The "What Are You Playing Now?" Thread

[Nerkahia]

Playing Last of Us Part 1 on Steam now. There have been lots of horrible, horrible reviews. And honestly, it did take my rig about an hour and 15 minutes to initially build shaders. But gameplay itself is going pretty smoothly so far.

[Wool]

I heard about that and was kind of surprised. I thought Sony had been doing well on the PC ports so far. Maybe the strict deadline of coinciding with the HBO show hurt more than it helped.

There might be some confirmation bias here, but it sort of seems to me like troubled PC ports are becoming more common in general lately. It seems like every other game has some sort of stability issue that consoles didn't have. I have at least one diehard PC friend that finally just got a PS5 rather than deal with it (although FF16 didn't hurt).


P.S. Been playing Rogue Legacy 2 a lot recently, it's very good. I've also been playing a lot of rentals lately. At first I did it just to try a few things I wasn't sure about, but I keep forgetting to unsubscribe so I've gone through a lot by this point. Bayonetta 2+3, Hitman 3, Judgement, etc.

[Nerkahia]

I dunno; could be true. I haven't had that experience though. I just finished about three 100% campaigns of God of War on PC with absolutely zero issues. Last of Us is playing flawlessly. And before that, Red Dead Redemption 2 rocked.

*shrugs*

[FilanFyretracker]

Now its off to LA, looking a bit worse for wear and I guess she wont be recording that hit album any time soon.

[Nerkahia]

I'm playing the third and final Dishonored game and enjoying. I picked it up on Steam for $5.99 lol.

[Wool]

Finished Rogue Legacy but washed out on all the New Game + stuff. Mostly because I got an urge to play some Civilization and got a little obsessed. I finally tore myself away to make use of my Game Pass sub and tried Humankind a bit. It's a 4X game like Civ, except each era you pick a different Culture with its own bonuses instead of once at the beginning. It's pretty neat but I'm not sure it's balanced. Once I figured out how to play (a bit tough) I started snowballing pretty hard.

[Wool]

I spent this past month playing all the mainline Metroid games for the first time, from the NES to the Switch, and had a great time. Super Metroid was the only that really impressed me, but it was cool to see how the series evolved.

These games are really short so I played a bunch of stuff on Game Pass too, but the Metroid playthough was the one interesting enough to post about.

[Delores Mulva]

Hearthstone. It had been nine expansions since I'd played, I'd been doing the Twitch Drops thing whenever I saw it pop up, so figured I'd see how much was sitting there. I was up to close to 150 packs, had a pile of gold and dust sitting around too. Turns out they added a PvE content item (Mercenaries) and achievements since I'd last played. I'm planning to keep at it until I'm done with the story questline for Mercenaries, doing the quests for other content as they pop up and re-rolling anything that requires winning. The other game modes (battlegrounds, constructed) are still as bad as I remember them being, so "just here until I'm done with PvE stuff" should not be a hard promise to keep.

[Bonlainy]

I know this is pretty old school, but I am replaying HOMM V and its expansions. I saw it on GOG recently for almost nothing and decided to give it a go again. I'm definitely enjoying it, I always loved the strategy and turn based nature. The graphics are obviously not great but they aren't that bad for an almost 20-year-old game.

I'm also going to be getting the new Baldur's Gate soon as well, I loved the original ones, and the good things I am reading here and other places has me excited to try it.

[Wool]

I remember playing HOMM V a long time ago and enjoyed it. Although I think the main game was just way too long, as each faction had a campaign long enough to be it's own game. I really liked the orc expansion though. It was a good length and was more interesting than the base game, I thought.

Hearthstone. It had been nine expansions since I'd played, I'd been doing the Twitch Drops thing whenever I saw it pop up, so figured I'd see how much was sitting there.

I've probably said this before, but Hearthstone is one of those games I really like but also pretend doesn't exist. I had to uninstall it so it would stop hurting me.

This month I've been playing something in the same vein, except it's so small and lightweight that uninstalling it is ineffective. It's only ever a 30 minute download away. FTL. Every couple of years I tend to get the urge to boot it up, fail horribly, then get annoyed and put it away again. I stuck with it this time and have won several times, but man it hurts.

I've also been playing Triangle Strategy on my Switch. Very good game.

[Wool]

Been awhile since I bumped this thread. I think I've mentioned elsewhere that I spent several months playing Tears of the Kingdom. Had a great time.

I also recently finally played Stranger in Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin. That game isn't half as silly as the weird trailers would have you believe. The story is still sort of okay, but I was more impressed with just how much I liked the gameplay. I shouldn't have doubted them as it was the same studio that made Nioh, but people were so mixed about the game that I didn't think I would like it. It was very good.

Basic synopsis: it's an action game with a Final Fantasy job (class) system. You can have two equipped at any one time and switch between them like you would a gear set in other action rpgs. It's got a lot of classic FF jobs like black mage, dragoon, etc. Story ties into the first Final Fantasy, but it's also sort of it's own weird thing.

[Nerkahia]

I finally kinda ran out of stuff to do in Starfield. Not sure how many thousands of hours I've got into it lol. I was trying to stay occupied until the DLC dropped but I haven't seen any evidence it will be any time before fall.

So I played The Outer Worlds. -Pretty fun game but kinda simple and short. The graphics are a little cartoon-ish for my taste but not horribly. I LOVED getting 10 points to spend every level, and a perk to spend every other level. Overall I enjoyed it. I wasn't really sure what to get into next though. Dragon's Dogma II looked interesting to me, but I heard it only has 2 save file slots that really turned me off. (Completionist, min/maxer, etc) I also heard less than stellar reports of the PC optimization. But I couldn't find anything else that interested me so I went ahead and pulled the trigger on it.

I do not regret it in the least. The graphics are spectacular. I would compare it to Witcher 3 and RDR2. I have not experienced any crashes or glitches. Combat is pretty cool. I find myself resting at Inns and quick saving frequently to get around the 2 saves issue. It is a very complicated game IMHO. But interestingly so.

Just as an example, it's recommended you run with a group of 4 in this single player game, so you recruit 3 "pawns" that are AI helpers. But one of the pawns you create and customize and this one stays with you throughout the game. The other two pawns do not level while with you, so you need to keep dismissing them and recruiting two others as you level up. Not only that, but also you can recruit kind of static pawns or player made pawns and those you can receive rewards and rate them lol. You can also recruit pawns higher than your current level for help with difficult encounters, but these cost in game currency. And that's just pawns lol.

The only kinda weird thing to me, is how the game is so complicated yet leveling is totally simplified. You get no points or anything to spend on abilities. On a level up it is just a static upgrade to your stats.

Of course there is an alternate leveling system for your vocation (fighter, mage, archer, thief that can be changed anytime back and forth). You earn discipline XP points for those that you can spend on improved abilities, so... there's that lol.

All in all I'd recommend it, despite being very early on. It's kinda cool because there is hardly any online guides, or walk-throughs, or tips for this yet because it's so new. Folks are saying people are still too busy playing the game to write up guides lol. So, flying blind but enjoying!

[Wool]

I would argue that the limited save slots is integral to the way the flow of the game works for the same reason why fast travel is so limited. It's probably also necessary for the pawn system to work.

Similarly, I would caution you to not get hung up on completionism with quests either. If it's anything like the first game, npc quest arcs coincide with the main story progression and will fail/advance on their own if you don't complete them in time. That's assuming you even find them. You aren't expected to do them all in one playthrough.

What sucks though is only ever being able to have one character. While you can always just change classes at any time, doing so on a fresh character feels very different than doing so on an already beefy character. I got around this limitation by buying the original on multiple platforms. Not doing that with a $70 game though!


Incidentally that's what I've been playing these past two months since I don't have anything powerful enough to run the sequel. I already had it on PS4 but got it on Switch and PC too so I could try different kinds of characters. The game isn't very long but I had never played the expansion content before so am only halfway through overall.

[Delores Mulva]

Wool, good news in your quest to not play Hearthstone. They just tripled the requirements of the weekly quests, but only increased the rewards by 20-30%. Between that and the current metagame (many decks are "kill everything that hits the board until my unstoppable OTK is drawn"), people are heading out the door in droves. Guess this won't increase "engagement" like they wanted!

[Wool]

It's funny that you say that, as a month or so ago I almost started playing again, having forgotten why I (apparently?) hate that game so much. I was messing around with Warcraft Rumble* and as these things tend to do it made me want to play more Warcraft stuff. "I bet I still have Hearthstone installed," I think. But I kept getting an error and couldn't get it to run, so I uninstalled it for real and haven't bothered to try it again since. Phew, that was a close one!


*It's just as trashy as any other mobile game by the way. I tried it anyway because I like Warcraft and the in-game models are cute, but blech at this game balancing designed to leech a constant stream of microtransactions from players. It's gross. I will say the interface is better than most, however, and I like the way you can customize and upgrade your armies. Too bad it takes weeks of grinding to upgrade a single unit unless you want to pay up though. Just gross.

[Nerkahia]

I'm in ng+ Dragons Dogma II and loving it. I may go ng2 before settling with the intended ending. But I JUST learned the most awesome news! God of War Ragnarok is coming to PC!!! In September!!! Can't wait!!!



https://blog.playstation.com/2024/05...-coming-to-pc/

[Wool]

I've finally had my fill of Dragon's Dogma myself (the first game). I've been trying to motivate myself into playing Eiyuden Chronicle from a couple months ago, but I've mostly been messing around with smaller games. Finally got around to trying Pentiment, it was pretty neat.

What's been your favorite vocation/class from Dragon's Dogma so far?

[Nerkahia]

What's been your favorite vocation/class from Dragon's Dogma so far?

I'm pretty hooked on Magick Archer. -Which is actually pretty different from classes I typically play.

But what I actually do is play Warfarer, which is kinda OP. You can wear any class armor you wish. You earn xp in every vocation simultaneously. But the best part (or most OP part? lol) is I can run around as a magick archer spec, but when needed can swap out for a mage staff for heals or levitate lol. Pretty cool.

The secret endgame, the Unmoored world is spectacular. Dragons, Minotaurs, Chimeras, Griffons, etc combat is really, really impressive.

[Delores Mulva]

Something for former WoW players who may want to scratch an itch: right now there's an event on, Remix: Mists of Pandaria. It lasts for about 80 more days, and is a completely contained 10-70 experience. You make a character, it starts at 10, and you level through MoP and only MoP. Details:

https://worldofwarcraft.blizzard.com...ts-of-pandaria

The TL;DR on why I mention this: trial accounts can do this, up until level 20. Any old account with no game time on it counts as a trial account. The rewards you can buy off vendors in this thing include every toy that drops somewhere in MoP (including the ultra-rare one off the snails in Throne of Thunder) and 40-odd mounts. The mounts are both new mounts (almost all recolours) and mounts that drop off MoP mobs. Huolon mount? The star-filled dragon mount? Yup, all available. And you will likely be able to buy at least any one thing you want. At level 20, the daily scenario quest alone gives 500 Bronze (the event currency), and the cheapest mounts are 2200 bronze, with the most expensive being 38500 bronze. Any stuff you buy in the event stays with your account, even if you're just doing it as a trial.

Because of how scaling works and how you continue to gain stats beyond just gear stats, those level 20 capped characters can become stupidly powerful. I was in a scenario with one guy who was one-shotting entire packs, without taking any noticeable damage, and running at close to mount speed (run speed is one of the stats you can boost). It's intended that, by the end of the event, players will be soloing raids. A 20 won't be doing that - the first raid opens up at 25 - but there's five dungeons you can do at 20, and eight scenarios, and three of the MoP zones. You even keep the character after the event, with reasonable gear given to it to replace the event-only gear. I'm using how quickly you level in this to get all the allied races to 70 for the "level an allied race to 50" achievements (confirmed by devs that this counts and will trigger the achievement once they move to Live at event end).

[MichelOnGraffe]

Currently really enjoying Diablo 4, aside form couple of anoying things it's a great game