Currently playing...

[Misfit]

Moving Out

Couch co-op fun for those wanting something to follow Overcooked except instead of being chefs you are in the removals business. Not that special on your own, but a lot of fun and complete carnage with a few others.

Played with the kids for a few hours today and didn't swear at each other nearly as much as Overcooked. Which is good!

(It's on pretty much everything, and there is a demo, but it's 'free' on Xbox Gamepass)

[MattyP]

Last Of Us 2. Around three hours in. It's intense.

Although the fan noise on the PS4 Pro I'm using is killing the atmosphere a bit

[VNVObit]

Been playing Outer Worlds on PS4. Getting near the end of the main story now.

Bought it after they did a second update on increasing the UI and subtitle text to make it readable to anyone with less than 20/20 vision.

Dunno about bog standard PS4, but on Pro it looks lush.

Looks like a cross between Bioshock and Borderlands.

I would have put it more like Fallout lite (particularly the conversation options)
Fun game though

[venusian]

Been playing Outer Worlds on PS4. Getting near the end of the main story now.

Bought it after they did a second update on increasing the UI and subtitle text to make it readable to anyone with less than 20/20 vision.

Dunno about bog standard PS4, but on Pro it looks lush.

Looks like a cross between Bioshock and Borderlands.

I would have put it more like Fallout lite (particularly the conversation options)
Fun game though

I bought it in the Epic sale a month or two back. I got about 10 hours in on PC and haven't touched it again. Frankly I just don't give a toss about any of the characters. I found the "moral" decisions to be painfully clunky, the reams of turgid dialog were tedious and the core humour spread far, far too thin. The gameplay between the story points was meh and the less said about the menu system the better.

Not a fan.

I guess I shouldn't bother with Fallout either.

[fog]

Been playing Outer Worlds on PS4. Getting near the end of the main story now.

Bought it after they did a second update on increasing the UI and subtitle text to make it readable to anyone with less than 20/20 vision.

Dunno about bog standard PS4, but on Pro it looks lush.

Looks like a cross between Bioshock and Borderlands.

I would have put it more like Fallout lite (particularly the conversation options)
Fun game though

I bought it in the Epic sale a month or two back. I got about 10 hours in on PC and haven't touched it again. Frankly I just don't give a toss about any of the characters. I found the "moral" decisions to be painfully clunky, the reams of turgid dialog were tedious and the core humour spread far, far too thin. The gameplay between the story points was meh and the less said about the menu system the better.

Not a fan.

Likewise. I can't remember a game I've changed my opinion on more than Outer Wilds. I was hyped for it and the opening hours were good enough, but they forgot to add an interesting plot and characters, interesting locations, and any sort of depth at all.

All it did was motivate me to play through Fallout4 again for the third time. It's all greys and browns, the engine is 2 generations out of date and it's full of bugs, but it's still a much more interesting world to explore, dripping in atmosphere with some proper RPG elements.

One of my biggest disappointments this gen.

[Portland]

Still rocking Civ VI.

Last couple of updates and expansions have been fantastic. Loving the Apocalypse mode and the new civs...

[Foozwah]

Belatedly (due to only finally acquiring a PS4 a few months ago) immersed in No Man's Sky, for the most part.

I was vaguely aware of the disappointing "not nearly what was promised" launch, inevitable internet backlash and ensuing pile-on and all the rest, but having read about subsequent updates etc. in the years since thought it was still worth a shot, and am SO glad that I did.

Only about 14 hours in, but in these lockdown-times I am enjoying the limitless vistas and open-ended gameplay, whilst still making beginner in-roads into the storyline. Coming to it late has definitely been rewarding for me, as it scratched the old Elite itch nicely.

Apart from that, rando games of Tetris 99 and still finishing off Pokemon Sword, having restarted from scratch recently despite being previously up to the seventh gym at that point (both on Switch, natch).

[Misfit]

I tend not to bother with games that need an investment of time but did start Outer Worlds as I liked the silly company setup, it was on Game Pass and I needed to mow the lawn...

Sunk in a fair few hours but once I got off the initial world I got bored with the conversations/running around and haven't gone back. The humour of the intro wasn't there and it was all a bit depressing.

Fog - did you mean Outer Worlds? As Outer Wilds is also a recent release. I gave that about 30 mins and it can't have grabbed me and I've not gone back.

[PVB]

Belatedly (due to only finally acquiring a PS4 a few months ago) immersed in No Man's Sky, for the most part.

I was vaguely aware of the disappointing "not nearly what was promised" launch, inevitable internet backlash and ensuing pile-on and all the rest, but having read about subsequent updates etc. in the years since thought it was still worth a shot, and am SO glad that I did.

Only about 14 hours in, but in these lockdown-times I am enjoying the limitless vistas and open-ended gameplay, whilst still making beginner in-roads into the storyline. Coming to it late has definitely been rewarding for me, as it scratched the old Elite itch nicely.

Apart from that, rando games of Tetris 99 and still finishing off Pokemon Sword, having restarted from scratch recently despite being previously up to the seventh gym at that point (both on Switch, natch).

Friend Code: 2DKA-2FAB-0H434
Send me a message on PSN if you need help with anything.

[PVB]

Been playing Outer Worlds on PS4. Getting near the end of the main story now.

Bought it after they did a second update on increasing the UI and subtitle text to make it readable to anyone with less than 20/20 vision.

Dunno about bog standard PS4, but on Pro it looks lush.

Looks like a cross between Bioshock and Borderlands.

I would have put it more like Fallout lite (particularly the conversation options)
Fun game though

I bought it in the Epic sale a month or two back. I got about 10 hours in on PC and haven't touched it again. Frankly I just don't give a toss about any of the characters. I found the "moral" decisions to be painfully clunky, the reams of turgid dialog were tedious and the core humour spread far, far too thin. The gameplay between the story points was meh and the less said about the menu system the better.

Not a fan.

I guess I shouldn't bother with Fallout either.

Not everyone likes the same game?!

[venusian]

Been playing Outer Worlds on PS4. Getting near the end of the main story now.

Not a fan.

Not everyone likes the same game?!

Thank goodness it's not a democracy or we'd all be playing COD and FIFA.

[Rhythm]

Have been living with GF and her kids during lockdown, ended up playing a few things from PS Now whilst they sit and direct. It's been a ton of fun.

- Shadow of the Tomb Raider - bloody marvellous. Can't remember if I posted before about this but what a game! The best of the reboot series by an enormous margin and possibly my favourite Tomb Raider game ever. The ability to set difficulty levels independently for action/exploration/puzzles is fucking inspired. More of that, please

- Outlast - Not sure how we started on this but it turned out to be a good play. *Really* scary, both in atmosphere and jumps. Compact, well-paced, loved it

- What Remains of Edith Finch - I'd played this before but the storytelling is absolutely brilliant and it went down well in the room :-)

- Erica - PS+ game from this week. Plays in less time than it takes to watch a movie. Decent enough but not particularly outstanding. Using the phone as a controller was great, although if you have power-saving enabled on your PS4 it will bug you and try to put the machine in standby every few minutes which is super frustrating

- Outlast 2 - Hmm. A much better-produced game than the first, but way too open. Too many scares just rely on confusing you and getting you lost in the environment

- Amnesia Dark Descent - had put this off for years because of the rumours of how scary it is but it turns out it's dull as dishwater. Seriously naff

- Prey - everyone bounced off this super hard.

- Spider-man - Between this and Horizon Zero Dawn I'm thinking Sony need to stop sponsoring open-world games. Just bad from start to finish. No fun to traverse, dreadful combat, too many cut scenes...

- Fallout 4 and Fallout 76 - with the exception of Oblivion I've never really been a fan of Bethesda RPGs. My brother convinced me to try these and yeah, more of the same. Nonsensical stories with time constraints that don't seem to matter in worlds that don't make sense. Not impressed, although I will say that for all the shit it's gotten since it came out, 76 is tons better than 4.

Not sure what we're going to tackle next. Thinking of hooking up the laptop and perhaps playing Alien Isolation

[fog]

I tend not to bother with games that need an investment of time but did start Outer Worlds as I liked the silly company setup, it was on Game Pass and I needed to mow the lawn...

Sunk in a fair few hours but once I got off the initial world I got bored with the conversations/running around and haven't gone back. The humour of the intro wasn't there and it was all a bit depressing.

Fog - did you mean Outer Worlds? As Outer Wilds is also a recent release. I gave that about 30 mins and it can't have grabbed me and I've not gone back.

Yes, I actually meant Outer Worlds. Sounds like quite a few of us have similar views about it.

[funkstar]

It's been a while since I posted here.

Gaming's weird for me, at the moment. Life just does not allow me to play anything with an extended run-time, yet I still find myself oscillating between 'big'/long/AAA and 'small'/short/indie games. So, I'll spend months pushing through an FPS campaign like DOOM (2016), and then get a quick change of pace with Devil Daggers and then do Rise of the Tomb Raider (another month) and then do Pikuniku and then...

And I'm starting to wonder if the 'big' games are really worth it. I'm not good at abandoning games halfway through - if I don't immediately bounce off something, I'll usually see it through to the end. Even if they're not all that good. (I'm guessing this behaviour is a common trait with older gamers - I only had a very limited number of games to play when I was young, on a limited number of platforms, so I had better make the most of them. Nothing like now, where no game is out of reach if only I want it enough; and the backlog is, frankly, preposterous.) I've already cut out MMOs, MOBAs, most (J)RPGs, etc. to conserve my sanity, but even with that, I'm wondering if those big games aren't taking up too much of my play time. Do you have similar problems? How do you cope?

Anyway: Zelda: Link's Awakening is very Link to the Past, for good and bad. It feels a bit like comfort gaming, really. My daughter is absolutely hooked on it, so it's definitely doing a lot of things right. And honestly, the Switch is fucking brilliant - being able to pick it up and continue playing away from the telly is a fantastic feature for a games console.

[Misfit]

Do you have similar problems? How do you cope?

Yes. Time is a very different beast now we're all grown up. I have started a few of the bigger games thanks to Game Pass and given them a few hours fully never expecting to return.

The Switch does have that amazing pickup-ability and perfect for the indie world, but I'm too pissed off with my Lite (see previous rants on text size and build/screen quality) to take it as seriously as I like. I'm finding Game Pass the gift that just keeps on giving...

Been meaning to report back on a few things but two that have really caught me in the last couple of weeks, that I would consider on the Switch, but are both 'free' on Game Pass:

The Touryst - talked about on here before and it's not new, but new on GP and on sale on the Nintendo store - a beautifully pixelated adventure. Not long, not hard, so far, but quite a relaxing/charming play.




Carrion - FAR from charming is this horror platformer with a twist, you play the monster. More pixelated art, but it works so well and it's a true delight to control your spaghetti and meatball blob, zipping around the levels and tearing humans apart as you try to escape the facility you're being tested in.

Switch version apparently on par with the Xbox/PC one but of course 'free' on the Xbox.