Hey y’all, what have you been playing?
I have been playing quite a bit of lies of p, and I started cocoon as well. Both super solid games. I’m getting my PC back tomorrow so I think I’m going to finally start Alan wake 2 as well!
We bought Palworld yesterday, probably play that most of the week. It mashes up a lot of games and has some nice QoL updates from similar games (like Ark)
I just finished Portal Revolution. Puzzles were high quality. Story, script and voice acting was meh. Now I’m playing Outriders, which I bought during the winter sale. Super mid game, very formulaic gameplay. Story and visuals are kinda cool.
I’m playing through portal rev now. Every time I finish a section of traveling I feel like I’m a genius solving all the little 2 or 3 step puzzles. Then the path opens up into one of the huge puzzle rooms and I’m like shit where do I even start this looks impossible.
I’m getting through it all and enjoying the journey.
Picked up Palworld and started it today. It is pretty fun and, as long as they patch it and support it, it could be a fantastic time waster.
I’m about to play Ico and Elder Scrolls Online
Ico is such a wonderful game. I wish I could play it again for the first time.
Ico and Shadow of the Colossus are two of my favorites. I even loved The Last Guardian, in spite of its flaws.
Shadow of the colossus is in my top 10. I just beat last guardian after playing for like 2 years. Struggled getting into it but the other day i decided to power through to the end and i absolutely loved the end. I have high hopes for ico
I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. It has a deeper story than Shadow of the Colossus, but the combat hook in SotC is just soooooo good.
The Last Guardian just needed another 3-6 months of tightening up, I think. But if they waited much longer they would have missed the PS4 entirely.
Sill playing Aurora. Missle combat is very different and it took a while to learn. I’m hitting my stride now I feel.
Also in the middle of Citizen Sleeper. An RPG where you’re playing a transhuman cyborg traped on a space station. It’s been interesting. I would compare it to Disco Elysium. That title obviously had a better budget but Sleeper holds up well.
Picked up Another Code Recollection. Never played the original on the 3DS, and I’m really enjoying it.
I’ve been playing Red Dead Redemption (the first one) and I’m enjoying it a lot. I’ve decided to play without the on-screen map and it does wonders for immersion, recognizing areas, locations, where people are, etc. I highly recommend it!
I really like that in RDR2 you can disable the mini map and replace it with a plain compass. It has the added feature that you can briefly show the mini map again if you need to get your bearings, and it disappears after a short delay. Definitely helps with the immersion.
I remember being very unimpressed with RDR, though that could be because I rushed through it the week before the sequel came out. In my experience rushing through a game like that ruins the experience completely.
What is it you enjoy most? Open cowboy world or the story or something else? Might have to go back to it (and actually finish the sequel lol)
Well I’m not a huge gamer, specially since I have a kid, but I was expecting GTA with horses, but I’m enjoying it a lot (I don’t really like GTA) anh I had not played this game, since I never had a console, but it came out for switch and I went for it. I’m not going to try to sell it to you. The no-map immersion is a big factor, I guess, which is new for me!
Well I’m glad you’re enjoying it!
I might just try that someday. The idea is intimidating but sounds like a new level of fun. Have to try to emulate it on PC though
Emulate the Switch version. It works far better than trying to the get the PS3 version to run.
If you like the idea of playing a large open world game without a minimap, I can also highly recommend the first two Gothic games, Gothic II in particular. Maps for this game can only be bought, found or stolen and they don’t show your position. Since every location is hand-crafted and unique, you won’t actually miss having a minimap. Even two decades later, these titles still wipe the floor with most open world games in terms of world design.
My time I’d normally use for gaming has gone in to starting to learn FreeCAD, which I guess I could argue is an open world builder game.
If i’m not sim racing, its BattleBit, Noita or Baldur’s Gate. Lots of fun!@
Currently into Triangle Strategy’s New Game+. I’m enjoying that game way more than I thought I would. It’s a fun, charming successor to the strategy JRPG. It has few tropes and the mechanics have been streamlined while maintaining challenge. Surprisingly low magic as well. I mean there are plenty of magic users, but no monster, no supernatural armageddon and the end game is not “kill god”. It does have that peculiar JPRG theatricality, so you need to be fine with that.
I’ve been playing a ton of Pillars of Eternity still. I think I can wrap up Kana’s quest before I head into Act 3. I’ve got a lot of irons in the fire of my quest log that look like I need to advance the plot or level up more to finish them, so Act 3 is maybe when they intended for me to finish those.
I’m currently playing V Rising with a friend on a private server. I like survival games but I hate PvP, raiding and griefers. So far it’s pretty good fun! Like a mix between a Diablo-like ARPG and something like Valheim. You don’t need to grind resources so much, you collect plenty just playing. The focus is more on combat. Some bosses are pretty tough and progress is gated behind them.
I just finished Spider-Man Miles Morales. So I’m gonna be starting Spider-Man 2 soon.
Still mainly Diablo 4, but a lot less this week. I finished my seasonal goals faster than I thought, and have been slowly mopping up some of the stuff that’s season independent. I filled out the map, found the Altars (3/4 by myself the rest with a guide), and also did all the dungeons to unlock the legendary aspects, but I guess those reset, and you have to do them again in the new season (or just the ones you’re interested in).
Then I also did more Soulstone Survivors runs. So far I’ve been mainly playing as the default class, the barbarian, and unlocking everything for him. There’s so much stuff, and then do a lot more for all the other classes as well. It’s fun, though still lacks a bit of variety, mainly in the levels.
My son and I are like 95% done the end-game content in the Super Mario RPG remake, only Culex 3D remains! It’s been a total blast. My biggest struggle is finding more games like this.
We’ve loved all the Paper Mario games we’ve been able to play (original, Super, TYD, and Origami King…. unless I’m forgetting one), but trying out miscellaneous JRPGs hasn’t had any success with him yet. He’s too young for a lot of games, but seeing things from that pre-tween point of view I also feel like we all could do with more games that aren’t fueled by adolescent angst or grim brooding. Bright, fun adventure on a foundation of silliness paired with great music is such a good recipe.
Have you played Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling yet?
We tried it once, but it didn’t grab my son’s interest at the outset. I’m going to have us try again as I’ve heard nothing but praise for it.
The Mario & Luigi games are similarly approachable and good RPGs, Superstar Saga (the first one) especially. They are handheld games so maybe a bit more difficult to play together with someone, though you could emulate them very easily to play on a more suitable device.
Sea of Stars also might be worth a try. Takes a lot of inspiration from Paper Mario.
