whatchu playing now

man why doesn't axel just jump over the damn walls

sor3 is weird. it seems like it admits to tactics then it doesn't really.

I think after you get past the stage where you are fighting kangaroos and evil dominatrix clowns they just figured they could get away w that.

Played 2-player Hyperstone Heist for the Genesis last night. Got to Super Shredder and then we died and we were out of continues! The music in that game is incredible. Orchestrated speed metal.

i'm still playing bg2.

eu4 always with the eu4. genovese colonial empire.

wish i could get into eu. each time i load it up there are like 300 tutorials

if it helps you still won't know what the fuck is going on if you sit thru the tutorials

Sadly not as into Mirror's Edge as I'd hoped (hinges way too much on barely-disguised quick time events, which fuck that). Surprisingly way more into the first Metal Gear Solid than I expected (tough but mostly fair, cutscenes and dialogue that are reasonably well-written and not totally perfunctory, generous with the game saving, and the controls and camera, while occasionally obnoxious, are better than those on a lot of the PS2 games I've played). I still haven't been able to get past the first boss yet, though, so we'll see how long my admiration lasts.

is there some kind of amazing online tutorial that will teach me how to play?

there is a lot of user and wiki content so possibly but i'm not aware of anything myself. i think you just need to start playing it with the expectation that you won't know what you're doing for a long time. start with france: raise a big army and start some beef. you can go a long way with them without having to worry about some of the more arcane stuff for a while and you will pick up a good foundation in manpower/supply, tech advancement, diplomacy, religion. you can dip your toe into trade and colonies if you want but you'll still be able to do plenty without. and you'll have the immediate objective of unifying france to get your teeth into, which definitely helps the transition into the sandbox. you'll always have something to do with them and that is certainly not always the case elsewhere.

have any of you played crusader kings 2 and can you take the same approach there? tried to get into it but get caught up on figuring out how levies work and what a demesne is and somehow the game had me entering into an affair with my own wife

ftl

Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow
Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance

Aria of Sorrow is incredible. Are the GBA Metroids this good?

Harmony is cool too, if only because the lead character is dressed like anime Santa Claus.

I remember the GBA Metroid I played being awesome

this is gonna make me sound like a crazy person but i've gotten into watching lets-plays of EU4 and i don't even own a PC. they're weirdly soothing?

any you'd recommend? esp for newbs?

there's a youtuber by the name of shenryyr2 who i gather is some kind of god at it. he doesn't really do tutorials but a lot of the rhythm of it comes out via osmosis.

my general sense is it's just not a 'for newbs' game, you just kind of have to keep jumping in at the deep end until it clicks

jeez, just had a click around that guy's YT, he is nutso. if i had infinite hours i would watch the lot. but yeah, as a learning experience you probably already need a foundation to get anything from someone like this.

Aria of Sorrow is incredible. Are the GBA Metroids this good?

yeah he's also endearingly/annoyingly ignorant of actual history & geography

i just wanted some cool flowing graphics of a map shifting slowly over time while i did other shit.

xp

*checks england ca. 1650* "a republic? england went republic? wtf, that makes no sense"

was that cromwell? idk I'm too lazy to wiki at the minute

metro: last light
had no idea the wolfenstein remake is more then just "lol nostalgia", preview trailer got me intersted

xp yeah

just finished back to the future telltale game, it was pretty fun, but if it hadn't been for walking dead s1 i dunno if i would've had the patience. now i am trying to play sam & max penal zone and it is next-level inscrutable adv game :(

Did any of you happen to see this week's Steven Universe where Steven gets obssessed with this epic Pokemon/Final Fantasy-style Mini Golf RPG? Man, I would love for that to actually exist.

no but that sounds great. i also love the SU where garnet becomes transfixed with the meat beat mania arcade game

hah, that was great too!

ftl

Played a little "Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia" yesterday and holy crap am I addicted to these Castlevania games...

I got stuck on the second DS game and never moved onto that one

Fuckin' boulder, I hate you

been playing the tomb raider game from last year and goddamn, this is the metal gear solid game i wanted instead of guns of the patriots

solo castle crashers insane mode, the endless air comboing has a meditative appeal despite zero margin for error

Risk of Rain

In what I'm sure is news to no one, Portal 2 is an absolute delight. We'll see if my GF agrees if I manage to convince her to try out co-op mode.

yeah the second act of portal 2 where you're climbing your way out of the old laboratory is one of the best gaming experiences ever imo

Warning: the co-op puzzles are a little harder (and generally, way better) than the single player story puzzles. Also lacks most of the charm that story has, but that's an easily forgivable sin.

Ya know what, I forgot about the robot hi-fives. Maybe not.

That is, it's still pretty damn charming.

played co-op with my gf at the time and i was so bad at it that i cried tears of frustration and embarrassment and she was really horrible to me in front of her friends lmao

Well, at least there's no chance of that, thankfully. The scant time she's spent on anything FPS-ish has been mostly about trying to figure out why she can only see the ceiling as she's running into walls.

I just got to the deep, deep underground part of the game last night and was a little wary about whether it was going to still hold my interest now that I'm no longer in the testing chambers. I'm glad to hear it stays awesome.

Oh, and I was wondering if it was a stupid decision to buy it from the PS store (seeing as how I'm rapidly running out of space on my PS3) but I seem to be avoiding the ridiculous load times that I've heard people complain about, which I'm sure only enhances my joy.

Peggle 2 (360) is more of the same with slightly better presentation, but... that's pretty much what I wanted.

ftl

FTL is a semi-permanent rotation for me - gets fired up every week or so for a few quick games.

Anyone got Watch Dogs yet? Picked it up last night, but I'm trying to force myself to finish the last few levels of COD: Ghosts before I move onto it (though, based on the rest of the game, the last few missions should take ~10 minutes).

In other 'whatchu playing' news I'm 4 dungeons into A Link Between Worlds, a few hours into Dragonfall, and barely touched Child of Light (which is very pretty, but mostly boring so far).

i am playing the banner saga, ty ilx

Played the new Wolfenstein the other day on PS3, and it was really really great! Old school shooting fun w minimal (and really well-done) QTE cutscene storyline stuff sprinkled in.

I watched about an hour or two of someone playing Watch Dogs last night, and it also looked cool. A lot like Assassin's Creed 4 minus all the piratey stuff (well I guess you are still a pirate but you use a phone instead of a pirate ship).

I just bought watch dogs on a whim because I needed a new ps + 12 month card and target was giving you $25 off if you bought both.

xp congratulations dEXter!

I bought a soft-modded PS2 recently for a steal; been playing Dragon Quest VIII and OutRun 2006 via SSD on that and having a ball. Sure, I could just emulate, but this is much more fun & interesting IMO. It's also a bit of a project because the optical drive isn't working, so I am going to take it apart and attempt repair (I have no idea what I'm doing but I've watched a few YT guides)

xp

I haven't played Resistance, but have played some Sniper Elite 4 & 5. Which seemed pretty similar. But good stealth games tbh! Had fun with them.

the sniper game where you could infiltrate other people’s games and countersnipe them (while they played single player, I think) looked fun

really enjoying the impeccable old school side-scroll arcade feeling of shinobi: art of vengeance. it's a lot of fun and a joy to play.

I started that game Evil West. It feels like a janky pre PS4 throwback, for better or for worse, but so far it is relatively enjoyable and definitely straightforward dumb fun.