What are you playing? v.11 (Knee-Deep Edition)

[Ashen One]

"Descenders 2"

It's essentially a snowboarding game with some rogue like elements. You basically see how far you can go on a run on a bunch of randomly generated hills, and earn certain perks to keep you going until you eventually run out of lives and have to start over. The game itself is pretty good, albeit very punishing. Almost sim-like in it's gameplay. It ain't easy. It feels really good to play, though. You feel the speed and the danger at every turn, and the controls are very responsive, if not a bit unorthodox. Nothing you can't get used to, though. When you fuck up, you know it's you and not the game.

The game for me is a bit of a forgettable time waster I might dick around with here and there, but if you're into these types of games, I could see some getting hooked.

7/10

I have a lot of time spent in the first Descenders title so this was nice to read!

 

[method115]

Beat Metaphor this weekend. I liked the game a lot but man it got hard towards the end and I hate end game difficulty spikes. Not just the side content either which is expected but the main content as well. The game just got hard towards the end and I essentially had to look up guides on how to break it which I like doing in JRPGs so that turned out fun even if it was frustrating at first. Working my way through the plat now and I'll most likely do this while I wait for Hell is Us.

Also beat It Takes Two with my son and that was a lot of fun. I felt bad because I didn't realize we stopped playing at essentially the end of the game. So most of our time was mainly just cut scenes and shit and then it was time for him to go to bed. I purchased Split Fiction though and we also started playing that the next day. Pretty fun so far

Played a bit of BF6 this weekend and man is it fun as hell. This reminds me of BF4. I love the dense city maps.

 

[Valhoven]

Mentioned elsewhere today but finally dove into Diablo IV. Sitting around 5h at time of writing.

Having so much fun. This is my first-ever Diablo, if you can believe it.

The scoring is excellent and both cutscene and setting are so macabre, so dark. Lilith and her son (hooded Promethean-looking guy) are deliciously evil. Absolutely love it.

Having avoided guides, I'm playing as archer (rogue) and unlocked caltrops as soon as I saw them as that's my go-to from Nioh and what I know.

I'm uncomfortable spending any gold after seeing crap-tier items like a vanilla dagger going for 8K. What a rip as that's for me a heap of money right now. Also opting to dismantle items for raw mats rather than sell. Hope that doesn't come back to bite me.

 

[HereticBD]

I'm uncomfortable spending any gold after seeing crap-tier items like a vanilla dagger going for 8K. What a rip as that's for me a heap of money right now. Also opting to dismantle items for raw mats rather than sell. Hope that doesn't come back to bite me.

Nah, you're playing it right. I sometimes wonder why they even bother to have weapons/armor shops. There's never anything good in them, and that goes for the entire series. You really only need gold for crafting costs. Just use what you like, replace when you find something better and scrap everything else. Don't play it like a traditional RPG or anything, where the shops are vital for better weapons/armor. You'll get everything through loot drops. The trading/crafting elements will become more clear as you play.

Also, if you're playing Rogue, poison is your friend.

 

[Law Talkin’ Guy]

Mentioned elsewhere today but finally dove into Diablo IV. Sitting around 5h at time of writing.

Having so much fun. This is my first-ever Diablo, if you can believe it.

The scoring is excellent and both cutscene and setting are so macabre, so dark. Lilith and her son (hooded Promethean-looking guy) are deliciously evil. Absolutely love it.

Having avoided guides, I'm playing as archer (rogue) and unlocked caltrops as soon as I saw them as that's my go-to from Nioh and what I know.

I'm uncomfortable spending any gold after seeing crap-tier items like a vanilla dagger going for 8K. What a rip as that's for me a heap of money right now. Also opting to dismantle items for raw mats rather than sell. Hope that doesn't come back to bite me.

I need to get back to that. I played through the base game with a necromancer throughout March and April but need to play the DLC still. I’ve mostly been playing Nightreign with my buddies the last two months, or for the past week the Heretic and Hexen remasters when I’m on my own. I also still need to play Doom the Dark Ages. I beat the first level on launch day but haven’t touched it since.

I’m a long time Diablo fan and I was pleasantly surprised with Diablo IV, it was a lot better than Diablo III in my opinion, but I still prefer Diablo II overall.

 

[Dinkin_Flicka]

Picked up Minishoot Adventure as a quick game to play while on vacation I could rock on the steam deck. Super fun adventure game and with progression like The Legend of Zelda with bullet hell play mechanics. Seems pretty short, took out the last boss with about 90% complete, clocking in around 6 hours. Opened up a bonus dungeon and plan on clearing out over the next day or so. Perfect bite of a game over a week trip with the fam.

 

[GearSolidMetal]

@NoSmilez
Saw you mentioned in another thread you played Chaos Gate?

What did you think of it?

 

[Zazen]

Got the platinum for Ninja Gaiden Ragebound. I didn't love it as much as the critics did. I'd probably score it a 7 out of 10. It's just too repetitive and the boss fight design seems to completely be at odds with the speed run nature of the levels. The bosses have so much damn health and you only have one attack in the game. You just end up mashing square the entire fight. The bosses aren't that interesting either, they have a very small number of attacks and they just recycle them and since the fights are long you just see them way too much and it gets boring. Game length was fine for me, people saying its too short but if anything it felt a bit too long since they don't introduce any new mechanics past the first hour. There's not enough variety in the gameplay. Anytime there's a strong enemy there will be a weaker enemy nearby flashing either blue or purple. If it's blue you melee attack it and it will power up your next melee attack dealing insta-kill to any non-boss enemy. If purple you shoot a projectile and it will also kill the next enemy you hit instantly. It's like this for the entire game. Honestly the Shinobi demo alone is more fun. Still don't regret buying this game as it is still pretty fun and nice to look at. Just wish they added more variety in the combat. I'd recommend it at 14.99 if people are on the fence.

 

[Valhoven]

Have a great weekend, guys. Set time aside for yourselves and get your gaming on. Don’t miss the fights this weekend either. Hell of a dance in store come headliner billing.

 

[method115]

Just realized Metal Gear comes out at the end of this month also. Man I wanted to day 1 that game also. Tough choice between that and Hell is US but I could really do with some great stealth right now.

 

[Zazen]

Just realized Metal Gear comes out at the end of this month also. Man I wanted to day 1 that game also. Tough choice between that and Hell is US but I could really do with some great stealth right now.

Yeah I just mentioned that in the PlayStation thread. There are a shit ton of games coming out at the end of August up until the first week of September. Lost Soul Aside, Shinobi, Gears of War Remastered, Hell is Us, Cronos The New Dawn, Metal Gear Delta, and Metal Eden. I have them all on Wish List. No way I can buy all of them. This fall some decisions will need to be made. First world problems lol. Hell is Us does have one major advantage here though in that it's ten dollars cheaper and offers a longer experience. I think Metal Gear story is only like 14 hours long or so. I'm just basing this off the third game being short and the devs saying that they aren't really changing anything for this remake or adding much. Probably going to be the better reviewed of the two though if that's your thing. I think Hell is Us will split some people with it not having traditional story telling and quest markers.

 

[Zazen]

Picked up Minishoot Adventure as a quick game to play while on vacation I could rock on the steam deck. Super fun adventure game and with progression like The Legend of Zelda with bullet hell play mechanics. Seems pretty short, took out the last boss with about 90% complete, clocking in around 6 hours. Opened up a bonus dungeon and plan on clearing out over the next day or so. Perfect bite of a game over a week trip with the fam.

That does look fun. I would pick it up if it came to PlayStation.

 

[Valhoven]

Still journeying across Sanctuary re: Diablo IV. About 30h in, maybe.

10/10 game.

On Heretic's advice, I leant into poison being a rogue and had great success with the build.

With time, though, I experimented across elementals and fell in love with shadow DMG instead of poison (mostly for the CC help), so I've evolved now to proccing shadow and dropping smoke nades instead of caltrops. Have a number of armor and weapon modifiers for smoke nades in particular that make current build fun. I haven't completely dropped poison because my nades have been modded for poison vapor infusion.

Going to do my first nightmare dungeon this weekend (what I'm dubbing Operation Demon Stomp) as I've a sigil I've been shy to use.

 

[Aurelian]

Not sure if anyone cares to hear about this, but Europa Universalis V is scheduled to be released November 4th.

 

[Zazen]

Finished up Sword of the Sea. I played it a tiny bit on Thursday. Then I beat it over the next two sessions on Friday and Saturday. I think this was one of my favorite games of the year so far, definitely in my top 5. Possibly as high as top 3 for now although I know that's going to change considering how absurdly stacked the next couple of months are. I beat it in 3 hours and 11 minutes so it is a very short game but I don't mind that since I've had less time to play these days. There's not a single boring moment in the game which I appreciate, it's just one level after another and each is unique. The music is great and if you're playing on the PlayStation the haptic feedback is no exaggeration up there with some of Sony's first party titles. If anyone has around 3 hours or so to spare I highly recommend giving it a try. Shinobi Art of Vengeance unlocks on my PS5 in 18 hours so I'll be looking forward to playing that next.

 

[GtehMVP]

I'm finally able to play Alpha Protocal properly

I'm sure a lot of you tried it on the 360 era too, but it was a broken mess, and the pc version was worse for a long time.

GOG made a port a few months ago, and it runs like a charm on my pc, but it's the perfect portable game, with its hub/mission select style.

Using the heroic launcher, I can play GOG *and epic) games on my Steam Deck.

This is a total blast. I'm only focusing on stealth, pistols and melee. Basically I'm a juiced up super soldier sprinting around the map ko'ing or throat punching everyone.

When I use stealth, it's to set up my melee kill runs.

The game is best known for its RPG mechanics and dialogue choices, which makes role playing fantastic, but melee and stealth being so op makes combat so much fun.

Instead of sneaking around, I kick in every door like a blood thirsty lunatic.

 

[Law Talkin’ Guy]

Well, I don’t know what happened to my two buddies that I always game with, but neither of them have logged on for any Nightreign in almost two weeks, so I’ve just been playing the Heretic and Hexen remaster. The new episode for each that Nightdive made are both really good, probably better than the original campaigns from 30 years ago imo.

When I get tired of this I may go back to do the dlc for Diablo IV or maybe I’ll get around to something that’s been festering in my backlog for a while like Cyberpunk.

 

[Valhoven]

When I get tired of this I may go back to do the dlc for Diablo IV...

 

[Law Talkin’ Guy]

Actually like a bonehead I forgot I still need to play Doom the Dark Ages. I’ll do that first, then I’ll go back to D4.

 

[Wrath of Foamy]

Anyone played Helldivers 2?

Thoughts?