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Author Topic: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.  (Read 328218 times)

Frumple

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Re: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.
« Reply #1665 on: April 26, 2022, 01:25:19 pm »

I thought that thing looked RPGmaker, but couldn't find explicit mention on the store page. It's the gameplay's kludgy or whatever, that's probably to blame, heh.
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Robsoie

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Re: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.
« Reply #1666 on: April 29, 2022, 01:57:34 pm »

Looking to get back into Jagged Alliance 2, i googled around to see where to find the very latest 1.13 mod.
It's there, at the current time it's r9370 (wow, it's far from the version i had used last time) :
https://thepit.ja-galaxy-forum.com/index.php?t=msg&th=24648&prevloaded=1&&start=0

As apparently there may be some problems with window 10, i used this :
https://thepit.ja-galaxy-forum.com/index.php?t=msg&th=24787&start=0&
as it only involved dropping 3 files from the DXWrapper utility into the game directory and things worked completely right. But to be honest i had not given a try without those DXWrapper files.

And the amount of new features and options between the old 1.13 version i was used to and this new one is rather amazing.
A lot of these new functionalities is due to a magic coder genius nicknamed Flugente :
https://thepit.ja-galaxy-forum.com/index.php?t=thread&frm_id=283&

I also noticed an option that is probably new "Logical Bodytypes" that will display on your mercs during gameplay (and on every soldiers in the game) the actual equipment he has instead of the generic troops visuals the game had. That must have been a gigantic amount of artwork to do (especially with all the soldiers sprite facing directions), but it works really great.

I also wanted a second install of JA2 but without the 1.13 mod that change so much the gameplay, but default JA2 may be problematic on modern OS, and there were many bugs left unfixed in the latest official patch.
But no more problem, there's the Stracciatella Project that deals with that and is still very developped.
https://ja2-stracciatella.github.io/

And no need of the dxwrapper files for this to work out of the box, it's just fantastic for those that only want the original JA2 gameplay but with all the fixes and capable of running on multiple modern OS.
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scriver

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Re: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.
« Reply #1667 on: April 29, 2022, 05:48:54 pm »

God I wish JA2 had ever gotten a sequel...
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Frumple

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Re: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.
« Reply #1668 on: April 29, 2022, 06:05:00 pm »

There's been a smattering of stuff like that (mostly of a "be careful what you wish for" nature, looking at it), plus JA3 development was announced just last year by these folks, who among other things did Tropico 3-5. So hey, there's options and fairly likely to be more coming.
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Robsoie

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Re: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.
« Reply #1669 on: April 29, 2022, 06:07:11 pm »

Didn't heard about it before, but looking around for some explanation about some 1.13 new settings, i noticed there's actually a Jagged Alliance 3 from THQnordic coming soon .
Trailer : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48b3BIU7vVY
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1084160/Jagged_Alliance_3
Judging from the short gameplay part of that trailer, it's using the xcom2 engine for the battles (so the game will run on the unrealengine apparently)
« Last Edit: April 29, 2022, 06:12:37 pm by Robsoie »
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scriver

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Re: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.
« Reply #1670 on: April 30, 2022, 01:38:16 am »

There's been a smattering of stuff like that (mostly of a "be careful what you wish for" nature, looking at it), ng.

No you misunderstand me, I mean there were no sequels *wink wink*

Cool to hear about that new one though, I will have to follow it. Xcom isn't exactly what I'd prefer for a JA game but I liked them, at least.
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Rolan7

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Re: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.
« Reply #1671 on: May 01, 2022, 12:08:53 pm »

It's all moot since I won't be playing XCOM 2 ever again.  Friday it crashed my new-ish video card so hard that it wouldn't operate again until I left my computer unplugged for an hour, then manually re-enabled my video card in the device manager.  Saturday after turning the settings way down, it did the same thing after just a few minutes...  so fuck it.  That might not be their fault but I'm definitely staying away.
Okay well, I saw there was an update (I hadn't cleared the HD space quite yet) and gave it another try on minimum graphics settings (instead of merely reduced).  No problems today.  The update was probably for War of the Chosen, but whatever.  My GPU fan still spins up hard while I'm in the base, but seems to calm down when I'm in missions.

So, credit where it's due.
Loading times are still really long compared to War of the Chosen which is stupid, but whatever.  Also I've yet to actually confirm that. 
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Robsoie

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Re: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.
« Reply #1672 on: May 01, 2022, 12:39:39 pm »

Try to limit your xcom2 max fps , either from your gpu device utilities or with riva tuner, this will help your gpu not going insane with its fans or getting 100% gpu load for nothing.
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Mephansteras

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Re: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.
« Reply #1673 on: May 02, 2022, 12:23:27 pm »

Loading times are still really long compared to War of the Chosen which is stupid, but whatever.  Also I've yet to actually confirm that.

It is very true. It has to do with a bunch of map/mission stuff that got optimized in WotC. No idea why they haven't gone back and updated the base game with those fixes, though.

I think there is a mod out there that does similar stuff for the base game.
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Robsoie

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Re: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.
« Reply #1674 on: May 03, 2022, 06:35:59 am »

Having decided to go with Stracciatella instead of 1.13 as i wanted to replay this time with the original game balance and features but with bugfixes and other non-vanilla breaking improvements, i finally managed to take the SAM site near Drassen so i can finally get some use of Skyrider.

But man, it was much harder than i remembered when i did in 1.13 , mostly because of the very limited choice in guns (only basic pistols up to that point) as i play with options mostly on normal with the JA2 options, not on plenty and the only good guns at early game are the ones that are default equipment from some of the AIM mercs (Reaper and his nice Colt Commando by example).

Fortunately at that point of the game the opposition isn't really having much better so it overall equalize the field somehow.
But unfortunately couldn't find a wire cutter anywhere, and the online shop had none yet, so i had to plan my night assault from the SAM site gates instead of trying to infiltrate from the wire fences.

The battle was divided in 2 parts, the gates/building and the location with all the SAM as both area of the map had their troops, with the gates/building having a lot more opposition. So the 2nd part was much easier.

And despite all odds, my team prevailed, but we lost my IMP and Nails, one of my AIM merc , both were knocked out by a grenade (i wasn't expecting one there) and enemies focused fire on both while they were incapacited, sad but not that unexpected.
Fortunately they were avenged by Reaper and Raider .

Surprisingly considering how hurt she was Ira survived in the end of that battle , unfortunately Raider decided to call it a quit and refused the extension of the contract, having other things to do.
Maybe related to his wife (the AIM merc Raven ) having been killed in a mission somewhere else (wanted to recruit her along Raider but she was already taken by an external job), hopefully i'll be able to re-hire him once his external assignement will be complete, assuming he survived it.

Next direction : going all the way to take Chitzena (far from here but it's always the easiest town to take after Drassen, and it has a mine too for more money making), this will also improve the gun selection at the Bobby Ray online shop. Reaper got a NVG out of the SAM site battle, so he'll be able to spot things further away at night.

M.E.R.C. website also opened , so i could hire mercs Biff and his secret crush Flo (Flo is my favorite character to try to keep alive and level up) as a replacement for Raider and the deceased Nails, not a good exchange in term of quality but certainly more funny and way cheaper :D
From now then, it seems everyone has some level of body armor, so normal and HP ammo become vastly inferior to AP one.
Only use of normal/HP ammo is in the case you run into Bloodcats, those damned beasts, fortunately it's rare so AP ammo all the way.
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Robsoie

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Re: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.
« Reply #1675 on: May 07, 2022, 10:32:18 am »

Since i got it for free on the epic store last summer, i have been playing very erratically with Control.

It's a game that i found strangely paced and that at first was putting on me some level of anxiety that no other games did before (even supposed horror games), and probably why my play time was so erratic. I wondered if it was the incredibly well done very oppressive bizarre atmosphere or the insane difficulty at first (dying so fast so easily). 

But after grinding a bit and getting some health upgrade i started to notice that i nearly never died anymore , that lowered half ot the pressure i felt (the oppressive environment still oppress :D ) .
And then when things started to get a bit repetitive is when the game genius start to appear : you will unlock some superpowers to your character by doing some special tasks, and you can craft more guns with different effect (shotgun-like, sniper-like, machinegun-like etc...) and improve them with weapon mods you're grinding through, and also improve the guns amount of equippable weapon mods so you end with weapon of massive enemies annihilation.
 
And why it is genius as other games do that too ? it's because it opens you a lot of options and possibilities to play and fight, changing a very lot the actual gameplay for the better.
While at first the repetition of those battles were going to be just annoying in the long term, it ceased to be annoying when you could then do those many battles from a lot of different ways, using very different methods and etc...

How about throwing part of the environment, walls or anything to the face of your enemies ? With one of the superpowers you can find, it's possible and hilarious fun.
How about possessing enemies (that were already people possessed by the "Hiss") and make them fight each other ? With another superpower you can find, it's really enjoyable
Those homing rockets coming at you ? Either make superpowered dodges while laughing at the enemy attempts or grab the rocket mid flight with psychic power and send them back !

And as i just unlocked today, why run and sprint ? Just fly like Superman ! That is so delightfull (and as if it was a metroid/vania allow to reach even more areas of the already truly massive game zones) especially when you can use guns and other powers while flying.

So overall Control is a game that gameplay start very average and gets boring but that will become much better the longer you'll play it due to the new options you'll unlock to deal with things. Probably why i felt it was strangely paced.
« Last Edit: May 07, 2022, 10:35:16 am by Robsoie »
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Robsoie

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Re: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.
« Reply #1676 on: May 08, 2022, 07:02:52 am »

Learned something about terrible bad game design regarding Control, or that's probably just another case in which developers do not play in depth (or at all) their own games.

In Control when you start to complete some of the main story missions, in the game main menu there will be a "Mission Select" option that will be added.
This will allow to replay storyline missions you had completed without restarting a new game. That sounds nice, well if it was designed as you would expect it to be.

What happens in practice : when a storyline mission appears in your current playthrough (basically when you complete the previous storyline mission) , a special save is made and is added to the Mission Select option.
Then when you select a mission in the Mission Select option of the game main menu, it will in fact load your character state as it was when this mission appeared.

So far nothing wrong.

But where it goes wrong is that if you load a mission in that Mission Select it will -overwrite- you main saved game, making you lose everything done after.
You may think "oh, but to get back to my progress, i'll just have to load the latest mission in Mission Select"

And you're then going for a shock.
Because it means everything you did after the main storyline mission you unlocked last will be lost (every side missions you may have completed after your last unlocked main mission, every points gained, upgrades you have done, mods found, collectibles discovered etc...) definitively.

So because you can't make manual saves or your own custom saves, there are 2 solutions to not lose a lot of your progress :
- always BACK UP your current save -before- you want to use the Mission Select mode
- never play a mission through the Mission Select mode.


Save location for Control : https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/Control#Save_game_data_location

« Last Edit: May 08, 2022, 07:05:59 am by Robsoie »
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Iceblaster

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Re: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.
« Reply #1677 on: May 08, 2022, 08:07:31 pm »

Wobbledogs is fun.

they wobble, they're dogs, and they get horribly inbred really quickly.

Robsoie

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Re: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.
« Reply #1678 on: May 11, 2022, 12:01:35 pm »

Toyed a bit with Royal Defense, that is currently free on indiegala.

The visuals are very Kingdom Rush-like, meaning they're cartoony pleasing to the eyes. It also take from it the fixed emplacement for towers.
But that's unfortunately the only things that are inspired by Kingdom Rush , because under the coating you have in fact what feels like a generic tower defense that lacks the fun of what made Kingdom Rush (i remember a flash game named Incursion that was very Kingdom Rush like but was also very fun and entertaining). 

While many of those kind of games are trying to include more or less original gimmicks to improve the genre, Royal Defense does not and you could easily switch to another generic tower defense without noticing really a gameplay difference.
 
It has a ton of levels though if you like tower defense games, they're set in a few campaigns (seems like you need to complete one to unlock another), but don't be expecting too much in term of level design, because each levels will actually appear 2 times during a campaign, only the enemies or a tower emplacement will change so variety isn't great despite the number of levels.

Out of this, you have the usual tower defense grinding to do, meaning some levels are impossible until you have upgraded enough your towers damage/cost/etc...
The good thing with the grinding is that when going back to a previous you can use your upgraded/unlocked towers without the usual restriction (like replaying the 1st level that was originally restricted to the basic tower will allow you to use high end stuff)  and can continue to earn more coins (there's no max coin restriction by level, even already completed ones).
A bad thing is that some branching upgrade feel more like a downgrade (by example the artillery tower that can branch into rocket tower, rockets that will deal small damage to only 1 target, though at longer range, instead of the more usefull artillery big damage to big area that can destroy some dangerous enemies) or some upgrades feels not really different (the canon tower branching into machinegun tower does not seem to kill anything faster despite the increase fire speed animation).
Maybe it gets better with different branching, but i have not yet played enough to unlock more.

And there are a lot of grinding to do because each upgrade being exponentially more expensive you'll need to replay levels a lot (fortunately there's a "faster" button) to prepare for some of the harder levels.

So overall while it's a decent but mediocre tower defense game,  it's definitively not up to par with the best ones of that genre.
« Last Edit: May 11, 2022, 01:30:41 pm by Robsoie »
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Robsoie

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Re: Blurb on Games that probably don't deserve their own threads.
« Reply #1679 on: May 15, 2022, 08:07:58 pm »

Prey is really a very good game (note : it's still free to claim on the epic store until thursday and it also include the Mooncrash semi-roguelike DLC in that free base game) .

I had some odd experience with it before getting completely hooked on it.

At first the interactive prologue reminded me so strongly of the Half Life similarly interactive start that i was rather delighted as it promised some nicely immersive experience.

But quickly (once the prologue and its surprising twist quickstart the actual game) i started to like it much less as things seemed to devolve into some basic shooter with a gun that was so weak that it was near useless against anything that is not a basic mimic. 
Making you understand that you should spend most of your time running away or stealth around, but unfrotunately it seems the stealth mechanics may not be very solid, as often i was spotted despite being behind walls by enemies that shouldn't have been able to see me (yeah, despite crouching and moving slowly all the time and having the stealth 1st skill allowing crouch walk hiding). 

And much more annoying those maintenance vents, some of them are simply bugged : it seems there's a bad collision detection that block you from moving through the bugged entrance/exit, i found for those bugged parts i must approach as close as possible (just before the game automatically try to make you move your head down) and small jump toward them. Fortunately most of the vent entrance works correctly, but for the couple of ones that are super bugged, try the "be very close then mini jump inside of them"

So for a while i was wondering if that was going to the same "not really good" game for hours as i felt it was (though the Gloo gun is fantastic), but still i continued to play as i remembered having read so many enthousiastic player reviews of that game that were hinting to what i was experiencing wasn't really going to be the whole thing.

And indeed they were right, at some point once i started to get more and more neuromods and usefull items, getting some skills from the various skill trees i finally started to get actual options instead of just running away or shoot with a pea shooter, and when i finally obtained a shotgun a big smile on my face as the thing really hurt .

Finally i felt the actual game was starting : i could make traps, i could stealth move around better (not just crouching), i could use the verticality (jump/skill power jum or use the gloo gun to build some self made ladder or even go into space :D ) of most of the areas to find alternative ways to avoid enemies, i could repair stuff, hack computer and enemies and etc... lots of options and things to do to deal with the opposition now . 

 And that without even mentionning the tons of more strange abilities you can get if you invest in the various alien skill trees (you can keep at using the human skill tree too, as depending on your choice the ending will change and depending on you using alien stuff or not, and some of the game mechanic can also be impacted (remember those protective turrets detecting aliens and saving your sorry ass sometime ? imagine what happens if there's too much alien dna in you :D ).

It's really that good, once you get out of the time between the end of the prologue and when you finally get access to more items and neuromods the game will start to shine and click with the player completely. 

A tip : ammo is more sparce than you would think and that shotgun is so good you want to shoot all the time with it :D
But the mineral type of material is used a lot in anything you can fabricate, including ammo, so make sure to not waste any shots as you may run out of that material to craft more when you need it the most, try to deal with most stuff by filling them with enough goo so they can't move for a few seconds and use that time to strike them with the wrench as hard as you can. At least it's ammo free.
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