v20. well its brutal i can say that (also dual wield )

Written by ANGEL REAPER on 14.06.2015 at 21:30

Brutal doom v20. well its brutal i can say that (also dual wield )

I just saw the trailer for Brutal doom. Looks so chaotic and fun.

Pillars of Eternity is the tits. It is a shame they made it real-time with pause rather than turn-based, though.

Waiting for the Path of Exile expansion, playing some ARMA III with my European friends when I have the time.

Written by IronAngel on 23.06.2015 at 13:16

Pillars of Eternity is the tits. It is a shame they made it real-time with pause rather than turn-based, though.

Aye, but I find PoE to be far more playable than old Infinity Engine games, even if PoE is trying hard to be like them.

Planescape: Torment was the only IE game I could stomach playing (since it is not combat-oriented at all), even though I wanted to like Baldur's Gate II a lot, my principal gaming experience with BG II was getting freed from Irenicus' crib at the start as a sorcerer, then meeting a couple of imp-like things, blasting them relatively fine, then ran out of spells, no way to rest and then I said hello to like 2 min long battles against imps where my two-member party nearly died with no way to regen.

This is on easiest. I fully realize I suck at this whole DnD shiznit, but I don't see why a real-time capable video game has to adhere downright strictly to pen and paper rpg rules, and I don't see how should I have fought those early battles with so limited spells as a spellcaster.

Never had this issue with PoE however, even if the game IS hard, and a turn-based (or fully real-time) combat system would have fit it better.

I just bought Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate for the 3DS, as I hugely enjoyed MH Tri on the Wii, so far its a

Bought so many games during the Steam Summer Sale, but I can't stop playing a wee £2 game called "Town Of Salem". It's so unbelievably addicitive. I'll get back to point n click games and CS:GO eventually

Im playing Broforce these couple of days.Its much fun !

Written by [user id=142921] on 12.07.2015 at 19:22

Witcher 3 done after 180 hours.

Got me thinking what games I have spent the most hours on. Pretty easy to tell with Steam members. Just look it up. So with that in mind, I have put in 1091 hours into Borderlands 2. 313 hours in Skyrim. 8 MONTHS on QuakeLive, but that doesn't count since it's an online shooter. On the consoles, I remember putting over 300 hours in Final Fantasy 7 on PS3, the counter stopped at 299 I think. Oblivion, Fallout 3 and New Vegas, I know I put a boatload of hours into those games as well. I am missing some other games, those are the ones off the top of my head. Anyone want to chime in?

I also found the swamp in Witcher (acts II and III apparently, looking at the Wiki) very generic and tedious. So many quests about running back and forth through uninteresting areas, farming uninteresting monsters. Perhaps my memory of the experience is distorted, but it felt like doing chores in two areas (half of Vizima, and the swamp) dominated the major part of the game. It had its moments: a good story, art style (apart from recycled NPCs) and atmosphere, but a large part of it was just unappealing. Outdoors area design was very MMO-ish, I guess you could say, and the combat/character building aspect sucks ass. A good game, though, but nowhere near a modern RPG gem for me. (But I guess that is partly due to me being an RPG fan and the game really isn't one, so I judge by unusual standards.)

Looking at Bloodborne for PS4. thoughts?

Written by BitterCOld on 16.07.2015 at 02:49

Looking at Bloodborne for PS4. thoughts?

If you like Action role-playing you will love it, but you need patience (game is hard as fuck, not for newbies) and skill.

Bah, games that don't have a difficulty scale down or way to pass certain obstacles drive me freaking insane. just stupid of designers to design a game that is impassible for those without appropriate twitch/coordination.

can't do online gaming down here so that limits options. not going to bother with something that will frustrate me to the point of tossing a flaming ps4 off my balcony.

Written by whatsacow on 10.04.2015 at 14:55

Kinda disappointed with Bloodborne's Replayability. There aren't any builds and new game + doesn't change anything. All there is is the Challice Dungeons. Still, absolutely fantastic 80 hours.

Wait, are you saying one playthrough of Bloodborne is 80 hours? That seems like a lot. Is it that big? I still haven't been able to play it (not gonna bother with a PS4 until there's more than one worthwhile game.)

Written by [user id=142921] on 23.07.2015 at 15:59

Written by Zap on 22.07.2015 at 17:27

Wait, are you saying one playthrough of Bloodborne is 80 hours? That seems like a lot. Is it that big? I still haven't been able to play it (not gonna bother with a PS4 until there's more than one worthwhile game.)

This should help

Thanks, seems like it's shorter than Dark Souls then. Still a long game though apparently.

Written by Zap on 23.07.2015 at 17:02

Written by [user id=142921] on 23.07.2015 at 15:59

Written by Zap on 22.07.2015 at 17:27

Wait, are you saying one playthrough of Bloodborne is 80 hours? That seems like a lot. Is it that big? I still haven't been able to play it (not gonna bother with a PS4 until there's more than one worthwhile game.)

This should help

Thanks, seems like it's shorter than Dark Souls then. Still a long game though apparently.

It feels short, but I think that's more a case of it never growing tired. You don't want it to end. Also, unlike Dark Souls, this games story is a lot more prominent, extremely dark and creepy, and all kinds of awesome. Think lovecraft/steampunk hybrid, but with gameplay that feels like a mix of Dark Souls and Old School Devil May Cry. I bought my PS4 just for it, and I wasn't disappointed.

Just beat Bloodborne, which was pretty good, if not quite a Dark Souls beater. Trounces Demon's Souls though, which is quite easily my least favourite having gone through all the games again this year.

I actually fucked up the end though and chose the wrong option, which, with to give a little spoiler away means you miss out on the last 2 bosses (or only 1 boss if you didn't do a certain thing, which I made sure I did). Bit annoyed as up to that point I'd solo one-shotted all but two of the bosses (making sure I didn't fall foul of the PS4 memory leak glitch too) and the one Chalice dungeon boss I fought; didn't bother much with the Chalice Dungeon as it was a bit rubbish. The only bosses that gave me trouble were Martyr Logarius who took 3 tries before I learned the value of parrying there, and Ebrietas, the Daughter of The Cosmos which was a bit of a bullshit boss with her nearly-unavoidable charge attacks. She took me 4 goes I think. Youtubed the last two bosses instead (as I'll be selling my PS4, which I only bought for Bloodborne) and they didn't look too difficult. Not to say this is any easier than other Souls games. Possibly harder in fact. Bosses take a lot more damage to bring down and you can often get caught in flurry attacks which nigh on kill you (most bosses I ended up with only a few blood vials left). Actually the NPC hunters were harder than the bosses, the side-quest related one inside the Cathedral in particular. Holy shit. Still though, the real enemy was the camera, which has somehow gotten awful. Rarely had issues with it in other games but in Bloodborne I could probably attribute half of my deaths to the camera when it filled the screen with the back of my character's head after being in a corner. Not to mention the jumping mechanic also got worse; putting the jump button back on the circle button: the button you also use to run and roll with. Why.

But yeah it's really good, if a little barebones I think. Great art style of course, even if the game feels a little saturated at times and sort of all looks the same a bit after a while, not to mention the fairly frequent re-use of assets and monster re-skinning. Story, and level design wise it could be the best yet; the way the levels sprawl and contort, although again at times the vertical nature and endless lift shortcuts felt a bit obvious after a while. Not quite as many "wow, I'm here?" surprises as with DS1. Definitely the best set of bosses I think in a Souls related game but maybe too many oversized grotesque amorphous creatures which fill the whole screen and become flailing messes, perhaps. They more or less all look spectacular though, and the fact the majority are multi-staged is great, and what all future games should aim for.

I say it feels barebones as there's not all that much choice for gameplay, outside of the (comparatively) few trick weapons. No matter how you cut it it's a little hack 'n' slash-y at times, and there's really only one way to play the game so definitely not as deep as a Dark Souls game. It does what it does fairly well though so can't really criticise is too much. It's much more fast paced (very much so during bosses; seriously intense) and parrying is easier and more encouraged, again during bosses as it's usually the only way to deal large amounts of damage. Dark Souls just feels more fleshed out, what with magic; proper long range combat; upgradable armour that affect your movement and poise; shields; tons of different weapon types and movesets, and so on. All missing from Bloodborne. It doesn't really beg for repeated plays, so I don't feel bad getting rid of it as I'd completed basically everything outside the Chalice Dungeon (I metagamed a bit). The timer by the end was 34 hours, and I was level 71 I think. Pretty sure I left the game idle for a few hours so maybe closer to 30 hours. It didn't feel short though. Any more and I think would have been too much given the very specific tone of the game. I guess the Chalice Dungeons are where the extra gameplay is. As I said though I tried them for a bit and didn't enjoy them at all as they wreaked of randomly generated content (which they are) which was pretty dull compared to the design of the rest of the game, mostly boxy looking rooms and so forth. It's a shame so many bosses are locked away in them. I guess most of them are reskins. Two or three look pretty nice though. Eh, what else. Multiplayer. Didn't get much experience with that. It took so long to download the patch needed for network play that I was halfway through the game, and even then there wasn't much of it.

I liked it a lot, probably more than it seems I do. It's a very memorable experience, maybe the most memorable of the Souls games, just not as fun as some of the others which is what keeps drawing me back to them. I've done DS II 3 times now, one being Scholar of the First Sin, and for all its flaws and questionable designs it's by far and away the most refined, playable and fun, not to mention content-rich. Now the wait for Dark Souls III.

--

I also put in about 50 / 60 hours into Witcher 3 before I got bored and uninstalled it. I can't get my head around the praise of it. It's certainly pretty, immensely so (technically speaking anyway) and the story is good and very well written but the gameplay is 1 part janky (broken hard-lock on system) and 2 parts dull: dodge; attack a few times; roll away, repeat. Spam Axii if need be, use Yrden if one of the Witch things. It rarely amounted to much more than that. I even bumped the difficulty right up in the hope it would affect the AI, but it didn't. Just artificially increased damage. I rarely had to prepare for fights either. Boring. There wasn't even any weapon variations to play around with. Axes I guess, but they were rarely worth it.

The worst part though was the ultra repetitive, cut-and-paste content itself. Sidequests seemed to be almost entirely (mildly) contextualised fetch quests, which followed the pattern: Someone / something's gone missing; use Witcher sense to follow some footprints; scan an area or two; fight a generic enemy; report back to quest giver. That happened a lot. And then there's the question mark spots on the map which seems to make up about 60% of the game's content (which is probably a good 100 hours or so). The thing is they consist of the same 5 or 6 events. 1: a settlement of pirates / thugs which you wipe out, who have the AI of a collection of drunken morons. Every settlement basically being the same, except sometimes they're guarding a cage with a vendor who's being held prisoner, who ends up selling useless items most of the time (if you can even track him down again to start with). 2: monster nests: the same as any generic monster group you find anywhere else, except after you beat them you get to walk up the nest(s) on the ground and press a button to blow it up. Riveting. 3: A single, stronger monster. Fun for a bit, until you realise it's re-skin central before long. 4: Treasure hunt. Always the same. You find a dead body with a note on, which you read and then sniff out off the chests, which 90% of the time contains nothing useful, usually armour and weapons which you sell because they're no good to you. 5: if you're lucky you'll find one of those pylon things which give you skill points to spend. Then there's monster hunts, and Witcher weapon / armour hunt missions which are basically more rewarding versions of other things. After rinse and repeating that for 12 - 15 hours or so it all started to feel very empty as a game, compounded by the fact all the little hamlets and villages dotted around were filled with people you couldn't interact with except the vendors, blacksmiths and the odd quest giver. I kind of wish I could go back and tell myself to set the game on easy, ignore all the side-content and just concentrate on the story. That's where the quality is. The rest drags it down so I don't see why it's a badge of honour that there's hundreds of hours of content. I actually found Dragon Age: Inquisition more engaging and fun, and it basically has the same issues. I recall really liking Witcher 2 though. The guided, more more linear world promoted more variety and kept things constantly new, and I don't recall having issues with the combat either.

Also put about 70 hours into Pillars of Eternity, though I didn't quite finish it as the story sort of stopped engaging me near the end. It felt like devs were running out of steam in that department. I enjoyed what I played of it though. The streamlined real-time / pause combat was actually pretty fun. Not as deep as Baldur's Gate but much easier to get into a flow and not bogged down by unnecessary spells etc. After the initial difficulty curve it got a bit easy though (on normal difficulty anyway). I think the only times I died were because of classic Obsidian glitches. I might go back and finish it one day.

Also played through the whole of Baldur's Gate 2 at last. Was pretty good overall. Probably the best example of world density and meaningful, interesting side-quests I've ever seen in an RPG. The main story was fairly decent, and Irenicus was a great baddie (though I'm a sucker for anything David Warner related) although by the end it sort of felt like they wrote him into a corner and resorted to revenge / power tropes. That being said he faired better than all the other main characters, which were almost entirely paper-thin stereotypes with typically lightweight banter. Hearing about Aerie's wings, or how Korgan was gonna fuck shit up, or how sneakily evil Edwin was for the umpteenth time wore a bit thin by the end. And speaking of the end; that feigned attempt at progression and resolution right before you go down to the final area, with the one line from each character. Ha! And let's not mention the romance options. Clearly Bioware hadn't learned how to write deep characters yet, though I guess if I'd play it back then I might not be so critical. Actually the best character in the game was probably that hilarious Beholder in Sahuagin City. Combat was functionally crap, but did the job I guess. Again, with prudent exploration I ended up tearing through the game, even dragons didn't seem to pose much of a threat with the same tried and tested approaches.

Also finally broke into Planescape: Torment after about the 6th attempt. Damn, that game is ugly, buggy and with God-awful combat. But I agree that the story and characters are immensely engaging. I've just reached Curst, which is when Bloodborne arrived so I put it on hold. Will get back it it now though.

That was quite a lot of text.

Written by BitterCOld on 16.07.2015 at 02:49

for PS4.

Be still my heart...