Harvester on 19/3/2020 at 22:07
Needed a game to play, chose Black Mesa, I loved Half-Life back in the day! My system is a bit older and I figured the system requirements wouldn't be that high, this being a game based on a 2004 engine. Indeed, it runs very well on full HD with most settings on medium or high. I like it so far, brings back good memories and I also like the subtle deviations from the original game. Voice acting is very well done too, very true to the original spirit. I think this will be a good game to take my mind off of current events in the evenings and during the weekend, at least until I finish it.
PigLick on 20/3/2020 at 13:21
PIcked up Animal Crossing today and boy is it ever the salve we need at this time, its so innocent and soothing.
henke on 20/3/2020 at 14:20
I've been playing Climbros, it's really good! I've been hankerin' for a good full-length 2D climbing game since GIRP and that Vertigo game that never got released. This is a lot more fast-paced than those, but the movement-mechanics are really fun, and the levels quite varied.
Anyway here's some gameplay:
[video=youtube;qUb4xuNCCtw]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUb4xuNCCtw[/video]
Renault on 20/3/2020 at 16:07
I recently picked up Far Cry Primal, and it's actually really fun, and a nice change up to the typical FC formula. Initially it takes some getting used to with such primitive weapons (club, bow, spear), but if anything it ends up being a bit more brutal because most of the combat is up close and personal (for the record, it's fairly gratifying beating the crap out of the evil cannibalistic tribes that are trying to kill you). It's also got some cool new (I think?) features where you can tame animals to fight for you, and also there's this nifty setup where you can send your owl out to scout out an area ahead of you and mark enemies.
The game is really gorgeous too, I just bought a new GPU and this was a great game to try it out on. And it runs super smooth. Nighttime can get really crazy with tons of wild animals running around. Everyone's mileage may vary on that as it can get to be tough to even walk around from place to place without getting attacked every 50 feet.
As a bonus, you get Adam Jensen's ancestor as the protagonist, although he doesn't speak English. (Kinda cool side note, the devs brought in an actual linguist to come up with a unique language for the game, but fret not, everything is subtitled).
Anyway, it's only 6 bucks on the current Steam sale, so I'd definitely recommend giving it a shot.
Tomi on 21/3/2020 at 21:30
Phew, I can cross Assassin's Creed: Syndicate off my list at last! I was expecting a modern(ish) AC game to be a bit less grindy, but boy was I wrong - not much seems to have changed in that department. I really enjoyed the first few hours, but repeating the same sort of quests over and over again becomes a bit of a chore very soon. So yeah, AC: Syndicate is definitely more about quantity than quality. The city of London looks fantastic but apart from some virtual sightseeing there's not much else to do. The story isn't very well executed and it failed to keep me interested enough to really care about the characters and about the big picture. Which is a shame really, because the city is obviously built with so much love and detail that it deserves better. A wasted opportunity. It could have been the perfect setting for some Sherlock Holmes game for example. :D
Thirith on 22/3/2020 at 09:27
Sadly, I've found that sort of gameplay in Assassin's Creed games to be little more than "Switch on Eagle Vision, check all the clues, follow the glowing breadcrumbs, rinse and repeat." There is the occasional 'detecting' to be done (IIRC especially in Unity), but there's very little. I may misremember, but the most thinking I remember having to put in in an Assassin's Creed game was the music boxes in Syndicate, where you have to figure out from what you can see in the clues where the picture was taken.
chk772 on 22/3/2020 at 10:39
Quote Posted by Tomi
Phew, I can cross
Assassin's Creed: Syndicate off my list at last! I was expecting a modern(ish) AC game to be a bit less grindy, but boy was I wrong - not much seems to have changed in that department. I really enjoyed the first few hours, but repeating the same sort of quests over and over again becomes a bit of a chore very soon. So yeah, AC: Syndicate is definitely more about quantity than quality.
Every single AC game is like that. And, most of the modern games are like that as well. They rather feel like a film, than a actual game, where you can take your own decisions, and actually have to make a effort to advance.
henke on 22/3/2020 at 17:01
Ok, used the EA Access to play a bit of Need For Speed (2015). As someone who loves racing games of all shapes and sizes, I do not understand how the NFS franchise is still alive. The last good game in the series was Porsche Unleashed, and that one came out TWENTY YEARS AGO. The driving physics in these games just don't feel right. Drifting seems to have less to do with what tuning you set up in the garage than anything you do behind the wheel. Without the right settings it's just about impossible to drift, but tune it to "drifty mode" and you just have to turn right at high speed and it'll toggle into drift mode, which feels very artificial. With so many other, better racing games out there, who is still buying these damn things? After this I started playing Watch Dogs 2 again and even that has better driving than NFS.
Tomi on 22/3/2020 at 22:39
Quote Posted by icemann
Play the DLC then. Has gameplay of that variety, solving murders.
Sounds interesting, but like I predicted, I'm now all AC'd out again for a while. I wanted to play
AC: Origins next, but we'll see about that...
I too remember liking the glyph puzzles in the earlier AC games, so it's a shame that they're not in the newer ones. These games desperately need some variety in the gameplay. AC: Syndicate has the crafting and gang stuff and all sorts of upgrades of course, but they don't really make the game any better in my opinion. And just like every other AC that I've played, this game is also so ridiculously easy that it's just kind of disappointing. Repetitive (and therefore boring) content with non-challenging gameplay is like the worst possible combination.
Anyway, I've been playing
Carcassonne (recent Epic freebie) now. I never thought that a board game like this would be any fun on a computer, especially when playing against the AI, but I've really enjoyed it so far. It looks good, like a proper board game without any unnecessary UI elements, and the gameplay is nice and simple. Of course it won't beat the real thing, but it gets pretty close! :D And during these times of social distancing, it might just be the only option too.
demagogue on 23/3/2020 at 02:39
I've played a lot of that version of Carcassonne too for ages now. It's a good mix of lowkey but still strategic.
I miss the time when I first learned it. We used to play it coop style, where the goal was to cooperate to beat our previous score together. It's one of those games where you can do that and it still be a game. Of course you couldn't do that here (I made a PC version on the Vassal engine where you could), but I wouldn't do that with the AI anyway because that was more about sharing the experience with someone, and I don't have any problems screwing over the AI.