So, what're you playing?

[rk47]

Finished the Witcher 3. It was ok. The way Geralt moves was too damn awkward and I hated the way the game locked you on to enemies. That clumsiness killed any replay value, not willing to put up with it a second time to see what would happen if I made some different choices.

Now to start on the games I picked up in the summer steam sale. Just started with the South Park rpg.

They're patched the clumsiness away with alternate movement option.

[satael]

Ended up reinstalling TESO due to rk47's radicalthon but so far I've spent more time configuring a gamepad for it than actually playing the game since they haven't gotten around to adding actual gamepad support to the pc version.
(though it's one of those things they have more or less promised to add at some point and many I had hoped that it would have been the game's launch on consoles).

[Signe]

I was going to use a game controller because of the quickslots until I noticed that I could hot key them.  I put them on my numlock numbers and now I just hit the number of the item I want to use and then Q.  This works better for me.  I'd like to try the game on the PS4 but, unfortunately, I don't have one.  ;p

[Kail]

I've been messing around in World of Warcraft lately.  They've been doing a 7 days free trial, I don't know if you're aware, they've been pretty subtle about pushing it.  I dunno, just not feeling it running solo.  It seems like a pain to level up a new character without knowing anybody in the game, and I can't con anyone into trying it again.  And all my old characters are in Northrend or something where it takes hours to see your XP bar creep forward.  I want to do dungeons on them but I have no idea how the classes play anymore.  Loaded my druid for the first time in years, ran in to combat, shifted in to cat form, and started cursing as my hotbar vanished because I guess cat form is COMPLETELY different now.  Even after fiddling around with it for like ten minutes (which is a huge pain in the ass, since you can't tell which skills are cat form skills unless you're out of cat form and you can't assign them to the hotbar unless you're IN cat form) as far as I can tell I have one combo point builder skill, one finishing move, and prowl, which seems useless because I can't find any of the ambush/sap/sneak attack skills I could have sworn cats used to have.  That seems a bit lean to me.

[Yegolev]

It's dead, Jim.

[WayAbvPar]

It was dead the day they announced they would have pandas as a playable race, and it wasn't on April 1st.

[Signe]

Especially those pandas.  They have vacuous smiles and dead eyes. 

[brellium]

My favorite PvP experience was actually in WoW on Sunwell Island.

I was playing my PvP druid in full season 2 (I didn't really compete in PvP arena), and insta-gib'd some shaman with a full party watching. The party then chased me into the water, stealthed out swam to the bottom and shapeshfited to waterform and went back to land, and sat around watching the party swim for the next ten minutes.

The rest of the time was spent sadly watching two shaman sitting together on their own fire totems in the middle of the zone doing nothing.

[Rendakor]

Etrian Odyssey Untold 2 is pretty awesome. Unlike EOU1, the new dungeon is playable in Classic mode so there's no reason to play Story (unless you want more story in your dungeon crawlers at the expense of party customization). They've added some map-related QOL improvements too (passages change color when you've opened them, chest icons open, damaging floors auto-color red, etc.) that make the game feel more fresh and modern. If you missed it on the original DS, pick it up now.

Got bored with FF:Record Keeper so I downloaded Puzzle and Dragons again for my mobile fix. After a few restarts I got a pretty decent team, but now that EOU2 is here I've been playing that on the go instead of using my cell.

Also bought Oneechanbara Z2 but haven't played it yet.

[Mithas]

I started playing Dark Souls on PC. I've never played a Souls game and I really struggled for the first 3 hours or so. Doing better, but holy shit is this game frustrating.

[Yegolev]

You'll look back on these first three hours with fond remembrance.

I started BL2 PreSequel last night and decided to play Claptrap.  The game warned me that I was making a terrible mistake.

[Sky]

Invisible, Inc. What a fantastic game.

Had a level where I tripped a daemon to pull in a higher level guard. 50% chance he'd spawn in at a spot with a direct path to my agent's escape route. Rolled the dice...lost. Had to get greedy with those safes...but I'm so broke! So my 2 'good' agents sprint for the door as my third unimproved, ungeared agent snags the last of the cash and follows. The hostage we dug up (not mission priority) I used as a decoy for the guards (probably should've hacked the mobie camera, but I was low in energy). What followed was a pretty funny escape scene as the agents all made it into the teleporter just as the guards were busting into the room...leaving the poor courier all alone with the porter on countdown. He then amazingly was able to slip behind obstacles long enough to have the porter open back up, sprinted in and got out alive.

[Druzil]

Finished the first episode of Kings Quest which was better than I expected.   It seems like they added at least 3 solutions to many of the puzzles as well as some character interactions that you can change one way or another that affect the story.  Gives it a little replay value.   Since it's only the first episode I'm not sure what the decisions you make affect in the long run, but hopefully they do something interesting with it.  Only had one pixel hunt moment so far, so nothing that was too obscure or cheap.  Also some of the voice acting is pretty good.   

The biggest knock on it that I have is the first hour or so of the game is very linear and has a few QTEs and an action sequence which is not what most of the game it like. 

[Bunk]

Played a couple hours of Submerged last night. It's what it advertises - a very pretty puzzle/climbing game. Nice visuals, great music, and a cool way of presenting the story/plot. There's no combat, no health meter (other than your boat I think), as far as I can tell no real way to lose. The choice of almost no dialogue at all is interesting as well, but it works. Makes for a nice casual game experience.

[PalmTrees]

Finished the South Park rpg. Was like a decent episode of the show. Started on Pillars of Eternity. Damn I forgot how frustrating limited number of spells per rest period is.

[rk47]

I revisited my 'cheap EA games I bought on Origin that I never played' library:




Morte would've been proud.

[Jeff Kelly]

Played a bit of Galak-Z. I liked the presentation. It's basically a rogue-like like in the style of R-Type or Gradius styled like a late eighties/eraly nineties japanese animated TV show.

You're flying a ship though environments that are reminiscend of Gradius or R-Type and you have a similar upgrade system with different types of missiles, shield upgardes and shot upgrades you can find. The flying mechanic like in asteroids your ship has thrusters and inertia and you have to change direction using forward and reverse thrust and the orientation of your ship. It's rogue-like like because you only have one live and if you die you lose all of your upgrades and progress. Oh and half way through your ship can turn into a fighting and flying robot.

The levels or episodes are procedurally generated and there is a pool of episode plots that are randomly selected for a mission.

The whole presentation of the game is a callback to eighties or nineties animated TV. Blocks of missions are grouped into seasons and missions are styled like 20 minute episodes of an animated TV show (and take about as long to complete) complete with title card, animated cut scenes and cheesy dialogue. The whole art style is also heavily influenced by japanimation of that era.

That being said I don't like the gameplay. The game is basically structured into 5 seasons and 5 episodes per season. You need to complete a whole season of 5 episodes to unlock the next. You start off each season without upgrades. Upgrades carry over between episodes. If you die you lose all progress and all upgrades and restart at episode 1 of the current season.

THis is also my main gripe with the game. It's hard and every death resets your progress completely. So you'll end up hearing the same goddamned dialogue and plot information over and over again. I've played it for a few hours and I've already cylced though all of the basic missions available in season 1. Upgrades don't carry over like for example in Rogue legancy and so you can't "grind" your way through the game. There's nothing worse than failing at the boss fight at the end of a season and knowingb that you'll just get reset to the beginning of the game and have to hear all of the dialogue and mission exposition again.

[Yegolev]

Description seems to indicate it was meant to produce excessive excitement/anxiety in the player, so I skipped it.

[Kail]

I'm messing around with Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments, which seems neat so far but glitchy.  The load times are SUPER long and frequent and I'm stuck at a part where I'm getting a 100% crash every time I fail a tightrope walking minigame, which doesn't seem like it would be difficult but every time I press the wrong button I end up having to sit through five minutes of load times which makes every attempt feel like the first time.  Which is too bad, because I was liking the game otherwise.  The character models look really great and the game is more focused on making deductions and finding clues than the previous games weird "he disappeared suddenly, leaving behind only this box which is locked with the tower of hanoi puzzle somehow".  Rather than one big case, the game is a series of smaller cases, and at the end of each one there's a little screen telling you how many other players solved the case in the same way and made the same choices you did.

Also FINALLY finished Starcraft 2: Heart of the Swarm's single player campaign, ugh.  Not sure why, but I really hated it.  I mean, the story was obviously complete garbage, but the gameplay seemed mostly fun, there were a bunch of neat ideas for levels and things.  Maybe there was just too much gimmicky stuff, I dunno.  But I pretty much had to force myself to finish it.  Kind of worried about the third one, to be honest.

Still messing around in Heroes of the Storm, they're coming towards the end of a big three month Diablo 3 event, which I'll be glad to see the end of.

[Mac]

- Lots of Payday 2 with the gang after it was free to play last weekend and everyone bought it on sale.
- Some TESO but it doesn't seem to grab me.
- Bought Wolfenstein: New Order awhile back and tried it but it's so annoying I deinstalled it.

[Rendakor]

Finished the main "story" of EO2 classic mode. Taking a break before I start the postgame stuff.

Started playing Dungeon Travellers 2 on the Vita; it's another first person dungeon crawler. A good deal harder than EO on normal; the interesting thing for me is the tiered class customization. Also, all the fanservice.

[Furiously]

I picked up Party Hard, it's a stealth based pixel game about killing people who are partying too loudly.

I can't help but think the music in the game is going to land the developer in deep water. That being said, the music is amazing. Gameplay is fun. I'd strongly suggest picking it up before they are forced to remove the music.

[Shannow]

4 years or so late but damn Mount and Blade Warband is ridiculous fun. Playing the Game of Thrones mod for some context.
 

[Montague]

4 years or so late but damn Mount and Blade Warband is ridiculous fun. Playing the Game of Thrones mod for some context.
 

Prophesy of Pendor is a must-play mod as well.

[Rasix]

Nearly done with the FFXIV 3.0 story line.  The story bits, while gated behind a lot of grinding, are really well done this time.  

If in game population/link shell activity/guild attrition are any indication of game health, this xpac is bombing hard.  While it has taken me for-fucking-ever to hit 60, there's just apparently a lack of end game content worth doing compared to the bounty the game had before the xpac.  I've also heard the esoterics gear grind is particularly brutal.  I'll just wait until a bigger content patch or a massive nerfing before I dive into the endgame content.

I dislike the mechanical changes to bard, but I've gotten used to them.  In most situations it's a massive DPS increase (yer a viable dps, harry), except in dodge-a-thons, where it's aggravating.

Ohh well.  Maybe I'll actually buy a game after this.  It really takes a lot will power to dive into my Steam backlog.  It's full of shit I purchased but really had no immediate desire to play.

[Signe]

You should buy Just Cause 3 now.  Maybe you'll win an island.  Srsly.  Maybe there will be cannibals or a spa.  You won't know until you win.  Just do it.  Shit the Beef compels you.

[Velorath]

Playing through old D&D games right now. Ran through the two Intellivision games (Cloudy Mountain and Treasure of Tarmin) as well as Heroes of the Lance and Dragons of Flame. Played through Pool of Radiance, Curse of the Azure Bonds, Hillsfar, and Secret of the Silver Blades so I'm skipping past those for now. Currently working my way through War of the Lance which I haven't really played before and since it's a strategy game it takes a bit more learning than a lot of the other games. After that it's on to DragonStrike followed by Champions of Krynn. Might post something more in-depth after I've gone through a few more games.

[schild]

I picked up Party Hard, it's a stealth based pixel game about killing people who are partying too loudly.

I can't help but think the music in the game is going to land the developer in deep water. That being said, the music is amazing. Gameplay is fun. I'd strongly suggest picking it up before they are forced to remove the music.

Why would he have to change the music?

[Furiously]

I picked up Party Hard, it's a stealth based pixel game about killing people who are partying too loudly.

I can't help but think the music in the game is going to land the developer in deep water. That being said, the music is amazing. Gameplay is fun. I'd strongly suggest picking it up before they are forced to remove the music.

Why would he have to change the music?

Because he basically just 8 bitted Daft Punk, RUN DMC, and David Guetta?  It's one of the funnest games I've played in the past year.

[Ard]

He also claims to have licensed it all.  Assuming that's true, I doubt there's anything to worry about.

[koro]

If in game population/link shell activity/guild attrition are any indication of game health, this xpac is bombing hard.  While it has taken me for-fucking-ever to hit 60, there's just apparently a lack of end game content worth doing compared to the bounty the game had before the xpac.  I've also heard the esoterics gear grind is particularly brutal.  I'll just wait until a bigger content patch or a massive nerfing before I dive into the endgame content.

The big problem right now is that they swung a bit too hard with their new primary 8-man raid series. Story/normal-mode Alexander is incredibly easy for the most part, but savage/hard-mode is so absolutely soul-crushingly brutal that only a handful of guilds have even unlocked the fourth boss, and even fewer have beaten it. It makes vanilla Naxx look like Karazhan in terms of player participation.

It's such a drastic difference in difficulty that it leaves a lot of people out in the cold until they release new dungeons and the 24-man raid. You can get Esoterics-quality gear without a ton of trouble, but unless you're in a hardcore raiding static, there's just nothing for you to do right now.

[Zetor]

I'm also playing FFXIV right now (got roped into it by friends), and the Heavensward  levelling experience seems OK after the stupid story gating. What makes things , though, is that at max level there's a grand total of TWO 'endgame' dungeons to run... just like back in fall 2013 with WP/AK! The more MMOs change, the more the cockstabs stay the same.

[luckton]

Devil's Advocate: Which would you prefer? Having a dozen dungeons available at launch and never seeing another until the next xpack, or having a dozen dungeons released over the course of the current xpack until they release the next one?

[Zetor]

Definitely the first one... I could play all the content, then - if there's enough variety - be not-bored enough to stay subbed for a few months before moving on, then returning for the xpac. In the second case I'd probably quit before the first content patch, maybe resub later to take a look at some new dungeons with people insanely overgearing them, thus making them a lot less interesting/fun... then quit again. I actually did that for FFXIV:AAR pre-expansion, and the overall experience wasn't that good, *especially* since Heavensward requires you to play through a lot of it (as well as the surrounding X hours of fetch quests) before you can even get to the expansion areas.

e: The real answer is, of course, None Of The Above -- ie. a dev team that is at least vaguely cognizant of how high-level content works, has enough endgame dungeons to keep players content at launch, and adds enough of it over time to keep things fresh. Kinda like WOW-WOTLK. It's extra sad because FFXIV is probably the game with the most content readily available right now... and they still make every 60 run the same two dungeons over and over because reasons.

[koro]

2.0 was similarly painful with only Amdapor Keep and Wanderer's Palace to do anything with, but I think once they get the first set of three dungeons along with the 24-man out, it should be pretty decent until the next expansion.

Personally I'd have had between 3-4 level 60 dungeons to go through at the start, and then resumed the "two revamped old dungeons + 1 new one" model with the first big patch. Maybe something like Dusk Vigil HM from the get-go.