What games are you playing now?

Oh man yeah, that's a game I keep telling myself that I simply must replay, Elex. Maybe later this year, and I hope you have a great journey there!

I finished Dying Light, and now I'm playing The Following. It's an expansion, but it seems to have as much content as a full game.

It was my second time finishing Dying Light, but this is my first time playing The Following. It's basically more of the same but in a very different environment compared to the main game. It also adds a vehicle and a new skill tree.

Originally Posted by Carnifex
Oh man yeah, that's a game I keep telling myself that I simply must replay, Elex. Maybe later this year, and I hope you have a great journey there!

Thank you. It's a bit disorienting to jump back into the middle of a game after such a long break, but it's all coming back to me now, and I'm having a great time.

Now this is weird.
For so many years of ignoring Warhammer games, I've bought WH40K: Mechanicus on the cheap for Switch and. . . praise the Omnissiah, this is a d*mn fine game!

Any good game recommendations for a WH newbie, my fellow geeks / Henry Cavill wannabes? (the only one I'm familiar aside Adeptus Mechanicus is the age old Space Hulk game on Amiga)

Still playing to Skyrim and discovering the Survival mode. Food (and sleeping) is now actually useful. You now think twice before jumping in a lake of icy cold water. And you get to know the land so much better when you can't just warp around. The adventure feels so much more real.

After finally concluding my run in Divided Reigns, and clearing out my winter/gift back log, I'm replaying Grandia 2. I last played this one seven years ago so I'm quite looking forward to jumping back into this world!

I've been playing Horizon: Forbidden West.

I'm not far enough to write any kind of real review (~17 hours) but I've played enough to have some solid impressions of the game. I'll do it in tried and true pros and cons format.

Pros:
Jaw-droppingly gorgeous. The textures, the lighting, the animation…everything is top notch. In fact, most things take the previous understanding of top notch and find a new level. One of the most impressive things (on the PS5) is the draw distance. I have never seen a game that looks this good this far away.

Excellent combat. It's not much different than the first game, but it doesn't need to be. Lots of fun tools to play with (including some new ones) and a huge variety of enemies (saying they're all robots is showing a massive lack of imagination).

Smart gameplay changes. Crafting was good in the first game, but it's even better in the sequel. I like how there's no crafting menu per se; instead, you craft directly from the item or ammo selection screens (that was true for the latter in its predecessor, but not the former). Traversal is more varied and more fun. There were a lot of times in Zero Dawn when I ran all over the place to find the correct avenue to get up to a collectable. Boring. Now you can actually climb. Jumping on things is easier and smoother. The hang glider thingie is very satisfying to use. The pullcaster is useful for puzzles. Oddball side note: never has moving blocks around been this smooth. Usually there's a sense of being in a locked grid and it being too easy to hang up on things. In this case it feels like you're moving them over a continuous surface at any angle, and you don't get blocked by pebbles.

Music. Very good and varied score. Every time I notice it, it's a positive. The music was probably good in the first game too (same people created it) but I can't say I honestly remember. Sound effects are good. One thing I do remember is the great effects for the dinos and that's still the case.

Haptic feedback (PS5 only). Never thought about this before in any game. In fact, I often turn vibration off. But it really adds a lot to TFW because of the range of different degrees and types of tactile feedback it provides.

Story. The writing is good, the characters are good, the lore is excellent, and the voice acting is superb. But…

Cons:
The only criticism I have (and it's a mild criticism) is that they got kinda carried away with their motion capture/facial animation stuff. It's very, VERY good, and I think that's the problem. Every conversation is fully animated, no matter how minor, and characters tend to emote a lot. There are gestures to emphasize a lot of what they say, and their facial expressions change constantly. Most of the time this simply adds to the scenes. But sometimes it's imo too much. They could have stood to dial it back around 10-20%.

I know I'm back a little early this time, sorry

But gaming is a bit on overload this month - and it's hard not to engage in some exchange about it!

My (long-awaited) vacation is coming up - and I'm kinda struggling to pick a game to focus on.

I got myself a PS5 as the price finally dropped to something I can accept. Obviously, I had to get myself Horizon Forbidden West - as I mostly enjoyed the first game.

Honestly, I bought it primarily because I wanted a decent PS5 showcase - but I have to say I'm very impressed.

It's much, much better than the first game in the ways that matter the most to me, which includes progression, exploration, immersion and even the story.

Now, I'm only ~15-20 hours into it (it's BIG) - so who knows how it all comes together, but it's definitely one of the very best AC clones so far.

In fact, I think it's on par with my favorite AC (Valhalla) - or even better.

Then they had to go and release 1.5 for Cyberpunk - and I've tested it quite a bit by now. They seem to have fixed 90% of my issues with the game - and it's the one game I really want to play the most - but I also know there's a lot more coming for it, and mods need to be updated for the new patch.

Beyond that, there's Elex 2 - which was basically the game I planned my vacation around.

While I wasn't a huge fan of Elex - I did end up really liking it after a bit of modding. Elex 2 looks better in most ways - and I've never not enjoyed a PB game in the end.

As for Elden Ring - it certainly looks like a great game for Souls fans. I'm calling bullshit on the 97 Metacritic score, though - as I'm hearing several reviewers gloss over certain issues, like heavy stuttering and no 60+ FPS support for PC.

Beyond that, while the game looks good (not that great to me, honestly) - there's absolutely nothing about it that seems to justify the 10/10 scores - beyond reviewer bias and hysteria. I felt the very same way about Witcher 3 and CP 2077 by the way.

Maybe I'm wrong, though - and I certainly don't need another huge RPG right now.

Really trying to get into Valheim. I just don't get the hype, maybe it's single player, but it just feels uninteresting. I won't give up just yet.

Im on the cyberpunk 2077 replay, 83h in it, finished all gigs and ncpd stuff, now im into the side missions.

I'm two days into replaying Grandia Two, and having a decent time with it. I'd forgotten this is one of those games that you cannot save just anywhere, so that's really the only downside I'm experiencing, to date.

I spent a few hours playing Assassin's Creed: Valhalla during the current free promotion.

I've done the prologue island and explored a few parts of Norway so far, and I'm already losing interest.

The environments are very drab. Other than the snow, all I see is shades of brown. That, and it seems like a step backwards from AC: Odyssey in the graphics department in general. At least it's well optimized. It runs really smooth with everything maxed on my aging system.

The other elements are "ok". It's what I've come to expect from an AC game. The combat is visceral, but there isn't a whole lot of variety, and it's mostly the typical checklist type of gameplay as before. I might try to advance the story a little further, but I don't see myself investing much in this.

Originally Posted by JDR13
I've done the prologue island and explored a few parts of Norway so far, and I'm already losing interest.

The environments are very drab. Other than the snow, all I see is shades of brown. That, and it seems like a step backwards from AC: Odyssey in the graphics department in general.

Get to England. They aren't and it isn't.

Originally Posted by JFarrell71
Get to England. They aren't and it isn't.

Well, so far, they most definitely are.

About how many hours does it take to reach England if I just focused on advancing the main quest?

Originally Posted by JDR13
Well, so far, they most definitely are.

About how many hours does it take to reach England if I just focused on advancing the main quest?

Very few. Maybe 2?

I'm doing AC Valhalla too. I was expecting another step down, but that is not the case for me! I've put in 5.5 hrs today and Sigurd just arrived back with the assassins from his world tour. I have been running around checking out all the POI though.

Originally Posted by Philistine
I'm doing AC Valhalla too. I was expecting another step down, but that is not the case for me! I've put in 5.5 hrs today and Sigurd just arrived back with the assassins from his world tour. I have been running around checking out all the POI though.

I'm about an hour or so past that point. I think how much one enjoys any AC game depends a lot on how much they like that particular setting. For me, ancient Greece was a lot more interesting and appealing than what I'm seeing in Vahalla so far.

I'm at a certain boss fight right now, and I suspect I'll be heading to the next map afterwards. Maybe I'll like that area more.

Valhalla is definitely the best AC for me, personally. Not just because of the setting - though I definitely prefer the variety of the environments in Valhalla over the largely samey areas in Origins and Odyssey.

Mostly, however, I enjoy the combat and progression. Tons and tons of skills and abilities. Oh, and the great music as well. The loot system is also a vast improvement, though - sadly - it's a little under-utilized. The unique perks aren't as impactful as I think they should have been, which would have made it a fantastic loot-hunting game as well. Plenty of cool little events and stuff to explore, too.

Beyond that, I found the writing above average - and, on occasion, quite strong. It even has quite a few meaningful examples of C&C here and there.

Out of the box, I think it's among the best open world RPGs out there.

I know Ubi is a popular target for many outlets and around the net, but I think they put out more consistent quality than they're getting credit for.

Not that there's not a ton of bland crap as well. I don't necessarily agree that all their games are copies of each other, though. At least, no more so than a lot of the more popular darlings of the media/critics.

I'm excited about Elex 2 as well, even though my now very old once premium gaming laptop might not be able to even play it. I am going to buy the game regardless when it comes out on steam very soon, and I will have a little test to see if it can run on a windows 7 gaming laptop older machine…

If it doesn't work, I will return it for a refund to steam. I know I have two hours to test it anyhow.

PB games aren't very demanding, typically - though it's hard to be sure.