Whilst we wait to settle Jorges shopping spree, I finished another backlog game finally: Greedfall.
I really liked it! The Bioware-of-old comparisons where not far off tbh. Very interesting world to explore and the mix between magic and 17-18th century tech was really nice. Lots of companions with good quests, side quests which were relevant to the world building and story and a good main story. I played as a female tech specialist and it was a great choice, my lady De Sardet kicked ass and fit very well into the world.
I also did the dlc; The De Vespe Conspiracy, which was also very good. A good story with a new area to explore and some new enemies. The antagonist was similar in style and appearance to my character which made it very cool to see them clash.
The AA-jank showed itself at times, but overall this game hit above its weight. The combat was decent, the pause function was very useful and will probably be even more so in a future Extreme mode playthrough. I will definitely play this again in the future, there are different choices to make and different endings to see with different role playing things to do.
Just finished Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice (Steam) + 1
The Hellblade tech showed off at GDC prompted me to finally play this. I’m glad I did, and I recognize the quality of the game, but I did not really enjoy this much. The combat never clicked with me, and I found the portrayal of Senua’s psychosis to be pretty disturbing (which I’m sure was intended - it just did not make playing the game fun…).
On the bright side , the game looks absolutely amazing with the all the settings cranked up on PC. I’m sure Hellblade II will be a complete looker, but I have no idea now whether to look forward to the gameplay or not.
I liked it but it was indeed very disturbing. I hope the sequel features a Senua in a somewhat better place so to speak, it can get a bit too much and overtake the gaming experience I feel. My expectations for the sequel are high, but I also am very uncertain.
-1 for me as I finally bit the bullet and purchased Final Fantasy 7 Remake for my Steam Deck. It’s never going to make its way to Xbox at this point and the price was too good. Looking forward to checking it out though.
Really need to crack on with Ni No Kuni 2 and start getting through my Backlog.
Finished the Rally Adventure expansion for Forza Horizon 5. It was great, the rally part was really fun with a map reader. I might have to look into more rally games…
The new area was fun to explore and race in with good traversal and varying environments. The teams and their challenges is fun to complete, and there’s some great new cars to be had. I much prefer this expansion over the Hot Wheels one tbh.
Inspired by @Mort , I have now completed Greedfall. +1
I enjoyed this game, but boy does the AA nature of it really come through. For almost every good thing about it I found a bug or annoyance. My biggest annoyance was the fast travel system. You can only travel from your camp or from other specific points (like the exit of a map) and you can only travel to similar specific points. Needless to say there were not nearly enough campsites or travel points. I’m pretty sure I spent at least 10 hours of playtime just running back and forth to camps or travel points while trying to complete quests.
I played this on Steam, and I installed a few mods, so I’m not sure how many of the bugs were “natural” and how many may have been mod-induced - but I suspect most of them are just from the game. I never actually crashed, and lots of the bugs fell into the “more amusing than annoying” variety - but still, there were a lot of them. I fell through the world during a boss fight, had all sorts of crazy camera issues (mostly during dialogue scenes), had NPCs get stuck in walls, and my PC got hung up on more geometry than I can ever remember in a game.
My “favorite” bug occurred every time I talked a specific NPC. I probably had to talk to this guy ten times over the course of the game. Every single time I spoke to him my PC teleported himself into a chandelier (or something) on the ceiling and held the conversation from there. Luckily I didn’t get stuck, and could just jump back to the floor after the conversation was over.
Despite all this, the game tells a good story, and has “good enough” combat, characters, etc. Anyone looking to scratch the itch of a Bioware-type rpg should check this out.
P.S. I own the DLC for this too, but did not play it due to a specific bug. Every single mob and most critical NPCs in the DLC area were invisible for me. I read online that the DLC does not play well with mods… So at some point I may do a fresh (modless) install of the game and see if I can get the DLC to work properly.
I had none of those bugs… like none at all. Played on XSX.
The AA jank I encountered was things like the fast travel system, like you mentioned, and the lack of NPC variety, somewhat dumb monster AI, so-so dialouge in places etc. etc.
I was completely charmed by the Bioware-esque nature of the game though and the setting is really great.
Favorite: The cheating answer is Pokémon SoulSilver. Pokémon Gold is one of my favorite games of all time. So a remake with more on top of it is guaranteed an easy high placing. Now, when it comes to a new game I might have to say Voice of Cards: The Forsaken Maiden. It’s an RPG that plays like a tabletop game, but once your in fights its basically a turn based game with cards. The first game (Dragon Isle Roars) was a cool concept, but the cast was mostly pretty generic and the plot itself is basic as hell (aside from the occasional twist). Forsaken Maiden had a solid story and a message I really appreciated. It starts off slow and has a couple of strange difficulty spikes though which killed it a little for me.
Biggest Surprise: Probably Voice of Cards again. I’ve been burning through these games like crazy. Enough to the point where I’m almost sad by the idea I’m playing the final one. Might have to push myself to play the original version of NieR to help feed the Yoko Taro itch.
Worst: Probably has to be Call of Duty 1. The later half of the game actually kind of saved it, but most of the vehicle missions are absolutely horrendous imo. Also doesn’t help that I feel like my character is glued to the ground and can barley move. I personally feel like the original Medal of Honor and Halo CE have aged better, but maybe that’s just my nostalgia talking.
So far this year I don’t think I’ve played anything I’ve genuinely fallen in love with (Forsaken Maiden is probably the closest), but I also took like a 1.5 month hiatus from single player gaming so maybe that’ll change. Really pumped to check out Coffee Talk 2, The Last Case of Benedict Fox, and maybe Jedi Survivor over the next couple weeks (plus all the extra stuff I’m playing).
HBU? Any memorable gaming experiences this year for better or worse?
Atomic Heart was a great surprise. Very cool setting, interesting story and probably the most satsifying looting mechanic I’ve encountered heh.
On the other side of the scale there’s Kentucky Route Zero which was horrible… I don’t quit often once I’ve started a game but this came very close. Tedious af. Probably the most overrated game I’ve ever played.
The best from the backlog is probably the game I’m playing right now though; The Last of Us Part 1. Holy shit, what a game!
I still need to check out Atomic Heart. Was going to wait for it to get patched up and give it a go. We’ll see if I can make some time for it this year.
Glad you’re enjoying TLOU P1. Debating about when I get a PS5 if that’ll be the first game I play or maybe Death Stranding.
