Monthly Recommendations Thread: What are you playing?

Briongloid@aussie.zonemod to Patient Gamers@sh.itjust.works – 70 points –

Tell us what game you are currently, or recently played, greater than 6+ months old.

If the game happens to be on sale, a link would be fantastic.

65

Been making my way through Return of the Obra Dinn. It's so different from anything I've played before. Really neat, though I wish there was some more help/guide info available in game on the mechanics of it. I feel like I stumble into things most of the time.

I'm playing Starcraft 1 again. We'll see how far I get this time. I'm not certain I've ever finished all the way through Brood War without cheats.

Hah, I definitely never got the bonus mission without cheats.

Last night I finally finished MGS The Twin Snakes, and soon about to be starting MGS2. Was pretty fun even if I had no idea what I was doing most of the time.

The Twin Snakes is excellent. I've not played 2/3 or 4 so kinda makes me what to go play them.

I'm honestly not a big fan of Twin Snakes (I think the mechanics ported over from MGS2 broke a lot of the original design of MGS1, and I don't prefer the cutscenes over the original), but if you think it's excellent you absolutely should play 2 and 3 at least. MGS3 is a masterpiece.

Make sure to play the original version of MGS1 eventually. It's different enough (and arguably superior) to Twin Snakes to be worth a play.

I've tried it multiple times. I don't like it, it looks worse and controls are clunky

Have you played any of the series before? MGS2 and 3 are some of the best games ever made, IMO :) Twin Snakes is ok, but I much prefer the original.

Can’t comment on hope good it is yet, but I picked up Disco Elysium for $10 and have been playing that. Also Open Roller Coaster Tycoon 2

Disco Elysium is on the Playstation prime or whatever it is called. currently enjoying the game. slow and steady.

I'm replaying this one right now (more or less, I hadn't played Final Cut before).

I know it's too highbrow for some people, but the writing absolutely pops in this game.

I haven’t had much time for games lately unfortunately but when I have found a few minutes here or there, I finally started Morrowind. I’m thinking of making a post about it soon, but it’s still an awesome game 21 years later

Playing through:

  • New Vegas
  • 13 Sentinels
  • Might start on Skyward Sword on Switch, now that I've finished TOTK

YES!! new vegas is soooo good, i got it for 3.00USD and its a great game!

I started playing it years ago but quit after reaching the Strip - this time I will make sure to actually finish it! The writing is great and the quests are really memorable.

Nier Replicant ver. whatever

Haven't played the original, only Automata, and damn this game has a lot of fetch quests. Pretty rewarding from time to time, but the gameplay of the side quests is ass. I hope I don't have to do much more fragile deliveries.

Damn man that's kinda disappointing to hear. I wanted to do this one eventually but not if it's going to highlight my death stranding work trauma. I can't keep just being a mule like that

Fragile delivery is only one quest. It doesn't gate any great prize or much storyline.

Haven't played Death Stranding myself but at least the paths are pretty short in Nier at least compared to how I imagine Death Stranding. That doesn't make farming items more fun though.

There's only one Fragile Delivery quest if I recall.

It IS skippable. But the completest in you will hate yourself.

I already did 3 fragile deliveries :D
The biggest "problem" is that you cannot tell beforehand if a quest will be good or not. The lighthouse lady and the old man's dog quests had an amazing conclusion, so they were totally worth it, even though gameplay wise they were boring.

I think you definitely feel that Automata is an improvement on the OG Nier (assuming that OG Nier and the remake aren't that different) in terms of quest design. That doesn't make Replicant bad though.

Oh my bad. It's one family of quests

This might sound crazy, but I actually preferred Nier Replicant to Automata in terms of gameplay. I preferred Automata slightly on story and feel, but I also felt like Automata made some really bad mistakes that Nier didn't (the notorious prologue, for example)

If I could ONLY play one of the two once, I think it would be Automata. If I could only play one game 100 times, it would be Replicant. if that makes sense

I actually like Automata's prologue :D

"Game Over" having to rewatch the opening 6 times in a row was almost enough for me to toss the game out. I ended up putting "super-duper-easy" auto-fight mode on until I reached the first save point.

Who though that having a 1-hit-kill boss 15+ minutes into the game BEFORE the first save point was a good idea?

Even Soulsbornes aren't that cruel

I probably just got lucky because I beat him first try. Just a completely different experience.

Fair point

But that damn double-saw is one of few bosses that both have one-hit-kill situations that also attempt to hit you with one-hit kills (instead of them being incidental collisions). One could say it's one of the hardest bosses in the game.

It really sucked how many times I had to watch the opening cut-scenes. They went from beautiful to annoying.

Nothing this week but I built my kids their first PC so looking forward to loading it up with games for them. It's old (i5 4690K + R9 370) but good enough for most games I own.

I'm getting back into the witcher 3 horse. Ive played it on and off over the years but never completed it. I'm looking forward to putting more time into it because its a really cool game so far

I recently finished Grime (I got it for free on EGS). Not 100% tho.

A metroidvania with lots of difficulty to it.

Tho I found it to be a great game, but not amazing.

The bosses have great music and a beautiful design, they offer a great challenge, and often a respoin point is close enough to not be an annoyance.

There was some (multiple) places where area music was absent, and seemed sketchy.

Weapon balance is, well not that great, due to stamina. The game heavily pushes towards using low stamina consumption weapons, which also attack fast and do low damage per hit.

Higher damage per hit weapons are slower and use more stamina which is very punishing.

The inability to change the mouse binds is also a disappointment. Tho good thing I had ghub to create macros for the game and allow me to change those.

I just did unga bunga (strength) and had a fairly easy go of it. I put a good many trait points into stamina as well. I also invested into stamina regen abilities.

Just Cause 2. The grind is pretty insane but it‘s a fun game with some quirks. I legit think the game would‘ve profited if it was only half as big lol

It‘s an old game and has issues on modern PCs, if you experience crashes (very likely), then do some or all of the following: Avoid the skull island in the middle of the map, enable Win 7 compatability mode, run as admin, turn decals and bokeh off in the graphics options. I‘d also suggest installing a hookshot mod that raises the distance you can hook to, otherwise getting anywhere on the stupidly huge map is gonna be a pain.

Monster Sanctuary. It's like a good mix of Legend of Zelda and Pokémon, pixel-style sidescroller with surprisingly deep lore and a lot of quirky monsters with interesting designs to collect. Lots of puzzles, different biomes, interesting abilities, upgradable equipment, an interesting story, rival characters with actual personality (and character development throughout the story) ... all in all a well-made "monster collecting" adventure game.

It is also currently on sale in the Nintendo eshop, at least in Germany (5 Euro). No idea if it's the same world wide, but 5€ are more or less the same as $5 so it is pretty cheap for a game of that size and quality.

Control and Fallout 3.

Control is a masterclass at world building and storytelling.

Fallout 3 is as excellent as always, but even on the Steam Deck it suffers from random crashes. Save often.

Baldur's Gate 3! It's such an amazing game that I used a week of vacation time to do nothing except play that game. I've never done anything like that before. Forewarning, laying on the couch for a week straight doesn't feel great physically.

I picked up Dredge on sale a few weeks ago and got the platinum trophy recently. It's my first platinum trophy to ever get. The game was well worth the price even if I hadn't gotten it on sale.

Assassins Creed: Odyssey, but wait for the sales.

Fuck yeah, I'm maybe three quarters done with that game, only the DLC left. I've been playing it for like a year and I've fully completed all of Greece, just finishing up quests. One of my favorite games at this point.

Rip. And. Tear.

Currently working my way through Doom Eternal and I think it’s one of the best first person shooters I’ve ever played. If you ever even touch a FPS game, you’ve gotta play this. The music alone is worth the price of admission.

Side projects I have are Tails Noir, It Takes Two (also an incredible game imo), and Crash Nitro Kart. I have Nitro Kart on a bit of pause since the steam deck can’t emulate it well. Will have to move emulation and saves over to my PC sometime.

Starcraft 2. Two friends and I have been going through a 3-player coop version of the single player campaigns. We just finished the first one, onto the expansions now. It has been pretty fun.

  • Metro Exodus

  • Soul Reaver 1 & 2

  • Does "Insurgency" count? Multiplayer still has players

Metro Exodus is such a beutiful game, i some time forget im playing a game because the graphics are so good. And the story is so well written.

Timberborn, Europa universalis 4 and the perfect Tower 2 😊

Which version of EU4 are you on? I've been playing it with some friends for a while (on a converted save from CK2), but because we have limited time that we're all free together we've been getting through it very slowly. As such, we're still on v1.33, although I have modded in some things from 1.34. Having fun, but it has been interesting seeing the newer versions. It looks like there's an awful lot of power creep and the proliferation of mission trees seems to make it less of a sandbox, but I haven't actually played the up-to-date version of the game so I'm very much just looking in from the outside

Am a bit broke at the moment so I recently started a new island on Animal Crossing New Horizons. That should keep me busy until the holiday sales arrive.

I wish I had the time for a redux. The early game is absolutely fantastic, but I've got such a limited time to play I don't think I could really commit to it.

I'm replaying Bug Fables, which is a kind of spiritual successor to the first two Paper Mario games. Definitely can recommend if you like that style of game!

Don't really get the drive to play games much nowadays, but when I do I usually hop onto deep rock galactic or vermintide 2.

Its just so satisfying to shut off the brain and cleave through hordes of enemies with a nuke or a big sword

Nothing right now but something to keep in mind for the future. I spent the last week playing "the Finals " and it was legitimately the most fun I've had in an online game in a long time. The open beta ended on Sunday and it has left a void in me. I don't feel like playing anything else, I just want to play more of the Finals.

So that's my recommendation. When the Finals comes out it's definitely worth trying out.

SW Jedi: Fallen Order

I stopped playing a while a go at an annoying boss fight but this week I stuck it on easy mode and continued on. It's a great game so far and also mostly suitable to play around my kids so they watch. The giant spiders freak us all out though...

I re-downloaded the VR game until you fall, after not playing it for a couple years. It's really fun but it's sweaty as hell fighting for my life in there XD

I'm loving "night of the dead" so much, it feels so much like pubg lite modded into a single player game (to the point I suspect it's that or something similar), it's got a pretty big open world with buildings that for the most part make sense, you can tell the devs put a lot of effort into making it feel cohesive even if the inside layout of some buildings doesn't make that much sense. I'm not big on the tower defense aspect of it but it's growing on me.

If you have a reason to and/or interest in introducing your littlest ones to video games, "king boo" is really good, mind you it's for really small children, great as a self rewarding teaching time to learn about controlling their frustrations and it also works as a reward for good behavior. I call it the dark souls of 3 yearolds (no combat, only vibes).

Kingdom Come Deliverance. Occasionally it's a bit tedious but I appreciate a Fantasy RPG without the fantasy as a change of pace, particularly since I enjoy history of that period. I've liked it enough that I'm doing a Hardcore run straight after, and taking away much of the UI clutter is something I appreciate (especially with a mod to remove the compass altogether). Not to mention not relying on quest markers adds another element of immersion which would probably annoy me on a first run but adds something to the second run.

I just finished Batman Arkham Knight and started Breath of The Wild... So far I'm liking it!

I don't know if I'm so noob, but I'm feeling Zelda is a bit harder at the start than Batman lol.

  • Project Zomboid
  • Idling to Rule the gods (free)
  • Blade & Sorcery (VR)

Started another playtrough of Kenshi.

Finished Hitman 2 the other day, now working on the third. It's... alright I guess. Starting to get a little boring and repetitive.

Compared to 2, 3 also feels more linear imo.

How so? Except for the final mission I guess.

If you only play it for the story, they all have the same amount of linearity. The real value is in the exploration and replayability, doing all the missions again to see what you’ve missed.