I finally finished Baldur's Gate 3. Loved it. I immediately started again with a Ghost Recon team, where everyone is a rogue assassin/fighter battle master build so that you can get a ton of actions, create opportunities for advantage, and then get bonus sneak attack damage. It's working really well so far, and I've done more than half of the content in Act 1 with this team, though to be fair, of course the game will be easier when I know what's coming around the corner.
I also started up System Shock, a game that sorely needed that remake and shows that the difference between what made it good back in the day and what would make it good now are basically just graphics, controls, and UI.
I’ve played through BG3 around launch, and have been lurking the web, looking at what others have done. Right now, I’m also watching a streamer play through the game, and everything I’ve seen really makes me want to do another playthrough. Act 3 was a bit rough at times though, so I think I’ll wait for some more patches or a Definitive Edition, if Larian does it like Divinity.
Same, my friend and I gave up on Baldur’s Gate and will let the developer “finish” tweaking it. I like what Larian tries to do in its games, but I really, really despise the need to mash the quick save button after anything representing even minor progress because you might stumble into TPK combat while exploring. This happened to us in Divinity and when we got a whiff of the same in BG3, we wrinkled our noses and left the game.
I subsequently went on to play CP2077 v2.0 and really enjoyed myself, which I just “finished” yesterday with a satisfactory, bitter-sweet ending.
That’s awesome. I’m at the tail end of my first playthrough, but I’m already thinking about and all druid run with Halsin, Jaheira, Tav, and a respecced origin. I think druid is flexible enough to pull it off. How are you finding system shock, then? I never played it originally but have played many of its ‘spiritual sequels’ in terms of immersive sims. I was tempted to harken back when the remake came out but never bit the bullet.
I played the beginning of the original release some years back and found the controls unusable, even with a mod that "fixes" them. This new game adapts the way the original basically has a console printout for everything you look at and interact with while still allowing it to control like a modern first person video game. I'm not very far in it yet. Only about an hour. But it's one of those games where you're scouring for resources and navigating a map with keycards and turning the power back on and such, and it does all that well so far.
There are some times the camera angle is changed and locked to make it 2d side scroller for certain parts, and some parts reminiscent of some arcade games like 1945 Air Force: Airplane. And “hacking” opens a mini game mode that feels like a mobile game. On top of that, the lore and story is great and gameplay is fun. There are also collectibles if that’s your thing. And it still has the classic leveling and gear progression common to JRPGs.
Artistically,it was crazy, especially in the very early game. The homage to bullet hell, then the changes of perspective, a very immersive soundtrack. At time the most “normal” action RPG yet combined with existentialism and analysis of consciousness and self sacrifice.
2 that come to mind are Adom and caves of qud are very similar in terms of designs and inspirations but share very little in common graphics wise are from being all 2d-esque. You can explore dungeons in a roguelike fantasy world.
Kind of an old one, but Creeper World is kind of like that. I don’t know if it’s actually released, though. It was originally a flash game and the developer was making a new version, but in the devlogs I’ve seen he had changed the game significantly multiple times and then I lost interest. Might be worth checking out either way.
There’s an app called mini review that has reviews for games you can browse through there but not sure if there is a kids section but it’s helpful to filter out as heavy games.
I’ll never forget my friends kid being upset on our camping trip while we waited in the car in a store run saying how he has no wifi out there so he can’t watch his ads for coins
By the time Assassin’s Creed 2 came out, I was calling this my favorite series ever. The Ezio games made you feel like an expertly skilled badass with unprecedented success, and the stealthy, agile archetype is my favorite to inhabit. Even the gameplay loop was fresh and borderline revolutionary, and so successful it became the basis for what would soon be tarnished as the Ubisoft blueprint.
Last game I played was Odyssey, and though I spent…a lot of time on it, I’ve never felt more bitter at the end of the game. Seems you only get half the conclusion by completing the story missions, with the other half locked away behind the assassination list. And since any enemies 3 or more levels higher than you are always essentially indestructible, and the assassination targets climb very high in levels, it’s essentially a driver for bottomless grinding. By that point I’d already had far more than my fill.
I was casually interested in Mirage, but I learned from Skillup’s video that it’s essentially an upscaled Valhalla DLC, which is a red flag. With other reviewers pointing out that it, well, feels like upscaled DLC, I’ve no interest personally.
I loved 2 and Brotherhood, but 1 and Unity were the closest this series ever got to delivering on the elevator pitch, especially Unity. I tried Odyssey and had much the same experience as you, except I didn't have the patience to stick with it once I could see where the grind was headed.
You know one of the reasons I jump to 2, and I didn’t think of it until now, is because of aerial assassinations. If I remember right, there wasn’t an actual mechanic for it in 1, and the addition in 2 and beyond tied things up nicely.
Yeah, and the investigation missions in AC1 weren't great, but the assassination missions gave you the freedom to scope out a mission and do it yourself (same goes for Unity, even acknowledging in the dialogue to the player character that it's something the series has been missing), which was a thing that AC2 took away in favor of set piece boss battle moments.
If anyone enjoyed the earlier AC games, but avoided Unity because of bugs or bad press from its admittedly disastrous launch, all of that is mostly ironed out (at least on PC), so give it a shot.
It holds up surprisingly well, honestly, and probably has the best movement and parkour in the entire series.
Plus Revolutionary Paris is one of their best environments. Like, I like them all, but Paris is particularly well-done (I’d make a joke about Notre-Dame being well-done as well, but that was more of a medium-well result).
The trick is to not give a shit I guess: Just play the game, and if you can’t enjoy it, why bother playing it?
There might be some mods out there to change it if you play on PC though, might also be worth looking into, but at the end of the day: If you aren’t having fun, what’s the point?
I have the same issue with grading systems. I feel judged, and don’t want to continue until I get a better rating. Generally this ends with me petering out on the game faster than usual.
Yeah it’s great! I’ve started it a few times but recently got an analogue pocket and am trying to finish a lot of those older games I’ve never finished. I think I’m about half way through world 4 now. Still deciding if I want to try and 100% every level to get the bonus levels haha
I’m not sure about sites, but many of the old GB people have independent podcasts and streams. Check out Nextlander or The Jeff Gerstmann show. Some of their stuff goes up on YouTube as well.
YouTube is also a good place to find reviews, if you can find a few people who generally like the same stuff you do.
I’ve tried to get into their branching podcasts. The one I enjoyed the most was probably Fire Escape with Dan, Mike and Mary because they have the strongest group dynamic IMO.
Imagine if Rockstar did a superhero game.
With their satire style on it. Like The Boys style.
Open world, some destructive environment, a deep character creator.
Everything being in a simulation killed it for me, though.
The visually glitching-out NPCs ruined the fun of being a completely unhinged maniac with/without superpowers. Which is kinda what the games are about.
And the constant black skybox became depressing fast.
SR3 does it better, imo. It constantly rides the edge of “How much is movie set? And how much is not?”
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