Whatcha Been Playing?

[Alex79]

I picked up Gran Turismo 7 for the PS5 in a sale recently. Now, I've been a huge fan of the series since day one and have played the death out of every single entry, except GT Sport.

Oh boy, they really make it difficult to love this game. It is utterly maddening. What's all this bullshit with the cafe and menus and a world map? What an absolutely baffling structure to the game. I want a list of events that I can enter, car dealerships and a tuning shop.

There are so many, completely unnecessary barriers to just getting on and playing the game. Want to do the Sunday Cup? Ok. Want to do the next cup? Tough shit, you can do half the races in that cup until you jump through this arbitrary hoop we've put in the way for you. Want to finish a race and get to the next one? Get ready to press X about 15 times to get past all the complete nonsense menus, stat progress trackers and mandatory race replays.

It's crazy. Absolute insanity. The on-track action is fine, but even that is lacking compared to the likes of the most recent Forza Motorsport. Want a racing line? Ok, but it's all one colour and doesn't indicate where you need to brake. Oh no, instead we've got MASSIVE glowing strips on the entire track, urging you to brake for corners. It's horrible to look at. I don't usually use the racing line feature to be honest, so I'll turn that off as soon as I can work out how.

I do not know who this game is for. It has surely pissed off seasoned veterans of the series, and is impenetrably obtuse for newcomers. What an absolute mess.

I'm hoping it gets better. Somehow.

[Alex79]

Actually, it did get better. I like it now.



(It's a lot better game with all the assists off and a clean screen for driving without the HUD clutter).

[Truk_Kurt]

Actually, it did get better. I like it now.



(It's a lot better game with all the assists off and a clean screen for driving without the HUD clutter).

I've been waiting on a sale on this for a while either digitally or physically but never seen one. I bet it's no longer on sale now

[Truk_Kurt]

Picked up Balatro on Saturday morning, I have not put it down ever since
It gives me the same feelings I got from Into the Breach in that is has that one more run mindset behind it. And whilst they're different gameplay types, I do think there are some similarities with like how the different squads and their abilities is similar to the different decks and their abilities. I can see this being a GOTY contender.

[Alex79]

Actually, it did get better. I like it now.



(It's a lot better game with all the assists off and a clean screen for driving without the HUD clutter).

I've been waiting on a sale on this for a while either digitally or physically but never seen one. I bet it's no longer on sale now

It was a couple of weeks ago, was between £30-36 everywhere physically. I got it from Argos for £35 but seems to be back up to £60 now. If I see it on sale again I'll let you know.

[Alex79]

Picked up Balatro on Saturday morning...I can see this being a GOTY contender.

Well it's an indie game they've all played so it's 100% dead cert for the TCGS game of the year

[Truk_Kurt]

Actually, it did get better. I like it now.



(It's a lot better game with all the assists off and a clean screen for driving without the HUD clutter).

I've been waiting on a sale on this for a while either digitally or physically but never seen one. I bet it's no longer on sale now

It was a couple of weeks ago, was between £30-36 everywhere physically. I got it from Argos for £35 but seems to be back up to £60 now. If I see it on sale again I'll let you know.

cheers

[Jobobonobo]

Finally beat the Elite Four in Pokemon Radical Red. It took a lot of strategizing and coming in with the right held items and moveset but after many weeks I got into the Hall of Fame! But I am not fully done with this game yet, there is some postgame content I want to do. You can head to a new location in this ROM hack called the Sevii Islands where there is more rare Pokemon to catch and tougher trainers to take on. This game is hard as hell but I love it so much and want to get at least some of my monsters to level 100 before I consider myself fully done with this endeavour. It really shows what a complex gameplay system Pokemon can produce when you tweak with the base formula.

Also been playing Pac-Man World: Re-Pac. Remember playing the original on PS1 many years ago but only as a demo. It was pretty enjoyable and always wanted to return to it at some point. And while it is not groundbreaking this is a really solid little platformer. Collecting the fruits, keys and PACMAN letters is fun and all the little nods to the history of the character are endearing. The mazes are also just a pleasant way to pass the time. The villain is pretty unnerving to look at though, a horrible robotic abomination with massive teeth. I could imagine this thing traumatizing me as a small child!

[Jobobonobo]

I went back and did some of the Guardian Trials in New Super Lucky’s Tale and while it is not too hard it is definitely a step up in difficulty from the rest of the game. Did not have time to finish this game up properly early this year so now that I have a bit more free time it was nice to clear up some good content that I missed out on.

[Alex79]

Hadn't played on my Xbox for months because of getting a PS5 at Christmas and that being plugged in downstairs instead, but had a bit of a move around yesterday and put the Xbox in our bedroom and whilst the kids were playing Fortnite on a PS5 and PS4 in the living room and their bedroom respectively, I spent a couple of hours back on Elden Ring, which I've not played for ages.

Found myself in the royal capital, and ended up beating two bosses there (first one took two attempts, second one I did first time!) I'm now meant to be heading towards the land of the giants or somewhere like that, the snowy place, no idea how to get there though! An icon has appeared on my map but I can't seem to navigate to it. I also found the Colosseum but don't have Xbox live so couldn't do anything with it.

[Caligulas Horse]

Hadn't played on my Xbox for months because of getting a PS5 at Christmas and that being plugged in downstairs instead, but had a bit of a move around yesterday and put the Xbox in our bedroom and whilst the kids were playing Fortnite on a PS5 and PS4 in the living room and their bedroom respectively, I spent a couple of hours back on Elden Ring, which I've not played for ages.

Found myself in the royal capital, and ended up beating two bosses there (first one took two attempts, second one I did first time!) I'm now meant to be heading towards the land of the giants or somewhere like that, the snowy place, no idea how to get there though! An icon has appeared on my map but I can't seem to navigate to it. I also found the Colosseum but don't have Xbox live so couldn't do anything with it.

Nice on the bosses! I wasn't sure if you wanted to know where to go or wanted to just figure it out, so put it in spoilers below:

Spoiler: show

Fast-travel to the Avenue Balcony Site of Grace, go up the stairs and take a left. Follow the road until you reach a big set of doors and go through. From there it's a pretty straight forward path to the lift

[Alex79]

Hadn't played on my Xbox for months because of getting a PS5 at Christmas and that being plugged in downstairs instead, but had a bit of a move around yesterday and put the Xbox in our bedroom and whilst the kids were playing Fortnite on a PS5 and PS4 in the living room and their bedroom respectively, I spent a couple of hours back on Elden Ring, which I've not played for ages.

Found myself in the royal capital, and ended up beating two bosses there (first one took two attempts, second one I did first time!) I'm now meant to be heading towards the land of the giants or somewhere like that, the snowy place, no idea how to get there though! An icon has appeared on my map but I can't seem to navigate to it. I also found the Colosseum but don't have Xbox live so couldn't do anything with it.

Nice on the bosses! I wasn't sure if you wanted to know where to go or wanted to just figure it out, so put it in spoilers below:

Spoiler: show

Fast-travel to the Avenue Balcony Site of Grace, go up the stairs and take a left. Follow the road until you reach a big set of doors and go through. From there it's a pretty straight forward path to the lift

Thanks I did find the lift and made it to the Mountaintops Of The Giants. Just kinda running around in the snow at the moment. I beat a boss but I'm not sure who it was, not an important one as it just said "Enemy Felled". There's a big frozen lake and it gets real misty round there. I'm trying to head towards a big castle type thing but it's at the bottom of the cliff and I can't get down there!

[K1tsnats]

Currently playing Final Fantasy Rebirth. I'm about to head into the Gold Saucer area but I need to finish up the Queens Blood competitions in Barrett's hometown. I'm also a diehard OW2 player ever since it came out in 2016.

[Alabastermage]

Been playing Satisfactory with my friends. I guess most of you should know it. It's a resource management, builder-style game. Games like this aren't action-packed, so don't expect fighting bosses. But still, it's relaxing while keeping your brain engaged. 
Just beware, if you'll play it and you'll like it, it's better to rent a private server. Take my word for it, the official ones are laggy and frustrating to play on. We're renting one from supercraft.host for $8. It's not much, but it's totally worth it because the speed is stable, and you can play whenever you want.

[Alex79]

I just started The Talos Principle again (was about 8 hours in before) on Switch because I really wanted to play something puzzle like and relaxing like The Witness, but that's not available on Switch and I hardly ever get to play on my big consoles any more!

[Jobobonobo]

Tried out the demo for Sand Land. It just dumps you in a giant desert with no direction on where to go and what to do so I just went around killing enemies and speeding around in vehicles. Motorbike is nice and nippy but shooting with it is an absolute nightmare. The mech is a lot more fun to use for combat with its variety of weapons and punches and I also liked that it looks like Robo from Chrono Trigger. However, overall I was fairly sour on this. Your characters never shut up and repeat the same dialogue constantly. So much of the map is not accessible and when I thought I was making progress in a temple there were dead ends everywhere so exploration was a big waste of time. After that, I deleted it. I did not really get on with this and only marginally enjoyed the mech combat and motorbike speeding. But nothing else grabbed me about Sand Land at all. Never read the manga so had no attachment to the world or characters beforehand, this demo did not convince me to give it any more attention. Looks nice at least, Toriyama's artstyle really lends itself well to games. Curious to see what future installments of Dragon Quest will look like after his passing.

[BearFishPie]

Just finished playing through XCOM 2 for the first time (on Switch). I've owned it for at least a couple of years, and absolutely loved its direct predecessor, UFO: Enemy Unknown on the Amiga and Laser Squad on the Speccy I'd been feeling rather intimidated by it.

Although I got off to a terrible start, playing pretty well at the tactical skirmish level but royally screwing myself over in the strategic portion of the game I ultimately ended up completely hooked, and having an absolute blast with it. I can feel the draw to go back in with War of the Chosen, but have instead opted for a bit of a change of pace with The Forgotten City on Steam Deck.

[Alex79]

Just finished playing through XCOM 2 for the first time (on Switch). I've owned it for at least a couple of years, and absolutely loved its direct predecessor, UFO: Enemy Unknown on the Amiga and Laser Squad on the Speccy I'd been feeling rather intimidated by it.

Although I got off to a terrible start, playing pretty well at the tactical skirmish level but royally screwing myself over in the strategic portion of the game I ultimately ended up completely hooked, and having an absolute blast with it. I can feel the draw to go back in with War of the Chosen, but have instead opted for a bit of a change of pace with The Forgotten City on Steam Deck.

X-com 2 was probably my favourite game the year I played it, and I'm really not in to tactical games at all. I thought it was incredible. Also played on Switch and played the base game and then the War Of The Chosen straight after each other, about 100 hours all together!

[Truk_Kurt]

Midnight Fight Express has been on my steam wishlist for a while but after recently signing up to ps plus, I noticed it was on there so gave it a go.
I was expecting something like a mix between SIFU and Arkham combat, but I came away disappointed. The game is focused on combat but the combat just felt imprecise to me. It wasn't really clear to me how to read enemies actions and how to counter them effectively. It ended up being a bit too button mashy which wasn't particularly satisfying to play in a game where the focus is on combat.

[Jobobonobo]

After three weeks or so, finally finished up the surprisingly lengthy demo for SaGa: Emerald Beyond. I never played a SaGa game before so thought I would try this new release. I was a little intimidated trying it out as the SaGa games do have a reputation for being somewhat obtuse and convoluted to new players. I was pleasantly surprised when I found myself really getting into it. The battle system with its focus on where your party members are positioned on a timeline and how it effects combos and turn order can take a bit of getting used to but once I got the hang of it, I was really enjoying myself. The constant equipment upgrades and trials which reward you for performing certain actions are a really fun and moreish feedback loop. The leveling system is a bit strange too with only relevant stats being leveled depending on how your character performed in battle (for example, getting hit a lot increases your defense). I heard many Final Fantasy fans decry this system when it debuted in FFII but here I found it perfectly fine. The fact that each battle is completely relevant to whatever mission you are on means that grinding is completely removed from the game and even if you are dying constantly, re-configuring your equipment, stats and battle formation can really put the odds in your favour.

Another thing I really liked was how open the game is, by making certain choices through your playthrough you can unlock completely different story paths and I replayed certain parts over and over so i can see all the different paths you can do in one world. The simple overworld where you can move over the map like a figurine on a board game was actually quite refreshing from traversing a huge world map and since you always know your next objective you never waste time getting lost. JRPGs especially these days really focus on massive worlds where you spend ages getting into constant battles and sometimes it makes them really monotonous to get through but the simple to the point way of navigation here makes Emerald Beyond a breath of fresh air among its contemporaries.

My only complaints are petty but I still feel like airing them out so I will. The music while generally good (I love the jazzy overworld score in particular) can sometimes be utilised in ways that don't make sense in context. For example, I meet up with this witch and this sinister foreboding music is playing so I'm thinking "Uh oh, trouble's afoot." But it turns out she wants to help you on your quest so she insists another witch who was accompanying me joins me on my journey and wishes us luck on our adventure. So I get a new party member and am fully supported by this character but this creepy music is playing suggesting something awful is going to happen. And it never does. Maybe in the full game, it is revealed that she was some Machiavellian schemer plotting my downfall from the very beginning but somehow I don't think so as she gave off no vibes other than the music playing that she was bad. This happens often where spooky music is playing over otherwise mundane events and it just makes me wonder did they not think to put something more relevant playing during these scenes. It is not a big thing really but it is the one element of the game that came off as a bit half arsed which is a shame because I liked everything else about it. Well there is one other thing, I'm not a fan of some of the localisation in the script. Often your character will use saccharine internet lingo like "hecking" and I roll my eyes whenever stuff like that comes up. I never understand how talking like Ned Flanders became part of modern day internet speak but that is just my late 30s millennial grouchiness kicking in I suppose. Very small thing but it annoyed me enough to ding this otherwise quite enjoyable title a point or two.

Overall though, for my first time with a SaGa game it was not nearly as painful as I was expecting and has interested me enough that I might try the full game sometime in the future when I don't have such a mental backlog to deal with.