Escape from Tarkov PvE.
It’s so much fun to not be head/eyes’d from fucking nowhere by a random PMC. The bots are a little dumb, but the risk/reward for bot PMCs and Bosses is still there, for sure.
I bounced off of PvP Tarkov for years just trying to play with my friends, and now I’m finally having fun with it!
I’ve been playing a little bit of final fantasy tactics on the PS1 on my little RG34XX (The GBA looking one)
The Great Ace Attorney! Just finished the third adventure. I’m a huge fan of the original trilogy and was skeptical this would measure up, but it’s been a brilliant evolution of the series so far.
Baldur’s Gate 3 for me. Played for around 70 hours after the launch, recently started fresh after the final updates. What a game!
Going with entirely new team, first time I’ve played as custom Druid with Shadowheart, Karlach and Gale as the good guy, this time I’m going more chaotic with my Gnome Bard featuring Lae’zel, Astarion and Wyll.
I’ve been playing through Drayano’s Storm Silver, a rom hack of Soul Silver. It adds a bunch of pokemon and fixes the levelling curve while making it a little more difficult.
Best way to play IMO
For the first week in almost a month I’m taking a break from Blue Prince. I’m still enamored with it and am watching a couple or let’s plays of it still, but I’m now at the very end-endgame and I have probably only the final puzzle left and I’m stumped. My brain is fried and I’m taking a breather and hoping my sister and her fiancé catch up to me so we can all have a crack at the last puzzle together potentially.
In the meantime I’m continuing my extremely impatient gaming by jumping on Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. I promise I will get back to my backlog soon and do this sub justice. I have F.E.A.R. installed and everything.
Anyway, Clair Obscur is amazingly good. Actually worth paying full price for and I don’t mind supporting small developers either. Could this be the best AA game of all time? I honestly can’t believe a small studio pulled this off. The gameplay feels like a fresh take on turn based while still giving Souls-like satisfaction at beating a tough boss. The story has been stellar so far and the voice acting is phenomenal. I’m playing with French VAs because it just feels right for this game and this setting. If you don’t mind reading subtitles I highly recommend it, the french voices are fantastic and Maelle in particular is stealing the show. I actually prefer her to the English one.
blue prince frustrates me so much because it just won’t let me play. people keep saying you can bypass the rng with things you find but the game still has to let you find the things. it took me almost 40 days to first roll credits despite getting the initial basement stuff done on day 16 because i just keep. getting. shafted.
i have pages and pages of notes and nowhere to use them.
I had the same issue in the late game of Blue Prince.
The RNG is pretty fun at first but it quickly becomes frustrating when you have specific layouts in your mind. You gain some control but not enough to make it fun to restart over and over again until you don’t get shafted.
My solution was simple: I cheated. I gave myself infinite dice and rerolled the rooms until I got the layout I was looking for. Much more enjoyable that way.
You do get RNG control eventually, but like everything in Blue Prince it’s locked behind a puzzle. Well, that and certain room upgrades like taking any upgrade that gives you +2 Dice.
spoiler
Have you gotten to the bottom of the sheet music you can find around the house? That’s what you want to investigate otherwise.
It takes some time, but you have tools to mould the house however you want. However, RNG is definitely a factor there is no denying that. In the beginning though I didn’t mind so much as there are so many mysteries to investigate that no run ever feels “dead” - you always learn something or progress somewhere. It’s mostly towards the end where it can get frustrating as you’re looking for for example specific room combinations, but as I said - by then you have the tools to control it somewhat.
I also never really got frustrated because there is no time limit and no penalty to calling it a day. If a run doesn’t work out it’s so quick and easy to just go again.
i think the main thing that’s lacking in discussions is the acknowledgement that by its very nature people are going to have very different experiences. one thing i thought of was that the game should probably not be described as a “roguelike puzzle game” but as “a roguelike game and a puzzle game” just like how cult of the lamb is “a roguelike game and a management game”. they are the sum of their parts, not greater.
as for things i have done so far...
- orchard
- tomb to catacomb
- sheet music dig spot
- 3/4 braziers
- paintings, and
- 2/8 safes (the date format is too vague for me to be interested in trying the permutations)
- tunnel
- 2/8 classrooms (i never get more)
- fountain to basement
- foundation to basement (it’s at rank 4 because fun fact, while the entry on the foundation says it’s “permanent”, the blueprint itself says “doesn’t change”, which i interpreted to be a different wording on purpose)
- dig spot in basement (can’t remember the room, haven’t seen it since)
- hall of mirrors (can’t remember if there was something permanent in there
things i know i have not done:
- shelter radiation thing (i have created 12 experiments and finished 1 because i never get the items required)
- anything involving steam pipes (rng)
- periodic table (didn’t feel like it at the time)
- candles in tomb (have only gotten all prerequisites once)
- candle room in mine (same as above)
- chess (have coords of all pieces, can’t enter anywhere)
- anything involving money (no experiments = no quick allowance raises, i’m at 4)
- VAC (can solve, no idea what it does)
- classrooms (rng)
- server room? (never seen, got servants quarters on day 40)
- gallery? (never seen, saw name on wiki)
- anything story-related whatsoever
- probably more i can’t remember
- more volumes of drafting strategy (i’ve never seen the bookshop)
it just feels like i keep having to fight to find things. it’s more frustrating than anything. and the worst part is that hints are usually useless because even when you know you still have to roll the dice.
Well, it looks like you have a pretty solid list of tasks to work on. Have you been back to room 46? That should be on your list as well.
spoiler
You already have the Conservatory so that will be your main source of RNG control. I always hard roll for it on the corners if I have rerolls and have gotten into the habit of calling it a day in there if I have Blessing of the Monk active to guarantee it next run.
Also if you’re terribly unhappy with your Foundation placement there is a very roundabout way to move it, also involving Blessing of the Monk.
no, it was such a tedious task that i don’t want to go through it again. i dropped the game after credits. maybe i’ll pick in up again in the future but right now all i associate with it is annoyance.
i’ve never seen the conservatory while drafting either, i’ve had it for 20 days and never pulled it.
Conservatory can only be drafted on the corners of the manor, and it’s an Unusual room I believe. Helps trying to put stuff like Solarium and Greenhouse on the board before opening a corner room to maximise your chances.
But in the end if you’re not having fun then you’re not having fun. Better play something else then.
never seen solarium either.
ill probably come back to it in a few months on a new save to hopefully tame the rng. i want to solve puzzles, not draw cards, and it seems everyone who praises the game is just luckier than me.
I’ll definitely have to give Clair Obscur a look. Sounds promising!
It’ll be all over the Game Awards this year, I think. It’s sold 2 million copies for a reason. Absolutely gorgeous music too. Heavily recommended!
Swat 4
Hades. I am trying to get all the achievements. Probably going to take me a while.
Tried out Elden Ring randomiser mod, can feel my addiction returning.
Also have been playing Blue Prince on and off. Phenomenal game, but also not easy.
I was considering checking out the randomizer. How well does it run? Are there any performance issues or does it more or less run as well as unmodded Elden Ring?
I haven’t noticed any performance issues and my PC is pretty old. I expected more hassle with installation, but you literally point it at game’s exe file and click 2 buttons.
I’m guessing there might be issues if you uncheck some of the restrictions like matching boss size to arena size, but I haven’t ran into anything on default settings.
I’m playing V Rising for the first time, and doing it solo on brutal mode. I have to say it’s been very challenging, but also quite rewarding, and a ton of fun.
The way they do brutal mode is very cool. It’s not just number-based challenge scaling, but the bosses get a bunch of new mechanics as well.
I took concepts from Factorio and Oxygen not Included and applying them IRL. I bought some pipe and some heat exchanger, I made an ice melting cooler to improve habitability. Very much like ONI.
Breath of Fire IV. A nice pixel art RPG I never played this when it was new. A few hours in currently and enjoying it quite a bit!
Played the original PSX release as a kid, its a story that goes places, hope you enjoy it. Also, this is one of the original “you’ll get addicted to fishing” jRPGs so brace for that
I’ve gone back to Ostriv since there have been some nice updates since I last played. It’s such a beautiful game and I always end up spending most of the time makeing it look nice. LINK
Edit: added some pictures :)
i’ve been playing Fuser. i’m only a little late; the servers only shut down three years ago. not that it matters to me, i’m using it as a mashup toy. you can get it on archive.org and there is a vibrant modding community now.
it’s been mostly “Unnamed Space Idle” (idle/autoplay game with some interactivity), recently opened a new gameplay part in it and, well, it’s slow and idle waiting and few tactical decision making here and there. According to steam I’ve wasted like 1200 hours on it… which is kinda wild.
I also played and 100%'d “Exit 8”, it’s one of those anomaly spotting games. Not difficult at all, nor does it really have a failstate either. You just go on in a looping liminal subway hallway and turn back if there’s something out of ordinary. Dunno really if it’s something I’d recommend it or not, it’s about an hour (give or take) worth of gameplay if you’re into those kind of games.
I’ve been digging into USI for the past few months, what section are you in right now? I’m at Sector 100, and this is probably one - if not the - best idle games I’ve experimented, as someone who plays them regularly
clawing my way back to 100 after R5. Got some sweet fleet bonuses waiting for yet another reinforce-reset.
And, yea, USI is one of the better ones in the genre, I just keep coming back.
Oh, rad, I’ve just done my first post-Fleet reset yesterday and began climbing back to 100 once more to see how smoother things are!
mean while in dummyland: I just now realized I’ve been not using veil piercer. 🤦
was kinda wondering that I surely had this around 90-something last time… sigh :D
