A positive thread about what you're currently playing

Played Mario Superstar Baseball & Mario Strikers for the GC again recently. The Mario sports games are just perfectly simple and fun, I really hope they bring some to the Swicth other than the inevitable Golf and Tennis.

I haven't really played anything religiously for one or two months now

I've been playing Snatcher and it's pretty cool. Seeing Metal Gear mk2 and going to places like "Outer Heaven" makes me wish I played this game before I got super into MGS. It's really revealing to see one of the first games from the mind of MGS, one of the few series I've really followed over the years. The whole experience adjusts my impression of Kojima slightly. It's nice to see some of his sensibilities presented that far back like the mk2 introduction when you initially only see a big shadow revealed to be coming from a smaller object, a callback made in MGS2 with a Vulcan action figure. Also present are playful moments that break up the seriousness or the earnestness of the work, which is not a Kojima thing but a Japanese thing.

The highlight so far has been the sound. The music is very cool and puts me in the setting. there are sound effects that are really satisfying to hear. The voice work has the quality of cartoons of the era which takes me back and almost warms my heart. It wouldn't be considered good today but there is almost a tangible quality that makes you feel the time and place the game was made in. I like the visuals too and the way the characters are drawn, right up my alley.

It's also nice to play a style of game I've only played through to completion once. (This type of adventure game would be considered today's visual novels right?)

I picked up Severed on the Wii U when it was half off at one point earlier this year. I didn't know anything about the game and didn't really look into it much beyond watching the trailers posted here on the site and checking metacritic to see that it got some rather favorable reviews (only checking numbers without actually reading any, because yeah I am a guy who does that sometimes). I really just was looking to have more excuses to bust out my Wii U, though I didn't expect much of Severed and figured I'd probably only play it for an hour or so be like "yeah that was neat but eh I'm good" if I ever even bothered to play it at all.

But when I did play it I (kinda surprisingly) quickly started to rather adore this game.

It's a first person dungeon crawler type game, only the combat is this kinda novel "use the stylus to swipe kinda fruit ninja style to hack and slash and parry against some enemies that seem to be designed using the skyward sword mold" sort of thing that I find works quite well. While you're exploring the dungeons enemies generally appear as ominous flames in a particular location and you have to approach them to start the fight, then you're shown what enemies you'll be fighting against before the actual fighting starts. You often fight enemies in groups, though you can only look at one enemy at a time.

The fighting takes place in real time. You are stationary during combat, for the most part the only thing you control is what enemy you're looking at and your slashing, which you will have to time and aim to best attack or successfully parry enemy attacks. Part of the challenge is you have to juggle your attention to wherever it's needs to be at any moment, but there are indicators on screen which clearly tell you when each enemy you are up against is getting ready to attack so you can quickly and easily see "oh shit I need to look over there now" and then you just have to hit the d-pad to change what enemy you are looking at in time to attack or defend yourself. Enemies have distinct attack patterns or behaviors so if you know the individual enemy types you're facing well enough you can pretty quickly develop your strategy to best deal with whatever combinations of enemies the game throws at you.

It actually reminds me of Doom in the way that the enemies are fairly distinct so they are easily able to keep combat fresh by tweaking the amount of and mix of enemies that they throw at you, and I find the combat itself is just rather fun and manages to be challenging while always feeling quite achievable, which is a thing I don't feel many games pull off as well as I'd like. Beating a particularly tough fight feels quite satisfying, whether you pull it off without taking a scratch or barely survive with just a sliver of health. But when I die I usually see why I fucked up so it's never frustrating and in fact I've been quite eager to jump in and put my knew knowledge into practice to try once more to defeat the enemy at hand.

The "penalty" for death in Severed is also not at all bad and actually can be kinda helpful as you just spawn back super quick with full health (even if you had been wounded before you got into the fight) right next to where you died so you can jump right back into the fight you failed. This is another thing that keeps it from being frustrating.

There's a character upgrade system, if you combo your attacks without taking too many hits or being blocked too many times then you fill up a meter, and when you kill an enemy with the meter full you go into a slow mo mode where you have a bit of time you can sever certain body parts off of the monster you were fighting, and these can be used to purchase upgrades like stronger attacks, taking less damage from attacks, pretty standard but useful stuff. There also seem to be some abilities that you get which let you do stuff like temporarily stun enemies, for example.

The dungeon crawling aspect of the game has been extremely limited, as it's mostly rather linear with a few hidden secrets, some of which require some light puzzle solving and/or some backtracking (probably the only real complaint I have is there does not seem to be any way to backtrack other than to literally walk aaaaaaaall the way back to something that you passed up because you were previously unable to solve it without an ability you hadn't yet received, and going back to some of the stuff you have to pass up could be sort of annoying if they don't address that somehow, but it sounds like the game can easily be 100% completed in under 10 hours without trying to hard so I guess even that is not so big of a deal).

The aesthetic is also cool and there's a story that's straightforward and sparsely told, but the various story beats have thus far been emotionally compelling and the tone is cool.

I'm not finished it yet but so far I'm really fucking digging this game, maybe in no small part because it's quite unlike anything I would typically play, so I'm very glad I gave it a shot. It's also something that really seems to just be perfect for the Wii U, I doubt it would work as well on most other consoles if it even could be adapted at all, and the stylus and big screen give it an advantage over, say, phones.

@pyromagnestir: I've been meaning to check out that game on the Vita for some time now and am glad to hear your really enjoying it.

I've recently been playing Firewatch which I am really enjoying a lot and hopefully will finish off this evening. Maybe it just hit me at the right time, the stars aligned perfectly or whatever but I am really, really captured and enamoured by that game.

I'm playing Fate Grand/Order. It's a a mobile game, one of the only two I've ever put a lot of time into. The combat system is a lot of fun and the story is surprisingly in-depth and entertaining once you get past the extremely boring tutorial and prologue. Shame that the Gacha system is basically evil. I foresee this game sucking a lot of money out of me, but I'm definitely enjoying myself.

Playing Sonic Mania right now. Despite my problems with some of the more gimmicky bosses, I'm actually really liking it.

When the announcements were coming out and I saw how many stages were being re-used from the classics, I was afraid that it might turn into a nostalgia cash grab. However, many of the stages have been changed to include new mechanics, details and hazards that are consistently a nice surprise. There's also a way better sense of flow here. Some of the redesigned levels here like Flying Battery and Oil Ocean are so much better than the originals it's crazy.

The game's also chock full of references to earlier Classic Sonic games, and some of them had me either grinning like an idiot or in awe of how well-integrated they are into the game. It's that rare case where the game pays plenty of attention to its roots while not completely devolving into a "Best Of" collection.

Music's great, gameplay's smooth for the most part, the in-game cutscenes add a good amount of character when they're used, the animated intro looks flat-out amazing, and overall this really does feel like the true Sonic 4 (though I never hated that game like everyone else seems to). It's a real Classic Sonic game, all right, and so far a pretty dang great one.

I just played a VR demo called Aircar it has a bladerunner type setting the atmosphere and graphics are amazing you can fly pretty much anywhere you want in it. I highly recommend this for anybody that has Oculus.

Finished Prey, which was pretty good, nice little world they've built there but I wanted to finish it so I could move on to Persona 5.

I'm about 10 hours into Persona 5 and really enjoying it. I feel like I would be really overwhelmed if I hadn't watched the Endurance Run as I never actually played 4. I find myself nodding my head as they introduce each mechanic, recognizing the slight variations from Persona 4 and feeling immediately comfortable with the flow of the game. I hope it stays good for another 80 hours.

started playing civilization, great game

I haven't been playing anything besides Darkest Dungeon these past few weekends. I keep finding new party compositions and different ways of playing existing characters. I actually managed to complete the titular Darkest Dungeon, along with every variation of the boss encounters. The Darkest Dungeon quests seemed very intimidating at first, so I wasn't really planning on going through them, but I'm glad I did. They hide interesting mechanics and the final boss sure was something. The Crimson Court also introduces quite a few gameplay changes, and the Courtyard may be my favorite area in the game, even though it's one of the more difficult ones.

Just got to the third region of Nioh and I'm enjoying it so far. Even if I've completely given up on the story.

Should I feel guilty for ignoring plot in games? Not all games of course, but sometimes I'd rather plug some earphones in and focus on the gameplay.

Not at all. I've been playing Far Cry 3 recently, and I haven't touched a story mission since the minute I was able to ignore them. I'm having a lot more fun hunting, taking over strongholds, and doing all the different side quests.

I love good stories, but not every game has a good story.

I'm almost finished Persona 5, which is nice. I've enjoyed it, but have been coming back and forth to it. 85 hours is a bit of a slog

Been working through Ys VIII lately at a moderate pace. I'm been impressed multiple times at the size of the game. It feels pretty massive compared to other Ys games I've played, in a good way. The organic environments feel pretty nice too for a non-AAA game.

Been playing a lot of Dark Souls 2 over that past week and boy has it been growing on me since the vitriol I've had towards it after just beating Dark 1 a few months ago. At first the Pursuer was the bane of my existence, and now I can take him on the very first encounter, granted after some grinding for adaptability and getting a winged spear of which I affectionately call Toothpick. But, I am getting a little bored of my usual roly poly dex builds, so maybe it's time to try out some sort of magic. ...or save that magic shit for Skyrim and Dragon's Dogma.

Oh, and a 1060 can apparently handle this in 4K. That's cool. Nvidia DSR is a thing. Less stair steps are a good thing, right?

Tooth and Tail is probably the most interesting thing that has happened to RTS in recent memory.

Plus it plays well with a controller

I just finished horizon zero dawn great game but I feel it kinda was to long but anyways I'm glad I completed it may start up up some horror games now to get in the season.

I'm currently playing Warhammer Vermintide. TBH this game is like left4dead. The difference is just the settings. Nevertheless, I'm still having fun playing it. I started playing it last night, haven't finished it yet because of house chores.

NBA live is actually pretty good. Plays more arcade-y than 2k. Presentation gives me nostalgic from the early 2000s.

@jadves:the plot in Nioh is very worth ignoring. So is the plot in Far Cry 3! @nicksmi56:

Been playing Destiny 2. and I've been enjoying it a lot despite all these little nitpicks have. I owe a lot of this enjoyment to the fact that I played Destiny 1 after The Taken King and I always felt like I was behind my friends (which I was) and there were all these weird currencies and processes I knew nothing about. It made me really anxious when playing. So starting out at the very beginning has made this much more enjoyable.

The campaign is written so badly it's laughable and the low number of strikes is very disappointing. But the combat is top notch, the environmental and sound design are my two favorite parts, and the end game activities are much more involved and fun.

I'm raid ready and will be hitting up GB places to find some people. If you ever wanna shoot some aliens while shooting the shit add me on PSN: SloppyDetective. Just leave a GB message in the friend request.

I jumped into No Man's Sky for the first time since launch and it's actually really enjoyable. Beautiful, too, with the new graphical additions. They seem to have picked up speed on updates, too. They just patched in a bunch of things yesterday.

Wrapped up Snatcher and it was worth going through, I'll definitely check out more pre-MGS Kojima games. The last 45 mins of that game, lol, really goes for it. I wish all the info they dump at the end was more evenly distributed throughout the game but it's also kinda nice most of the game is somewhat understated given Kojima's curtain reputation. The game has great music and sound in general, some nice visuals, and an interesting world.

A little past half way Resistance: Fall of Man and I'm shocked how much I'm enjoying this game. Picked it up after seeing a blog post on the site, which rekindled my curiosity of the PS3 launch title. I really didn't expect much out of this game 'cause, though it reviewed rather well, critics always seem easy on launch games. It turns out, the PS3 had a really great shooter along side the release of its console. RFOM is just hella fun. The enemies are varied, the weapons are satisfying, and the game is, so far, is a perfect challenge. It actually reminds me of the most recent Doom in the way you have to strife and dodge attacks, as well as the speed of the combat. On top of that, no glory kills. I also love FPS games that's mostly about shooting from the hip and this is that. I wish the game had color but visually, it's crisp and moves exceedingly well.

Also, finally playing Super Metroid. Only about an hour in so don't have much to report but love the sound and aesthetics of it. Having only played Metroid Prime 1 in the series, I really like the callbacks they made. So far, it's what I expected: Level Design: The Game!

Although i have cursed several times at the game ( for it's dumb instakill you picked the wrong answer bullshit ) Divinity 2 is a real good game if you like old school top down rpg's.

Since I currently don't have access to my PC games due to issue on my HDD, I just focused on playing Ragnarok Spear of Odin. It is a hack and slash game for mobile phones. The game is interesting specially the raid where you can do it solo or with group of friends. If you're tired of PVE, you can do PVP where you can be matched to a player similar to your level range. The game is on CBT phase and there are few bugs in the game but the developers immediately addressed this issue as long as it is reported to them.

Replaying Crysis. I feel overpowered with these abilities, but the freedom of choice is just awesome. It's still more dynamic and has more impressive environments than almost every shooter out now. The guns feel and sound good. Hip fire accuracy isn't bad. It also still looks great ten years later. The people always saying realistic graphics age badly don't know what they're talking about.

Been playing the Etrian Odyssey V demo and I forgot how much I hate the beginning on EO games. Not because it's bad, but because I get bad decision paralysis. Like...really bad. The "problem" with EO is that every class and every party composition is viable. Some comps just take more work than others, but it's almost impossible to form a party that can't get through the game. So, every time I start up an EO game, the first damn near 5 hours (not even joking) is just me staring at menus and skill trees trying to come up with a "main" party lol. It's extra dumb too because it's not like there's a harsh limit on characters. You can make up to 30 right out of the gate so you don't even really have to limit yourself to be honest. Just a weird quirk of mine I guess. I can't wait for the full release. So far, it's been a bunch of EO goodness and that's exactly what I want.

Been playing Persona 5 and it is truly a work of art! I'm loving it!

I'm still playing Battlefield 1 and really enjoying it. The "In the Name of the Tsar" DLC is really good. I made a thread about it if anyone is interested, so I won't rehash much of that (although I'll add that the Federov Avtomat is dope), but Battlefield 1 has managed to keep me coming back for what's coming up on a year now, and it's rare that games (especially multiplayer first-person shooters) hold my attention that long. That list otherwise is seriously just OG Titanfall in recent memory, and then I have to reach back all the way to the CoD: MW days.

I just feel like people don't talk enough about Battlefield 1, relative to its quality. It plays well, sounds great, and looks as good as just about anything out there. About the only criticisms I can come up with are pretty trivial in the grand scheme of things. The progression is pretty slow, but that's the way games are going now, and it's not as dangle-the-carrot as most. I wish the DLC release schedule was a little quicker, but I can't complain about the quality of the first two bits of DLC at all. The mantling on some objects is occasionally frustrating, but the overall player movement/speed is solid. Oh, and I wish you could view/adjust loadouts during the matchmaking. That's about all I got complaint-wise in an otherwise great game.

Also, the campaign is strong. I still go back and replay a few of the missions every now and again, and they're still fun and often a visual showcase. It's "cinematic" without leaning too hard into the "everything is exploding around you constantly" thing that many FPS games do, and most of the stories are believable enough, though occasionally cheesy. I was surprised how not-campy and genuinely affecting several of them were, though. They were all worth playing for one reason or another, and overall it was the best time I've had with an FPS campaign since Wolfenstein: The New Order.

TL;DR: Battlefield 1 is still really good and fun, even nearly a year later. Play it if you haven't. It's even on sale on Xbox right now, I believe.

I've decided to re-play the entire Mass Effect series as a run-up to playing my recently purchased cheap copy of Andromeda. I've got to re-playing Mass Effect 3, and splurged on the Leviathan and Citadel DLC (already had Omega from earlier). I'm reminded why despite all the ending shenanigans that was my favorite game in the series. My opinion of Mass Effect 1 grew even more, so I think that's my new favorite (I suppose I'm a hipster who likes ME2 the least now, despite that game still being one of my absolute favorites of all time), but I'm pretty sure I like ME3 more than ever. It looks gorgeous (game's five years old now and I swear it looks better than some stuff coming out today, and runs super smooth), and I still maintain it contains the best moments in the entire series (The ends of the Tuchanka and Rannoch arcs in particular are both amazing). I love the way it really sets up the feeling of dread as the Reapers are taking over the galaxy and various locations get more and more beat up, it's very good at making it feel like you're living in the end days and fighting a loosing war against an overwhelming apocalyptic force. I think this, plus being overshadowed by the ending controversy, is what makes the game often be seen as weaker than ME2: Its focus is in a pretty different spot from the first two, being much more of a tone piece than a story-driven experience. The cast of characters is also great, as one would expect from BioWare, and the characters that have been with you since Mass Effect 1 are particularly strong (especially Ashley and Liara, back from a somewhat lacking showing in the second game, Liara in LotSB aside).

Leviathan is a fun little romp. It has my respect for answering a question I didn't think needed answering and making me glad it got answered, and the journey to get there has plenty of fun setpieces and intriguing little moments. It's a far step from the underwhelming Omega DLC, and stands up to the very high standard that Mass Effect 2's DLC set. It's a real good piece of lore with a bunch of fun action setpieces attached to it.

The thing I really want to celebrate is Citadel though. Holy shit! The actual story of the DLC is fine. It's a fairly unremarkable and surprisingly shlocky little action romp with a decent amount of good character banter and several attempts at implementing new mechanics, all at varying levels of success. It's a good amount of fun, definitely worth the time it takes to play through. But the stuff after that? Wow! A full new area on the Citadel that looks incredible, with tonnes of environmental details, "pass-by" conversations and absolute boatloads of things to do, including decently-sized (and mostly excellent) dialogue scenes for most of the main characters from ME3 and a good amount of ones from ME1 and ME2, a fully functional horde-mode score-attack arena thing where you get to use and level up damn near the entire party from both the previous games with their skills re-imagined to fit the updated ME3 skill system, a tonne of fun little space-arcade games and, most importantly, a fantastic final party that's funny and nostalgic all in one, designed to serve as a final hurrah for one of the greatest casts of characters in all of videogames. Honestly, Citadel could not have had story content at all and just been the stuff you unlock after it and been worth the asking price. As stands, Citadel is by far my favorite piece of DLC for any video game (unless you count full expansion packs like Oblivion's Shivering Isles as DLC) and far surpasses any other DLC in the Mass Effect series. I say this as someone who for years held up Mass Effect 2 as the shining beacon of DLC quality, the game that really set the bar and never really got surpassed. Lair of the Shadow Broker, Zaeed, Kasumi and the criminally underappreciated Overlord were all absolutely fantastic pieces of content. Citadel blows it all out of the water. It honestly might be the absolute best part of the Mass Effect series, which is one of the absolute best video game series of all time.

Turns out that Dead by Daylight is a pretty good game. While I haven't played as a killer yet, I'm having a ball skulking about as a survivor and desperately trying to stay one step ahead of the psychos chasing me. In many ways, the game lacks the breadth of play options as Friday the 13th but it is more polished and matchmaking isn't such a drag.

One day Bill will escape this nightmare but until then I'm going to enjoy limping over the finish line with some blood-soaked, knife-wielding lunatic hot on my heels.

Pillars of Eternity - it's freaking amazing! I wish there were more games like this, especially on ps4!

I'm playing Silent Hill Shattered Memories on PS2 this game deserves a HD remake for current systems it's criminally underrated the atmosphere is a 10 for me.

Destiny 2, i'm actually shocked at how much of an honest to goodness time i'm having with it. I played the original Destiny for over 400 hours and probably complained every second of it. They've done so many smart things to this one that there is very little I complain about :)

Playing WWE Smackdown here comes the pain on PCSX2 don't have my old copy anymore man this game is so much better then the new WWE games hands down I haven't had this much fun with a wrestling game in years.

My quest to completely defeat my backlog continues!

I just beatPillars of Eternityand had a real good time with it. The writing is frequently exceptional -- descriptive, deep, somewhat purple but fittingly so, and has the dark edge that Planescape: Torment did. It shares a lot of themes with it, too: past lives, lost memories, and the bearing both have in a fresh, changed (or unchanged depending on your choices) mind/soul that must decipher them to find peace and change the world. There are many NPCs you have the ability to delve into, glimpsing their past lives, and the writing there often shines brightest of all. They're a nice distraction, but too often they're placed directly next to each other, so it felt like a chore to read two or three one after the other. They should've been more spread out.

The companion quests (bar one) are emotionally resonant, tackle difficult and interesting issues subtly and with quiet grace, and aren't like any other I've done in an RPG, really. The fickle nature of memories in Pillars makes for an excuse to weave some very unusual inner turmoil for its characters, and they take that opportunity pretty far. How everyone in the world hasn't gone completely insane is a miracle.

Oh, it's also absolutely gorgeous.

I also beat Warhammer: Space Marine. The first nine chapters are serviceable as a TPS and, despite not having a hugely complicated or lengthy story, held my interest. It gets pretty epic and interesting after that, though -- huge, unsubtle acts of evil and planet-shaking chaos. It's quite the ride, and of course the character designs are dope as hell. Voice-acting is damn good, too. I wish it had a deeper story and better mechanics, but it was a great introduction to the universe for me.

I'm currently half-way through Eternal Darkness, and 18 hours into Mafia III. Enjoying both quite a bit. Mafia started off terribly in my opinion -- I think the first 90 mins are laughably goofy -- but it gets its footing eventually, and delivers on the setting more than it fails.

Windjammers - It is some dumb fun to wind down with. My internet is dodgy at the moment and so all of my online runs at ~400ms. It makes it real hard to be competitive...

Going through the DLCs for The Evil Within. Just completed the 1st of 3, The Assignment, and it's pretty solid. I thought they largely squandered the potential the story had in the base game but they are realizing some of it in this DLC. It's a pretty short but tense piece of content that layers and attaches to the vanilla TEW nicely right down the production level. I'm excited to jump into the next one, The Consequence.

Also, started Sly 2 and it's a good juxtaposition of gaming playing it along side TEW. The vibe is soo funky and it makes you see how vastly different games can be. Compare to the original, while it does look very much the same, the structure is completely new. I'm still pretty early so I'm not sure how I feel about that but it does reinforce your role as a thief. The addition of other playable characters is nice as well. So far, it's definitely a welcome, lighter, breezier experience to the ridiculously dark and dingy pallet of the aforementioned horror game. And the music is really great!

Never thought I'd say I was playing 3 games at once, but that's where we're at.

My main game nowadays is Far Cry 3. This game capitalizes perfectly on my side quest obsession. There's always something to do, and just going around filling up the map is a good time. The gunplay feels good, the hunting feels strategic and worthwhile thanks to crafting, and I love how I can feel myself gradually getting more and more comfortable with the island. And as much as I'd like to just become ridiculously strong overnight, locking certain skills behind the amount of story missions you've done is a good way to make sure you're not running through the game on God Mode.

However, thanks to the game's terrible screen crunch on my TV, I've had to set up shop on the big screen downstairs so I can read the really small text. Since that TV's not always available when I feel like playing, I've also been going through Mega Man 2 on my 3DS Legacy Collection. The original game gave me a really rough time while also feeling pretty bland, to the point that I nearly swore off the series after beating it. Glad I didn't, because 2 is MUCH better.

The levels have been smoothed out to focus more on platforming challenges instead of just chucking really powerful enemies your way to make sure you'd die at the boss. And because enemies aren't taking off a quarter or even half of my health each hit, I spend less time stopping and grinding smaller ones for health, meaning I can actually get a move on. The game also seems to have more personality, with the bosses being much more memorable for some reason. I actually have good memories with stages here instead of finding all of them a pain, and I like how some bosses actively try to block their weaknesses. Three more bosses until Wily and I'm ready to go all the way (even though I still dread that inevitable boss rush -_-').

The third game is New Super Mario Bros. Man, this is the first game I really FEEL was made for the DS. The levels are bite-sized enough that you can complete at least a significant amount of the world while in a car or on a bus, the graphics are pretty much made for the early hardware, and Mario even says goodbye when you put the system in rest mode, greeting you when you turn it back on. Otherwise, yep, it's another 2D Mario, with all the fun of one. My favorite new addition to these games has always been Star Coins, which I'm glad to see come back here. And I like that Mega Mushrooming your way through a level means you'll probably miss one or two. Wanna get everything? Do it the proper way. Sadly, because the worlds are so short, I'd probably blow through it in a day or two if I played it exclusively, so I've relegated it to traveling only. Still I have good fun with it when I do bust it out.

Still making my way through Nier Automata. I ran into a superfast car that's also a head and also a shop, and it's got an amazing theme playing out of a radio on its back. Storywise I'm sort of struggling. A lot of stuff is happening, and some of it is cool, but I feel like I haven't got a clue what's actually going on and my characters don't want to know. It's frustrating and gives me the feeling that they're saving all those revelations for the other routes, but the way they make sure you don't know what's going on is just to straight up never tell you a thing. It's not a great surprise, or feels very clever, if there's some more behind the scenes stuff when the protagonists never try to investigate anything. Because at this point I feel like you could have had just a single route if 2B had half the brains I did and maybe questioned an order or two. It's like if there was a version of Undertale where you had to kill every monster your first playthrough before you even get the option of being smart and not doing it.

Still, it's pretty fun. They've started dropping in new enemies that are more fun to fight than the early ones. I also ran into a conversation with the giant robot that's just a head that Alex mentioned on the Beastcast, and I'm interested to see where that takes me. Besides all that I'm still playing Street Fighter V. They dropped a ton of new DLC content yesterday including costumes, different music packs and a beautiful remake of a classic Street Fighter 2 stage. Finally got a new costume for my main dude Birdie, too. He looks terrifying.

It's just still a cool game. I played it for hours yesterday, and when you get matched up with someone around your level, it's so much fun to play.

I got a Switch while visiting sales tax free Oregon this past weekend, so I've been playing Zelda. For me that game embodies the idea that there is a line between great games and the best games. I think Breath of the Wild crosses that threshold via a strong sense of minimalism. It feels like every single pixel on screen is there for a reason; the visuals make the world feel alive without ever being overwhelming (e.g. blindly riding through the forests of Witcher 3 with an embarrassment of trees up in your grill).

Finished a really hard fight in Divinity: Original Sin 2 with under 100 health on my main character and everyone else in my party dead, then finished 2 bossfights in Cuphead. Really having to concentrate and work for the wins in those games and the occasional round of pubg seems to be somewhat rejuvenating my enjoyment of games in general, which seemed to be dwindling lately.

Sonic 2 is great. For the most part, the levels move a lot quicker than Sonic 1 which devolved into a good (albeit standard) platformer. I can see why some people see this as the quintessential Sonic. I've qualified that a bit as I've not ventured into Sonic and Knuckles. Probably the last classic Sonic to retain some of those original, cleaner aesthetics. Sonic 3 just looks a bit weird opening in these rugged forest environments.

I've been playing Golf Story quite a bit the last few days. It hides a surprisingly deep, challenging, and satisfying game of golf underneath a frequently whimsical facade. It's perfectly suited for the Switch, in that no single activity takes longer than about 10 minutes, but you can also easily get lost in it for multiple hours at a time. Another gem in an already loaded year!

The other day in Far Cry 3, I was going to take over an outpost. I was sneaking my way over and everything is normal until I hear one of the pirates scream "TIGER!!!!" Instead of everyone in the camp being mauled like last time, they manage to chase it away thanks to the help of a turret and a guy with Molotovs.

However, the genius with Molotovs throws one at the tiger as it's running away, setting the field I'm hiding in on fire. Two of them are chasing after the tiger to finish it off, so I pop out of the bushes and take them out before I'm barbecued. Unfortunately, that means the camp knows I'm here. The alarm goes off and reinforcements are coming.

Trying to beat the clock (and the fire), I sprint into camp and take out the last guy, who was manning the turret. I take over the turret and wait. The first wave of reinforcements tries to cut through the field to avoid the turret's line of fire, but the fire's spread so far at that point that they're killed instantly. The second wave pulls right up to the front gate, but I mow them down with the turret.

And right after everything's said and done, a rainstorm comes over and puts out the fire.

That's only one of a bunch of stories I could tell to illustrate how great this game is ^_^

Played through a game I meant to but kinda kept forgetting about, Frog Fractions. It was very charming and some of it really clicked with me but a lot of the references did fly past me. I remembered the "trick" in the beginning from when the Crew revealed it during GOTY so that did spoil some of the fun but I still enjoyed my time with the game. I can only imagine being over the moon about it if I had discovered that part on my own.

Also, been playing Horizon: Zero Dawn and though I don't think I'm that far into it, I think it's really terrific. People seem to have turned on this game since its release in the beginning of the year and I've been reading a ton of negative things in the forums about it but I'm really impressed. I've played some Ubisoft open-world games here and there but not enough to be jaded so that probably helps but I love so much about this game. I'm glad Sony believed in Guerrilla and allowed them to keep making AAA games 'cause they finally hit it out of the park. I get people are tired of crafting stuff but I just haven't engaged with those kinds of games that much and this game sets the perfect context. The world is intriguing and more beautiful than real life and I wasn't ready for the game to be as touching. Character stuff has traditionally been the Studio's weakest element but Horizon has a ton of low key moments that struck a cord with me a number of times.

Initially, I found the combat flow to be confusing but I finally "got it" and I'm starting to get a lot more comfortable engaging with it in different ways. On top of that, I usually hate hunting animals and stuff but I'm really liking pretending to be a hunter!

The only thing that's still bugging me is Aloy's voice. I just hear Chloe from Life is Strange and her too cool for school attitude. I wish it was literally anyone else.

Finally got around to playing Gunpoint and enjoying the puzzle solving so far after the first handful of missions. This game has ssstyle and the music contributes in a huge way, particularly how it changes when you enter the "hacking" view.

The other title from my backlog that I'm finishing right now is Alien: Isolation (this game really came out in 2013? damn) and despite some questionable story beats the experience continues to be pretty tense. I'm playing on Hard but have been given very little reason to use any of the crafting items yet? Hopefully this will change soon or I may just start using them for the sake of it.

So Destiny 2 is a pretty well known quantity now, but man does that game have some good gameplay. I'm still playing consistently each night even for just a little bit. Probably a little bit less this week after I finish the weekly resets since the Faction Rally is over, but still. Game is fun to just run around and listen to videos or podcasts in.

Second thing is Heat Signature. Holy shit, Heat Signature. It's a game where you can go inside the spaceships.

It's like Hotline Miami, but way easier because you can pause and just do the most absurd bullshit ever (but can also get ridiculously hard depending on what kind of missions you go for and what kits guards can have). For instance, you get on a ship with a wrench and a stealth shield that makes you invisible in the direction you're facing. First room has 5 guards. You could wait for them to walk out one by one to go check some terminal nearby and clock them all with the wrench. Or you could wait until one leaves, wrench some fool, and then throw that wrench at a second guy, teleport it back into your hands and throw it at a third guy, and then teleport it back again and wrench the last guy.

And now lets say they all had a concussive pistol, and maybe one had a Sidewinder teleporter, which lets you teleport anywhere in range as long as there's a clear "path" to the location (not blocked by a door, basically). Next group of five guys? Teleport in the middle, fire at one guy and immediately re-pause. Switch to the second concussive pistol you picked up, fire at guy 2. Pause. Third gun. Fire. Pause. Within a second you've just fired 5 guns. Or thrown five wrenches. Or maybe you let them fire at you and you pop up a shield at the last second and reflect it into their faces.

Heat Signature also has like, five types of teleporters. And then various modifiers that can go on most things.

Some of my favorite clips from that game are where people cut out the pauses to show you what the guards would see. It's usually just a five second blur of pain.

Been playing Total War:Warhammer 2 and it's.. I don't like to use this word, but its truly epic. I'm afraid it's going to be completely forgotten around these parts because it's sort of a grand strategy game/rts. But yeah, it's amazing.