Video Games

[Whizzinby]

What platform?

I'm on the PC and added a fast travel mod. Much better.

Xbox

 

[Mongillo19]

Yes, but I understand they made quite a few changes, too? I've never played the original, so I guess it's neither here nor there.

Yup! Seems to be a remake. Just wasn't sure if you were aware because I'm sure at its core it'll still be an older game that I'm curious to see if it aged well. I've heard it's about 10-15 hours long which I'm all for.

Sucks that games these days need to be 30+ minimum

 

[mbenigni]

61% through RDR2. Game has lost the plot after the island hopping diversion. Back in St Denis the second time now and I hate everyone in the gang. Arthur deserves a brutal death for not running off with Mary, and being Dutch’s bitch. This “let’s continually follow Dutch, who’s done nothing but make horrible decisions while being an obnoxious blowhard” storyline is making me root against everyone. The only person I half like is Sadie Adler, because she is the only one with a set of balls (figuratively) that doesn’t act like a sniffling weasel.

I’m also at the stare at the back of a horses ass for twenty minutes to get anywhere phase of the game. The fast travel function doesn’t really help because the problem isn’t getting from one city to the next, since you only having missions surrounding one city at a time generally. I rode 15 minutes to the docks to have a dude tell me to ride 15 minutes in the opposite direction to meet someone. FUCK YOU I’m going to play blackjack, you’re on your own writing that book, dick.

I told yall meme.

 

[Monkey Man]

@Deadpan good to see you here Brother T!

 

[laxu]

61% through RDR2. Game has lost the plot after the island hopping diversion. Back in St Denis the second time now and I hate everyone in the gang. Arthur deserves a brutal death for not running off with Mary, and being Dutch’s bitch. This “let’s continually follow Dutch, who’s done nothing but make horrible decisions while being an obnoxious blowhard” storyline is making me root against everyone. The only person I half like is Sadie Adler, because she is the only one with a set of balls (figuratively) that doesn’t act like a sniffling weasel.

I’m also at the stare at the back of a horses ass for twenty minutes to get anywhere phase of the game. The fast travel function doesn’t really help because the problem isn’t getting from one city to the next, since you only having missions surrounding one city at a time generally. I rode 15 minutes to the docks to have a dude tell me to ride 15 minutes in the opposite direction to meet someone. FUCK YOU I’m going to play blackjack, you’re on your own writing that book, dick.

I think you are at the stage of the main plot where it starts to really feel "most of the main characters are terrible people". I do think it's worth getting through because it has some good payoffs, but Dutch's "All we need is more time and more money" speech is a meme for good reason.

Otherwise the game is best played as a cowboy simulator. I almost never used the somewhat cumbersome fast travel because I found it enjoyable to ride around the map, especially with all the random encounters to keep it interesting. Cyberpunk was similar for me, drove around everywhere instead of fast traveling.

 

[laxu]

I picked up Dark Souls Remastered for Nintendo Switch yesterday. It's not a great port (30 fps at 720p on a game this old, shitty quality audio) but I wanted something to play during upcoming plane travels.

 

[Deadpan]

@Deadpan good to see you here Brother T!

Same!

Hope all is well this winter. Damn freezing here haha!

 

[Devin]

I'm very close to buying this one. Nintendo sent me a 15% off coupon and if I can figure that out, it should just about push me off the fence. I really loved Paper Mario Thousand Year Door way back when, but for some reason we just never seem to actually use our Switch.

Mario RPG is one of the best games ever made in my opinion. Haven't bought the re-make yet but I've played through the original so many times

DO IT

 

[Devin]

I picked up Dark Souls Remastered for Nintendo Switch yesterday. It's not a great port (30 fps at 720p on a game this old, shitty quality audio) but I wanted something to play during upcoming plane travels.

DSR on Switch is great tbh; it's more like the original game than any of the other Remastered versions


Plus it has a pause button! (the home button)

 

[Devin]

I finally downloaded F-Zero 99 yesterday and holy shit it's so much fun. Addictive as hell

 

[Deadpan]

I always lived the Last of Us and the show was great.

Never picked up part 2 though I wanted to.

With the release of the remastered version I had to. Wow, what a great game.

 

[mbenigni]

Mario RPG is one of the best games ever made in my opinion. Haven't bought the re-make yet but I've played through the original so many times

DO IT

That's what I wanted to hear! That'll be next on my list, then.

I actually circled back to Lies of P last night, and decided to finally commit to the block timing as opposed to relying on my dodge reflex. (I pretty much ignored the "stagger" and "fatal blow" mechanics, because I found the tutorial with the practice dummy to be a little ambiguous.) Anyway, once I started blocking, the first boss was surprisingly easy, and everything up to and including the second boss (where I finally stopped) was as well. I don't love the game yet, but it's a Soulslike, so it's going to keep me busy for a while either way. :)

 

[laxu]

I actually circled back to Lies of P last night, and decided to finally commit to the block timing as opposed to relying on my dodge reflex. (I pretty much ignored the "stagger" and "fatal blow" mechanics, because I found the tutorial with the practice dummy to be a little ambiguous.) Anyway, once I started blocking, the first boss was surprisingly easy, and everything up to and including the second boss (where I finally stopped) was as well. I don't love the game yet, but it's a Soulslike, so it's going to keep me busy for a while either way. :)

I haven't played it yet but my understanding is that the parry mechanics are downright essential in that game.

 

[Whizzinby]

Made it to the Epilogue of RDR2 last night. I am now controlling John in Strawberry. Only shows 80% of the story complete, so I may have a decent chunk left with him before the credits roll.

The story did start to redeem itself some towards the end. I started to give a damn about a couple of the characters. I still think the diversion to Guarma was stupid, and Arthur’s rapid health decline after giving no hint of illness was too abrupt, but they just barely managed to pull it off in a way where I still semi-cared.

Was sort of hoping Arthur would take that mountain chick to pound town before the end, but after riding a horse across the entire map to get there, only for it to be a 15 second story clip “was wondering when I’d see you again… well thanks for everything”. WHAT? I just rode for 30 minutes for that? Go f yourself Rockstar. She could have sent a telegram. I should have put a bullet in her leg for the inconvenience.

That said I am still mildly interested to see how the Epilogue plays out.

 

[laxu]

Finally finished Tears of the Kingdom. Had stopped playing basically right before the final boss mission so didn't take too long. Such a fun game, easily my favorite from 2023.

In a month I'll be looking to play Like A Dragon Gaiden, then probably Alan Wake 2 and maybe after that I might be ready to dive into Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth.

The bad thing about LAD/Yakuza games is that they are basically iterations on the same format with new main and side stories but if you play one, the next one might feel like too much of the same thing.

 

[laxu]

The story did start to redeem itself some towards the end. I started to give a damn about a couple of the characters. I still think the diversion to Guarma was stupid, and Arthur’s rapid health decline after giving no hint of illness was too abrupt, but they just barely managed to pull it off in a way where I still semi-cared.

Yeah the Guarma section seems weirdly unnecessary overall. I have no idea why it's in the game at all.

I guess the developers intended for you to play the main and side stories longer because if you keep doing side stuff for a longer time after Guarma, the random coughing by Arthur makes it more noticeable.

The game even has the entire RDR1 map built into it, it's just pretty much barren with nothing the player can do even though they can ride there. I wish they had done something with that, or released a RDR1 DLC for RDR2 by now considering the original RDR1 is apparently unportable due to shitty code.

 

[DrewJD82]

Made it to the Epilogue of RDR2 last night. I am now controlling John in Strawberry. Only shows 80% of the story complete, so I may have a decent chunk left with him before the credits roll.

The story did start to redeem itself some towards the end. I started to give a damn about a couple of the characters. I still think the diversion to Guarma was stupid, and Arthur’s rapid health decline after giving no hint of illness was too abrupt, but they just barely managed to pull it off in a way where I still semi-cared.

Was sort of hoping Arthur would take that mountain chick to pound town before the end, but after riding a horse across the entire map to get there, only for it to be a 15 second story clip “was wondering when I’d see you again… well thanks for everything”. WHAT? I just rode for 30 minutes for that? Go f yourself Rockstar. She could have sent a telegram. I should have put a bullet in her leg for the inconvenience.

That said I am still mildly interested to see how the Epilogue plays out.

Keep your interest mild.

 

[DrewJD82]

Yeah the Guarma section seems weirdly unnecessary overall. I have no idea why it's in the game at all.

I guess the developers intended for you to play the main and side stories longer because if you keep doing side stuff for a longer time after Guarma, the random coughing by Arthur makes it more noticeable.

The game even has the entire RDR1 map built into it, it's just pretty much barren with nothing the player can do even though they can ride there. I wish they had done something with that, or released a RDR1 DLC for RDR2 by now considering the original RDR1 is apparently unportable due to shitty code.

I get the idea that Rockstar was running behind on development for RDR2 and like GTA V’s story mode DLC, a lot never materialized. By the time they finished RDR2 they had to have been in full swing for GTA VI and probably didn’t even give a shit that RDR2 had a lukewarm reception because they know they’re going to make billions off GTA VI in the first week alone.

 

[laxu]

I get the idea that Rockstar was running behind on development for RDR2 and like GTA V’s story mode DLC, a lot never materialized. By the time they finished RDR2 they had to have been in full swing for GTA VI and probably didn’t even give a shit that RDR2 had a lukewarm reception because they know they’re going to make billions off GTA VI in the first week alone.

Apparently they put their effort into RDR2 Online instead. Which kinda cratered because nicer horses and whatnot is not exactly like spending real money on virtual supercars in GTA Online, is it?

RDR2 deserved at least a Sadie Adler DLC. I wish Rockstar stopped fucking over singleplayer fans and PC gamers with their nonsense. They should pivot GTA to its own online service and leave GTA VI as a pure singleplayer game.

 

[DrewJD82]

Apparently they put their effort into RDR2 Online instead. Which kinda cratered because nicer horses and whatnot is not exactly like spending real money on virtual supercars in GTA Online, is it?

RDR2 deserved at least a Sadie Adler DLC. I wish Rockstar stopped fucking over singleplayer fans and PC gamers with their nonsense. They should pivot GTA to its own online service and leave GTA VI as a pure singleplayer game.

Uh, well then they HEAVILY dropped the bal….er, took the ball and threw it down a mountain, with the RDR2 Online because that shit was BARREN when it first came online.

I was more excited for that than I was the story because I was such a GTAO fan. It took a few weeks (months?) for them get it online and when they did it was really lackluster. That game really had to rely on Rockstar making things to do because the map didn’t allow for the same kind of fun you could get into on GTAO’s map. You can ride a horse around, at most you can steal a train that stays on one track before you eventually die by the law. Not exactly as thrilling as stealing a jet from a military base and then using that jet to piss off griefers or kids on hot mic’s.

I have nearly a full year of game play on GTAO, I have maybe 20 hours at the most on RDR2O.