To me, they are both winners. I loved Phantom Liberty and just started playing it again last week, only for it to be interrupted by Shadow of the Erdtree. Both DLC’s reminded me how much I loved the base game and both are proper and large content additions. And they both run perfectly on Linux on day 1 <3.
Both these games and their DLC’s are in my opinion what other game studios should aim for.
Blood and Wine was honestly amazing. I haven’t enjoyed a DLC or xpac that much since Diablo II: Lord of Destruction. I think maybe the Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind’s expansion Bloodmoon was a great contender as well, but Blood and Wine just took Witcher 3 to a new level. It truly deserved its spot at the top of the heap.
Blood and Wine was exceptional. Much like Shadow of the Erdtree, there was enough content added that they could have almost justified releasing it as a full game. There are full games released today with less content than Blood and Wine brought to TW3.
It is, but by god don’t grind your face against bosses that are too hard. I was having a bad time when I did three major bosses in a row, now I’m fucking around and exploring it’s much more enjoyable.
If the strategy is looking at “what most people use” and “what is overrepresented in the win stats” you will always end up nerfing what is fun and popular.
So I’d suggest smaller changes… off course fix bugs and stuff that does not work as intended… but balance a weapon … and go on to the next. Also decide what a weapon is supposed to do… sniper shotguns should not exist… neither CQB dmr’s.
Nerfing things on a PVE game that’s supposed to be fun shows a lack of creativity.
You can buff the other things while finding better ways to increase the difficulty, instead of just boosting health and throwing more enemies, but that’s the “easy” button.
That’s just false, you’ll end up with Payday 2 where everything is so broken that enemies need to nearly insta kill you from any range to have an actual challenge.
That’s exactly why I super disagree with the idea, “If everything’s overpowered, then nothing is.” All it seems to lead to is a game that’s only dead easy or impossible.
I play DBD, and one of the playerbase’ biggest annoyance is balance by win rate and usage rate. Sometimes an option is just fun and well designed, without being too strong.
It’s especially important to look at what’s fun for multiple players. A good example might be Helldivers 2’s jet pack. Yes, it’s so fun to cover a lot of ground at once, but if the way that’s used is to abandon a cornered teammate to go do objectives while they die surrounded, then it suddenly makes teammates feel slow and useless.
Meanwhile there’s dopamine-driven team synergy potential with the assisted reload weapons. But, there’s not a lot of mechanical information encouraging their use, and it’s pretty simple for people to just use them alone.
I remember TF2’s simple idea where all weapons did more damage the closer you were to enemies, and it demonstrates what I think can be really good balancing design.
Genuinely excited to see Alpha Protocol available for sale again after all this time. Was not expecting to see it on the front page of GOG. It is such an interesting game, even if it isn't, strictly speaking, a good game.
gog.com/…/alpha_protocol_is_back_drmfree_for_mode… is the actual announcement. And the Raycevick sponsored video is 100% worth watching as it very much acknowledges… Alpha Protocol is probably a bad game but it is still fascinating. And then pivots into a strong push for the preservation aspects of things.
Which is a stark contrast to the way that the usual “I downloaded the latest AAA game because i want to preserve it” pisses on the efforts.
Also, bonus points, Raycevick managed to get THE Matt Rorie to talk for like two minutes on his greatest contribution to society and gaming.
I’ve been curious about The Finals, it looks fun. Is it easy to get into? I worry about toxicity in multiplayer because I’m not great at team based games.
It’s excellent, and I mainly play with randoms. The toxicity not so bad if you accept the BS that comes with random partners. Personally I have only dealt with some shithead teens and one guy who got mad I kept healing him. You get quitters quite a bit like in any PVP game, but it fills quickly. I have voice chat disabled 90% of the time, since pinging is in the game. The destruction is peak physics destruction in a multiplayer game, some of my favorite moments in any game have come from the pure chaos of things falling apart in the Finals. They also added a new 5v5 mode that feels way less frustrating and more casual (to me at least).
I imagine it’s even better if you’ve got a trio of well coordinated players, I’ve certainly played against some nasty trios in my 80 hours. Personally I think this is the most unique PVP shooter out right now, and it’s extremely polished for F2P.
I’m 100 hours in and just about to wrap up the story (I think). And I’m gonna go back and replay because I skipped a TON in acts 1 and 2. It’s such a good game
I didn’t skip the stuff in previous acts, and getting close to the end of my first play through on tactician. I’m currently thinking I’m going to land around 250hrs
Not to be a contrarian, the game is good, but I seriously don’t understand how it’s one of the best games ever made. Just my opinion no one asked for, but I know I can’t be alone. Only other game I can think that’s more overhyped is breath of the wild.
BG3 is annoying as fuck. There’s far too much sequential quest nesting that blocks you out of content for no reason. Not to mention the bugs. Save scumming shouldn’t be part of normal gameplay.
Rescuing hostages from the Moonrise Towers. It warns you against entering before you find the bad guy’s immortality, which sends you to save the Nightsong. If you do that, all the hostages die/disappear and you fail the rescue missions for no reason. The Iron Hand dwarves then won’t show up in Act 3, locking you out of that content.
That doesn’t sound right to me. My first playthrough was blind. Me and a buddy ran straight to Nightsong in chapter 2 and got a flag that warned us to check the rest. We managed to save the prisoners and then go do the nightsong.
same here, did entire playthrough with no guides and never ran into something like this. Was just very thorough on each map, like any rpg I play.
Only complaint I have is the underwater prison in act 3, that one I save scummed. The game makes it seem like Gortash is gonna blow it up in a instant, but you have enough time to dock and do your thing. That is not clear at all, and if you try to go back a second time, then it is instant.
There’s far too much sequential quest nesting that blocks you out of content for no reason.
The reason is for replayability and having a fresh experience each time. You get blocked out of content because there are about 60 unique paths you can take through the game with different content for each.
Not to mention the bugs
The few I experienced personally were fixed within a couple months of release. I haven’t seen a bug of any sort, actually, since January.
Save scumming shouldn’t be a part of normal gameplay
Then… Don’t do that. Save scumming also isn’t a part of tabletop gameplay. You fail a roll or fuck up your plan, you deal with the outcome. Saves are only for emergencies if some bug does come up.
You’re allowed to not enjoy the game, and that’s fine, it’s not for everyone. But your reasons why are poor reasons.
I do think BG3 is a very impressive game and deserves a lot of the praise it gets.
That said, it sucks how finicky it is to run away from a fight. There’s way too many fights that just sort of happen with very little explanation as to why they’re attacking you. It’s also waaay too easy to accidentally steal things and trigger fights, especially on controller.
You basically do have to save scum a little, because one accident can lead to an entire town being pissed at you. If the game had better ways to de escalate combat and some better signposting of consequences, it’d be a 10/10 game
It helps, but you can’t do that to talk to people. Some of the shop keepers are surrounded by so much stuff you can pick up, and even being very careful I accidentally triggered at least 4 fights. My wife missed out at talking to Rafael at last light because she accidentally picked up the chess board that he’s playing (he literally just disappears).
I absolutely love the game. Single player runs great, but multiplayer is bug city. Dialogue lines cut abruptly in the middle, characters listening in to dialogue turn invisible when it stops, actions in combat are sometimes inexplicably unavailable unless you can switch to someone else and switch back, etc. Nothing game breaking so far, but my husband and I experience a few bugs every time we game together.
I completely agree, I really enjoyed D:OS II but I just haven’t been able to get into BG3 so far. I can’t say anything was bad or poorly accomplished but it’s just not clicking for me yet.
Sounds like those just weren’t your type of game. Chances are I could toss a rock at work and hit someone who thinks COD is the best franchise on the planet. Not saying you’re wrong, your opinion is valid, just that to people who lean even a little more towards that kind of experience, to them these games are gold.
You’re not necessarily wrong but maybe you kind of are. I’ll explain, I played the other baldur gate games in the 90s (I still have the old school big box BG2 collectors edition), im not young or new to this style game. It’s not my favorite genre but I DO enjoy it. I played DOS2 in 2019 and loved it, baldurs gate was just over hyped after hearing everyones praise and llaying those other games i expected more. Its obviously keaps ahead of BG2 but thats an OLD game at this point… and man too many people love cod even tho it’s what I’d consider objectively not good, unlike BG3 which is an objectively good game (but over rated).
Another game I’ve played a bit of but can’t understand why it’s so successful is helldivers 2. I Def need to try it some more and see if it clicks, but it’s kind of… empty and repetitive, like cod.
It’s really hard to get a gauge on what you consider an excellent game without knowing some of your favorites. Might inform us on why you don’t consider two highly praised games as overhyped.
It’s honestly the only modern game worth $70 imo. One campaign run is like 126+ hours. Additional playthroughs are possible from other characters, which tells the story from different perspectives. Can go to areas you missed in the first playthrough, too :)
No, it is $60, I just feel like other studios don’t work half as hard as Larian does per title and still charge more money.
The sheer amount of script and voice acting in the game is insane. All the balanced fights, scripted scenes, level designs, characters, mo-cap, and rigging…I don’t even want to think how many hours that all mist have taken. Not to mention developing and writing a script, each with multiple choices and logic branches.
…meanwhile COD and 2K Sport game are reskinning their games every year and charging $70 and putting Nicki Minaj as an operator, haha. More power to them. It just feels like one studio is putting in the effort to justify a higher price and still charging the normal price.
I’m VERY tempted to buy Fallout 4: Game of the Year edition due to my hype for Fallout: London (which releases in April of this year), but I’m worried of getting burned if it turns out to be a bad/disappointing mod. :/
As someone who couldn’t tolerate F3/NV because they paled in comparison to 1/2, I actually really enjoyed 4. It lost a lot of the engine jank and felt like a decent FPS with light RPG mechanics, wearing the aesthetics of Fallout.
Imo, FO4 did everything better than FO3, except the plot. But FO3’s plot was already kinda bland to begin with. I mean, back then… It was incredible. But not by today’s standards.
It’s a lot stronger mechanically than 3 or NV - shooting is a lot less janky and the gun customization adds some great emergent quests.
The Boston of FO4 has its moments - a certain duck pond stands out to me in particular - but aside from Nick Valentine the questlines are largely forgettable.
Still, the core game loop is a lot of fun - go here, blow stuff up, scavenge bits to upgrade your stuff.
As a longtime Fallout fan (came for the isometric apocalypse, stayed for the 3D googie architecture) I still put 80 hours into FO4.
It’s a good fuckin’ game. It’s just competing with the legacy of a lot of other great games in the series.
My Deck is for playing single player games when I can’t use my desktop, such as when I’m on the train heading to work. I’ve finished more games since I’ve had the Deck than the few years before that. Love that thing.
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