Hey all! Whatcha been playing! Missed last week partially because I was thiiiiiis close to being done with titanium court and really wanted to finish before the thread. And I did! I absolutely loved it. For those who have played
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I ended up starting to leave asap as soon as I saw what was happening. I got some curses lifted kinda by happenstance. But I really enjoyed the characters. Had a big goodbye at the end. Puck helped me out, set the enemy up with Hop. It was a great time. Really wish there was a Kacey’s mod kind of thing for the game because it really is fantastic on mobile. Portrait mode! It’s awesome!
Now I’m playing the OOT remake and really enjoying it. I think the art style works. Game still fucks all these years later
I finally got around to playing 1000xResist. I don’t know why I waited so long, because it immediately grabbed me (and my partner) as soon as I started playing. We’ve been devouring it and are in Chapter 9 now. The writing and voice acting are just so good, and it packs an emotional wallop. Amazingly powerful game, especially given the limited budget for animations, textures, and the like.
Also started Queen’s Domain. I never played the King’s Field games this one is a spiritual successor of, but as a Dark Souls and Metroid Prime lover, this game is really incredible. The gameplay is shockingly slow, especially at first, but it’s deliberate and there’s a rhythm to it. The result is a game that makes you consider every room and encounter carefully. Then there’s the world design, which is dense with looping pathways and secrets; I’m early on but so far this is Dark Souls 1 tier of level design. I have no idea how big it actually is, but I’m definitely going to crawl over every inch of this game.
I’m also on the Queens Domain train. The gameplay gets noticeably faster once you unlock more dash crystal (I don’t remember what they’re called in game), but the combat IMO never does. I’m pretty much at the final stretch with the game and towards the end the combat ends up being either a boring slog because the weapon you use doesn’t do enough damage, or you trivialize the entire encounter by using a weapon that does too much damage and whatever you’re fighting dies before “combat” even begins.
But the exploration is some of the best I’ve played. It’s definitely not for everyone because I imagine players with poor sense of direction are going to get so lost in this game. But there’s so much to discover. I don’t even remember how many times I’ve somehow climbed up to a place and thought “surely the developer didn’t expect me to get here” only to find a treasure there. There’s a certain NPC (if you can call it that) and when you’ve given then enough of something you get to buy upgrades that let you see the locations of treasures and other stuff if you’re close enough to them. There are areas I’ve combed over multiple times trying to figure out where to go and then with the locator I still find secret in those areas. And some of the things are hidden in a way where I see them with the locator and even though I know the thing is supposed to be there I still don’t know how to get there.
And of course searching for secrets wouldn’t be interesting if not for the fact that each environment feels like it’s deliberately thought through. I assume it must be intentional level design but there’s a cook in the game who rides a big bird and eventually you get to their kitchen and I remember thinking “but how do they get out of the kitchen?” because it’s a big bird and they’re technically underground and it’s not like they’re going to take the route I took from the top to the bottom. So as I explore the kitchen I notice a treasure on a ledge and as I look up I discover there’s a big hole where the ceiling should be and from that hole you can see the sky. That perfectly explains how they get in and out of the kitchen. There was no reason for the game to have that hole there but there it was. The attention to detail is pretty impressive.
The lore also seems pretty interesting. I wasn’t expecting the lore to play such a significant role in the story so I wasn’t paying attention at first but I feel like unless the ending explains everything I might have to play again to get the full picture.
I started Rogue Trader the other day. Forgot I even had it, since I bought it after playing a little bit of Wrath of the Righteous which I got after putting in like 360 hours into BG3, which left me burnt out on the tactical rpgs for a bit. But now I’m feeling the itch again and this game is dope.
RDR2. My son bought me it for Father’s Day a few years ago, but I’ve never had known windows of time to play it, so by necessity i am a casual gamer and very low skill, for that matter! Now he’s away to university i actually have the time, but that’s quite bitter sweet because i can’t talk to him about it each night.
However, I’m loving it, despite being rubbish. I accidentally punched my horse yesterday because i couldn’t remember the controls 😬
LEGO Harry Potter years 5-7. It’s fun and doesn’t require a lot of thought.
Played through Routine, and I’m still trying to decide if I liked it or not. I’m not a huge fan of being chased while actively trying to do puzzles and the story was a little confusing, but the enemies were pretty easy to escape for the most part, and the ending explained everything I wasn’t sure about. It was overall a good time, but I don’t think it’s one I would play through again.
I’ve technically finished Diablo 4 Season 15, but I’ve been having so much fun with my necro minion build that I’ve been working completing all of the season objectives. Except for the one with Echoing Hatred, I’m doubting that will ever drop for me this season.
Retro Rewind just had a major update, so I’ve been updating my store accordingly.
Still working on The Sinking City.
Soulframe, its free and open public now, still early version.
Slightly dark fantasy world,
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locals and nature being exploited by techno knights from clouds.
Hero happens.
Hack n slash tpp, lots of grind, 65 weapons in 8 styles, 9 (+3 temp paid) classes with own skills and stats, some quests, some repetitive events, dungeons, sometimes puzzles, optional coop (playable solo, but always online, it’s a service after all),
007, Crimson Desert, CBP 2077, Wukong, DD 2, Yaga, Reka, Prime Monster, and wrapped up the new content of NMS. 😅😶🌫️
Titanium Court spoilers below, don’t read unless you’ve completed the game. I’m serious!
Titanium Court Spoiler
The way it kind of turns into a horror game almost after the Enemy steals your keys is so brilliant. I had gotten quite a few keys when I realised I was destroying everything, and when I went to leave the Enemy just stole them all. Then suddenly the whole vibe changes - you’re desperately trying to do everything you can to get whatever keys you didn’t already have and get back whatever keys you can from him. The castle becomes a lonely house of ghosts as you’re doing everything in your power to avoid everyone and everything to not unexpectedly turn anything more stale. You work with Puck. You have the sleepover, and prepare the spell for Her. And then yeah, the relief and triumph when you finally get to the big send-off. I even made a copy of my save file to try out several of the ways you can defeat the Enemy right at the end, there.
And also… I just really liked the central question of “does squeezing every molecule of content out of a game ruin the magic of the experience?” that the game poses you. It’s something I haven’t thought about before necessarily, and I think it may have succeeded in changing the way I think about games a little bit.
Don’t go for a 100% playthrough in the future, by the way. It’s pretty bleak.
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Yes on your last point I can imagine it would be really depressing. I was getting excited to go through it all but yeah the message is interesting. I got the mirror shortcut pretty early so I wondered if it would end up being something like this. I am someone who usually loves to get every last drop out of a game and I can understand the magic of a game being lost. Like, when I played ocarina of time when I was young, I definitely did not find everything, so I left that world knowing there was more out there, and that knowledge was kind of magical and made the world feel bigger than it really is. It helps keep the illusion alive I feel when you don’t consume all the magic it has to offer
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It’s something I’ve probably felt before subconsciously, but not seen or thought articulated until this game. The way your favourite RPG follower - after you’ve finished the companion quest and exhausted the banter interjections - becomes just a pile of stats. The way Dark Souls, after you look up all the maps and secrets online, becomes just a video game. And also I think, to a certain extent, the way your takeaway from an ending can diminish if you look up all the other endings and permutations afterwards.
But also, I think, on a more general level, the way especially achievement hunting and that sort of approach, 100%-ing, turns games from artworks into checklists. Even though I’ve never been a platinum hunter, I’ve definitely had experiences where I’ve let myself wear myself out on a game by trying to be too completionist. But maybe Titanium Court has taught me to be comfortable with leaving a few more stones unturned.
I decided to replay Risen, a classic german rpg from the creators of Gothic and a childhood favorite of mine.
