Author Topic: What are you playing?  (Read 75649 times)

MartinTeller

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Re: What are you playing?
« Reply #1140 on: December 19, 2023, 10:27:51 PM »
Every now and then my honorary daughter brings over her Switch, so I've been playing BotW in 3-4 hour sessions. Got three of mini-bosses down so far, one more to go and then Ganon. Probably not going to spend a whole lot of time doing side quests, though they are tempting. Her and I will probably change gears soon and start playing The Quarry.

I ended up getting my own Switch and beat Zelda: BOTW the other day. But now of course I am doing all the millions of side quests and finding shrines and collecting photos of every goddamn thing. Don't even talk to me about Korok Seeds. I'll take one if I happen across one but there's no way I'm hunting down all of them. I could easily spend the next year playing this game, but I think I'll probably get tired of it in the next week or two.

We did play The Quarry, which was pretty good if you like that sort of game. The characters are a lot deeper and more likable than Until Dawn. The dialogue is much better. We started a second run-through but never finished it.

Also I played Psychonauts 2 recently, one of the few games I got Platinum on. Perfect game for a collect-a-holic like me... lots of stuff to track down, but not TOO much.

Sam the Cinema Snob

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Re: What are you playing?
« Reply #1141 on: December 20, 2023, 11:03:31 AM »
Marvel's Midnight Suns. It's a fun action driven card strategy game. I honestly have been skipping dialogue and cutscenes for hours now. It's not bad storytelling, it just is very comic book superhero in a way I find dull. The interpersonal conflicts are great, thought. You really get to see everyone butt heads over both the little and big stuff that can ruin a team's cohesion. It's not enough to span the game's lengthy runtime. I'm just now in act 3 and I've clocked about 40 hours. This could have been a better paced 30 hour game.

Sam the Cinema Snob

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Re: What are you playing?
« Reply #1142 on: March 10, 2024, 01:54:53 PM »
Doing something new this year where I just write a bit about each game I've played as I finish it so I can go back and look at my thoughts. Not everything provokes a lot of thinking with me these days when it comes to games, but for those that left more of an impression you can tell I wrote a bit more about them.

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order

Surprised how much I enjoyed this. Gets original trilogy Star Wars more than anything I've encountered this side of the OG Thrawn Trilogy. Also is a damn fun video game.

Severed Steel

Titanfall 2 traversal meets bullet-time hi-jinks? Yes, please! I'll take this innovation over the slew of indie boomer shooters failing to get the fun of momentum and dodging that made the original Doom fun.

Cruelty Squad

More games should try to be an assault on the senses and an affront to video game norms. It's also a damn good immersive sim so it's a mechanical and aesthetic wonder all in one.

Ctrl Alt Ego


Look, I'm a pushover for anything immersive sim related, but this one is almost more puzzle-like in its approach, making combat truly suck in a way that encourages you to find ways to sneak, hack or distract your way through the levels. It's a cool world with cool mechanics and amazing levels that you need to play if you think there's even the slightest chance you'll like this game.

Time Bandit: Part 1 - Appendages of the Machine

You had me at Marx quote in the opening credits. GOTY 2023.

Marvel's Midnight Suns

Blade is BAE.

Sludge Life

Cute enough but feels like it wants to be satirical or have something to say but all it really is ends up being a 13-year-old sense of edginess mixed with a handful of hot button topics with no true thematic nuance.

Super Mario Bros. Wonder

You wonder (pun intended) what Nintendo could do new with one of the longest running game series and then they basically make a game where each level is a new idea, often polished to a perfect sheen, and what you are left with might be the best mainline 2D Mario platformer. Yes, I said it. Take off the nostalgia glasses and the old games have lots of problems and the new games have some rough parts too. This one feels like the team went back and looked at what made every single 2D Mario game good and said, let's do that, but even better.

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided

I missed this at the time it was released and I know there was a lot of controversy at the time with how Square Enix handled the launch and micro-transactions in a single-player only game. I'm not saying that stuff is bad, but now 8 years later, playing the game with none of that stuff attached to it anymore, it's an amazing game with so many great moments and fixes the few nagging problems I had with Human Revolution. The only downside is the abrupt ending and the occasional parts when you can tell they were constrained by time and budget to achieve their full vision. Still, one of the best of the Immersive Sim genre and well worth a play for any fan of the series.