Good call on the making sure you’re into the characters..I played the first but not in years and I’m right back with Joel and Ellie. Probably need to create a spoiler thread
Good call on the making sure you’re into the characters..I played the first but not in years and I’m right back with Joel and Ellie. Probably need to create a spoiler thread
Totally cool with spoiler discussions chapter by chapter if you want to keep it up but try and leave out any descriptors or locations, please. First one is fine, don't worry about changing it or anything. I know I personally have been avoiding any and all discussions I see about it until I get to play and there are probably others. I don't want to know a thing about it! Ha! Thanks
Yeah, I saw the First Chapter thread which had the location. I'd probably have bailed on the forums for a bit until I beat the game. Locations showing the road map of the game? Way too spoiler'y for my liking. This works though.
Well I changed it to just the chapter. I thought the locations were a good idea so people who were only part way through a chapter(me included) wouldn’t get spoiled by someone further in the chapter. But I i Guess locations are a spoiler so anyone who looks at the thread has to consider they could get spoiled for anything in that chapter...
update. Each location is considered a part according to an online guide. So I’m just gonna put the part number as well.
So I'm guessing I'd get a lot of recommendations for The Last of Us (The Original) from this thread?
It depends. With this new one released, I've heard more people than I expected to come out of the woodwork and say how they really didn't like the first one. A game that I thought was pretty universally loved. I guess it depends on what kinds of things you like. It is a game that jumps between stealth and shooter pretty quickly. It also is pretty dark and nihilistic, which is maybe not what people are looking for these days. Your character is kind of a lumbering tank of a person. So if you are expecting a Nathan Drake-spider-person, he is the opposite. I know that frustrated me at the beginning. But it was because I was trying to play the game like an Uncharted game and not how this game was intended to be played.
Just Dance 2020 - Switch. Came home to the boys playing a new game my wife downloaded. I’m jelly. I got next. Can’t wait to do a few of these with my boo.
I am rather watching right now, last of us 2 is the first game I watched extensively on twitch which is kind of a new thing for me. Since it is linear with repetitive gameplay and a lot of cut scenes that works pretty well for me. Just curious what is the ratio of twitch / play for you guys?
It's some of the most fun I've had online in years. It's basically an MXC/Wipeout-style Battle royale where you play as minions. So much fun.
I was just playing! It's so much fun! I played a bunch of games but I don't like the egg game! The controls are fiddly enough to still be fun except for that game for me for some reason.
I was just playing! It's so much fun! I played a bunch of games but I don't like the egg game! The controls are fiddly enough to still be fun except for that game for me for some reason.
Yeah the ones where you have to grab things are frustrating. Mainly the egg one and the one where you have to steal tails.
I actually love the egg and tail minigames! But nothing can beat one of the varied obstacle course maps. For me, any game mode with the balls do NOT click at all. I can't get the strats for those down.
I played like 4 hours straight last night with some friends it's such a good time. Oh and I was so pissed because I had made it to the crown in the final round before anyone, but didn't know you had to grab it so I unceremoniously jumped into it and fell into lava, losing my win.
Finally playing RDR2 since it's free on game pass (and I finished Divinity 2 and Ori and the Blind Forest), and while it's beautiful, I think it definitely could have done with someone after the game was finished going through and saying "does the game actually benefit from this?" and cutting like 25% of it. Does the game really need flower picking? Browsing a store by awkwardly moving in front of a shelf instead of just getting a list? 47 different kinds of food items to get back health, stamina, and dead eye, all of which give back different amounts of each? The stamina and dead-eye system in general being anything other than just gauges that automatically refill? A horse happiness system? Like, so much bloat in the name of "freedom." All that crap doesn't make me feel more free playing the game. It makes me feel like i have to pay attention to a bunch of tedious shit I don't care about.
Speaking of tedium, holy shit the source system in Divinity 2 is one the dumbest additions to a great combat system I've ever seen. Just have it recharge after each combat. Making me run around looking for bodies to drain after every combat isn't fun, it's tedious and dumb. Why did no one in playtesting say "wow, this is awful. It's not gonna make people be careful about using their source points in battle, it's just gonna make them run back and forth between the nearest pile of bodies to spam source vampirism. This is the opposite of compelling gameplay." Ditto for the puzzles. So many of the "puzzles" in DoS 2 (even more so than 1 somehow) are finding a random specific button or lever or some absurdly obscure crap. I still liked the game but I found a LOT more about it annoying than DoS 1.
Ori was mostly great, but there are 2 sections that are timed escapes that are basically pattern memorization. You have this great, tight, smooth platformer, why on EARTH do you decide to have two sections of awful memorization game play? Super Meat Boy did the same thing with one of the boss fights. I just wanna hit the designer on the nose with a newspaper. NO. Play to your strengths! You've designed something great! Don't add awful crap to it. It really didn't help that the "boost off enemies/projectiles/lanterns(only some not all lanterns)" is the least precise of all the mechanics and features heavily in both times escape sections. Also, and I'm looking at you too hollow knight, stop having decorative elements that either obscure the screen or look very similar to stuff you can land on.
Wow this reads like an old man yells at cloud screed.
Edit - I'm sure there are mods that remove the source tedium in DoS 2, but that doesn't forgive the design decisions.
Edit edit - Looks like store owners in RDR2 have catalogs. So I can tediously turn pages instead of tediously browsing the shelves. Progress?
Also, while I'm playing RDR on the xbox I've finally started Banner Saga 3 on PC, and I forgot how amazing the art in this game is. The gameplay is basically OG Oregon trail with turn-based grid combat and story choices that actually matter, and while the gameplay is good not great this game is really all about the art and story. Pick it up if you can. I mean look at this!
Edit - It's a story-driven game broken into 3 parts, so definitely buy 1 first.
Finally playing RDR2 since it's free on game pass (and I finished Divinity 2 and Ori and the Blind Forest), and while it's beautiful, I think it definitely could have done with someone after the game was finished going through and saying "does the game actually benefit from this?" and cutting like 25% of it. Does the game really need flower picking? Browsing a store by awkwardly moving in front of a shelf instead of just getting a list? 47 different kinds of food items to get back health, stamina, and dead eye, all of which give back different amounts of each? The stamina and dead-eye system in general being anything other than just gauges that automatically refill? A horse happiness system? Like, so much bloat in the name of "freedom." All that crap doesn't make me feel more free playing the game. It makes me feel like i have to pay attention to a bunch of tedious shit I don't care about.
Yea I bounced off RDR2 pretty fast. I got to the first town it was kind of overwhelming in a way that I was not sure what I should be doing or how important all of the various mechanics it teaches you in the beginning are. Like they train you to hunt and you bring the meat back to camp which sure, but is this something I need to constantly be doing? Is it something where later on I'll have wished I had spent a couple hours hunting at the beginning? Does it not matter at all until a certain story point? I'm sure I missed something there but every system felt like that to me on some level and I wasn't having much fun with it.
I also just generally have problems in games with very scripted action in that Rockstar style, I always fuck it up and end up just wandering until I figure out what the game was trying to get me to do or it fails for whatever arbitrary thing fails missions in these kinds of games. They really want you to just do the obvious thing and keep moving forward but my impulse is to poke at everything like you do in those giant open world Bethesda games. There was an early mission where you have to go up on a hill and scout something for a heist, so I was like OK let me grab my gun so I go back to the horse, can't grab the gun and the guy is yelling at me telling me to come there. Eventually I just went up and talked to the guy, and he was like now go get your gun and do the next thing and then I could grab my gun from the horse. I get why they would do it like this to make sure you have the right equipment and whatnot at every beat but I can't stand it, you might as well just make it a cutscene if I can't make any decisions at all and I'm just trying to follow a script.
I also just generally have problems in games with very scripted action in that Rockstar style, I always fuck it up and end up just wandering until I figure out what the game was trying to get me to do or it fails for whatever arbitrary thing fails missions in these kinds of games.
Oh my god yes. I was doing the hunt a bear mission, and there's part where you have to "drop bait by those boulders over there." So I walked over to the bouders, dropped the bait, game over screen. "You dropped the bait in the wrong place." Wait what? Did it like 5 more times and finally realized there were some other boulders behind these boulders where I was actually supposed to drop it. Just what? It's funny for how open and free the rest of the game is the missions are so scripted and linear.
However, I will say so far I'm enjoying my time with it. The world they built is wonderful - detailed, feels lived in but not crowded, looks beautiful. I just pick a random marker that the game is telling me is a mission (yellow or white initial circle thing), ride towards it, stop at anything interesting. Been working for me.
Oh my god yes. I was doing the hunt a bear mission, and there's part where you have to "drop bait by those boulders over there." So I walked over to the bouders, dropped the bait, game over screen. "You dropped the bait in the wrong place." Wait what? Did it like 5 more times and finally realized there were some other boulders behind these boulders where I was actually supposed to drop it. Just what? It's funny for how open and free the rest of the game is the missions are so scripted and linear.
Lol this is exactly my experience with Rockstar games and in a slightly different way all of the Call of Duty campaigns.
However, I will say so far I'm enjoying my time with it. The world they built is wonderful - detailed, feels lived in but not crowded, looks beautiful. I just pick a random marker that the game is telling me is a mission (yellow or white initial circle thing), ride towards it, stop at anything interesting. Been working for me.
The world was beautiful and I was all in for an hour or two, by all accounts the game is incredible and it's a lot of people's favorite game of all time for reason. I think five years ago I would have kept pushing but I've gotten to a point where when I recognize I'm not having fun I just turn it off and only come back to it if I feel like playing it rather than trying to force it. I've probably missed out on some games I would have liked eventually but overall I enjoy my time playing games much more.
Started up Horizon Zero Dawn over the weekend now that the PC version is out and this game is incredible. There's something about the feel of the combat and the way you hunt the machines that so far feels so much better than any open world game I've ever played. The only downsides I have are that my internet went out while I was downloading it (thanks Comcast), my power went out twice while trying to play it (thanks PG&E!) and now its way too hot to be in the room with the computer upstairs and PG&E is telling us we are going to keep losing power for chunks of hours anyway because their infrastructure is made out of popsicle sticks and tin foil that have been lighting the entire state on fire anytime there's a stiff breeze. I can't wait to get back to this eventually if everything stops being a complete fucking nightmare at every possible turn.
I will say that Red Dead 2 is clunky at times with its systems and what it is seemingly asking out of a player. @asmallcat I do not disagree with anything you are complaining about in your initial rant on the game regarding this stuff. I will say, however, when you go shopping in the stores, you can just walk up to the clerk and all of the items are there in the catalog. Given how the rest of the game is, I would not fault anyone for assuming otherwise.
The thing I would say is that while it does seem overly complicated and bloated with these systems, they don't really matter. You don't HAVE to keep hunting and providing food for the camp, unless you want to hear your fellow gang members and hangers-on react to you bringing in a fresh kill or even doing chores. It's just something they've put in there to change the atmosphere and make it all the more immersive. Sort of the same thing with your horse, or with Arthur himself. You don't HAVE to maintain a relationship with your horse, but they will ride faster and do more horsey tricks if you do. You don't HAVE to make sure Arthur stays at a healthy weight and eats right but his stats will improve just a little bit if you do.
The way they kinda screwed up though is that they make it seem like all of that stuff is necessary when really if you don't have all the time in the world to sink into that game, don't sweat it. I think it immediately turns people off, right out of the gate. @bizmarkiefader has the exact same attitude I've leaned to adopt in the last few years. If you're not having fun, what's the point? Just move on and come back when and if you're ready. RDR 2 is very long, even if you're steam rolling your way through the main campaign. There is some very unnecessary in there occasionally but overall, I truly think it's one of the best narrative experiences I've had in the last....ever. And given the amount of money they make from GTA Online and certain core members leaving Rockstar, it could be the last best one we'll ever get out of them.
The thing I would say is that while it does seem overly complicated and bloated with these systems, they don't really matter. You don't HAVE to keep hunting and providing food for the camp, unless you want to hear your fellow gang members and hangers-on react to you bringing in a fresh kill or even doing chores. It's just something they've put in there to change the atmosphere and make it all the more immersive. Sort of the same thing with your horse, or with Arthur himself. You don't HAVE to maintain a relationship with your horse, but they will ride faster and do more horsey tricks if you do. You don't HAVE to make sure Arthur stays at a healthy weight and eats right but his stats will improve just a little bit if you do.
This is really good to know and might make me come back to RDR2 at some point. I had a similar experience with Assassins Creed Odyssey where when you first get in that game there are a million different systems and it's all very overwhelming until you realize these are things you can do but you don't need to worry about unless you're doing a mission that will make it explicit. I was able to push through that a lot easier because that game leans extremely heavy into being a video game where RDR2 is going for a prestige factor where everything is just a little obfuscated to make you feel more like a cowboy. Those systems are cool and make for an immersive game but it is confusing in the early hours.
I truly think it's one of the best narrative experiences I've had in the last....ever. And given the amount of money they make from GTA Online and certain core members leaving Rockstar, it could be the last best one we'll ever get out of them.
I was just thinking about this on another thread about people's favorite game of the 2010s. In a span of five years we got Oblivion in 06, Fallout 3 in 08, and Fallout New Vegas and Skyrim in 2011. These are some of my favorite games ever and I've played all of them at least three times but all we've gotten since then was Fallout 4 which didn't land for me at all. It's pretty much the same story with Rockstar where they're just going to make GTA5 forever because why would anybody make anything other than GTA 5 and Skyrim over and over when everyone is still buying them. I couldn't believe it when the PS5 conference lead with GTA5 being on the PS5, I bought this fucking game for my PS3 like 7 years ago!
The George RR Martinification of video game development is fascinating. I get these things are more complicated and have larger teams and a lot more service components now, but how did we get from big future classic games every two to three years from a lot of these studios to it being 9 years since Skyrim and Elder Scrolls 6 still feeling like it's in the idea stage and might not even be a this generation game. Imagine when Skyrim came out telling them that in 2020 they would still be buying this game and playing it for a 4th time on their handheld Nintendo system (though this would probably not be the most surprising thing about 2020 to someone in 2011).
The only reliable continuous source for gigantic AAA budget single player games over the last generation seems to be Playstation and Nintendo exclusives.
The George RR Martinification of video game development is fascinating. I get these things are more complicated and have larger teams and a lot more service components now, but how did we get from big future classic games every two to three years from a lot of these studios to it being 9 years since Skyrim and Elder Scrolls 6 still feeling like it's in the idea stage and might not even be a this generation game. Imagine when Skyrim came out telling them that in 2020 they would still be buying this game and playing it for a 4th time on their handheld Nintendo system (though this would probably not be the most surprising thing about 2020 to someone in 2011).
A million times this. Games keep getting bigger and bigger and longer and longer when they really don't need too. Look at Titanfall 2's campaign. It was, what, 10 hours at most? And I STILL remember stuff from that game (the prefab housing factory level, the time travel level, the titan first picking you up) because it had a tight narrative. Give me a 10 hour game that's been well-honed over a 50 hour game with 20 hours of good story buried in there any day of the week. This would have the upside of making it so games didn't cost so much to make so you could afford to be experimental and have moderate success rather than a game having to sell 10 million copies to make back the budget.
The George RR Martinification of video game development is fascinating. I get these things are more complicated and have larger teams and a lot more service components now, but how did we get from big future classic games every two to three years from a lot of these studios to it being 9 years since Skyrim and Elder Scrolls 6 still feeling like it's in the idea stage and might not even be a this generation game. Imagine when Skyrim came out telling them that in 2020 they would still be buying this game and playing it for a 4th time on their handheld Nintendo system (though this would probably not be the most surprising thing about 2020 to someone in 2011).
A million times this. Games keep getting bigger and bigger and longer and longer when they really don't need too. Look at Titanfall 2's campaign. It was, what, 10 hours at most? And I STILL remember stuff from that game (the prefab housing factory level, the time travel level, the titan first picking you up) because it had a tight narrative. Give me a 10 hour game that's been well-honed over a 50 hour game with 20 hours of good story buried in there any day of the week. This would have the upside of making it so games didn't cost so much to make so you could afford to be experimental and have moderate success rather than a game having to sell 10 million copies to make back the budget.
Comments
update. Each location is considered a part according to an online guide. So I’m just gonna put the part number as well.
The combination of swordfighting/bow/stealth is well implemented and gives you options to approach things.
Also, the standoffs are one of the coolest things I've seen in a videogame, but I really like samurai shit. I don't think I'll ever get tired of them.
Agree about the standoffs being badass.
I'm interested in how the upgrades will be as I progress.
It's some of the most fun I've had online in years. It's basically an MXC/Wipeout-style Battle royale where you play as minions. So much fun.
DON'T. GET. ELIMINATED!!!!!!!!
For me, any game mode with the balls do NOT click at all. I can't get the strats for those down.
I played like 4 hours straight last night with some friends it's such a good time.
Oh and I was so pissed because I had made it to the crown in the final round before anyone, but didn't know you had to grab it so I unceremoniously jumped into it and fell into lava, losing my win.
Speaking of tedium, holy shit the source system in Divinity 2 is one the dumbest additions to a great combat system I've ever seen. Just have it recharge after each combat. Making me run around looking for bodies to drain after every combat isn't fun, it's tedious and dumb. Why did no one in playtesting say "wow, this is awful. It's not gonna make people be careful about using their source points in battle, it's just gonna make them run back and forth between the nearest pile of bodies to spam source vampirism. This is the opposite of compelling gameplay." Ditto for the puzzles. So many of the "puzzles" in DoS 2 (even more so than 1 somehow) are finding a random specific button or lever or some absurdly obscure crap. I still liked the game but I found a LOT more about it annoying than DoS 1.
Ori was mostly great, but there are 2 sections that are timed escapes that are basically pattern memorization. You have this great, tight, smooth platformer, why on EARTH do you decide to have two sections of awful memorization game play? Super Meat Boy did the same thing with one of the boss fights. I just wanna hit the designer on the nose with a newspaper. NO. Play to your strengths! You've designed something great! Don't add awful crap to it. It really didn't help that the "boost off enemies/projectiles/lanterns(only some not all lanterns)" is the least precise of all the mechanics and features heavily in both times escape sections. Also, and I'm looking at you too hollow knight, stop having decorative elements that either obscure the screen or look very similar to stuff you can land on.
Wow this reads like an old man yells at cloud screed.
Edit - I'm sure there are mods that remove the source tedium in DoS 2, but that doesn't forgive the design decisions.
Edit edit - Looks like store owners in RDR2 have catalogs. So I can tediously turn pages instead of tediously browsing the shelves. Progress?
Edit - It's a story-driven game broken into 3 parts, so definitely buy 1 first.
However, I will say so far I'm enjoying my time with it. The world they built is wonderful - detailed, feels lived in but not crowded, looks beautiful. I just pick a random marker that the game is telling me is a mission (yellow or white initial circle thing), ride towards it, stop at anything interesting. Been working for me.
The world was beautiful and I was all in for an hour or two, by all accounts the game is incredible and it's a lot of people's favorite game of all time for reason. I think five years ago I would have kept pushing but I've gotten to a point where when I recognize I'm not having fun I just turn it off and only come back to it if I feel like playing it rather than trying to force it. I've probably missed out on some games I would have liked eventually but overall I enjoy my time playing games much more.
The thing I would say is that while it does seem overly complicated and bloated with these systems, they don't really matter. You don't HAVE to keep hunting and providing food for the camp, unless you want to hear your fellow gang members and hangers-on react to you bringing in a fresh kill or even doing chores. It's just something they've put in there to change the atmosphere and make it all the more immersive. Sort of the same thing with your horse, or with Arthur himself. You don't HAVE to maintain a relationship with your horse, but they will ride faster and do more horsey tricks if you do. You don't HAVE to make sure Arthur stays at a healthy weight and eats right but his stats will improve just a little bit if you do.
The way they kinda screwed up though is that they make it seem like all of that stuff is necessary when really if you don't have all the time in the world to sink into that game, don't sweat it. I think it immediately turns people off, right out of the gate. @bizmarkiefader has the exact same attitude I've leaned to adopt in the last few years. If you're not having fun, what's the point? Just move on and come back when and if you're ready. RDR 2 is very long, even if you're steam rolling your way through the main campaign. There is some very unnecessary in there occasionally but overall, I truly think it's one of the best narrative experiences I've had in the last....ever. And given the amount of money they make from GTA Online and certain core members leaving Rockstar, it could be the last best one we'll ever get out of them.
This is really good to know and might make me come back to RDR2 at some point. I had a similar experience with Assassins Creed Odyssey where when you first get in that game there are a million different systems and it's all very overwhelming until you realize these are things you can do but you don't need to worry about unless you're doing a mission that will make it explicit. I was able to push through that a lot easier because that game leans extremely heavy into being a video game where RDR2 is going for a prestige factor where everything is just a little obfuscated to make you feel more like a cowboy. Those systems are cool and make for an immersive game but it is confusing in the early hours.