Someday I'll make you play UnderRail. After Descent to Undermountain, of course.
Oh don't worry, if I can get it to work there's a good chance Undermountain shows up on Dubious RPGs 3: The Actual Bottom of the Barrel. (I have like 42 games on the shortlist for that and some of them are wretched) There are some choice trash D&D games I haven't covered on stream and by god someone's gonna have to play Birthright: The Gorgon's Alliance.
Thankfully I can say I've been playing CRPGs for a while since before I knew BG3 was even in development. Disco Elysium and D:OS2 rank very highly on my favourite games list.
Honestly I know it's a bit janky but I genuinely do recommend Geneforge 1: Mutagen. It's really cheap comparatively, and has a lot more jank than the modern CRPG gamer is willing to put up with, but the world, combat and writing is excellent.
Oh yeah to be clear I think all of the Spiderweb games are pretty solid comfort food RPGs. That said, I'd be lying if I thought the intentionally minimal production values of those games might be a turn-off to someone coming into the genre via BG3. Jeff Vogel deserves a lot of credit for doing "indie dev" before that was a thing, but I just imagine someone taking one look at that Geneforge remake and running away.
Oh, and to add one (well kinda) to the list for people who like BG3's combat: The hot 2003 LucasArts release Gladius for the Gamecube/PS2/Xbox (You can buy it on the Xbox store as a classic for like $10). It's a hybrid RPG/tactics game that BG3's combat reminds me a lot of. It's got all the typical CRPG class stuff but a little simplified and it has a fancy gear system. I remember it super fondly. I bought it on a whim because it was used at EB Games for like $8 (it didn't sell well from my understanding). I ended up pouring tons of hours into it. Funnily enough, the "People also like" for Gladius' entry on the Xbox store is almost all CRPGs and the first two entries are the old Baldur's Gate games.
Gladius is a heck of an obscure pick. I actually bought a copy somewhat recently with the intent of playing it on stream. "LucasArts made a tactical RPG with fantasy gladiators and no one played it" is a heck of a pitch.
You're sick and I'm very proud of you. Between the two of us, I wasn't expecting you to be the one to go all the way down the N64 hellhole, but now you can legally say you're "an expert at Mario 64." Only a few half-A presses to go before you become a true master.
This series is right up my alley... so I will be watching it (or reading) very closely. Neither of these games I have tried, but Marvel suns is certainly on my short list.
Follow up question, what if I don't care about warhammer, will I still enjoy a game around it?
Part of the appeal of Warhammer games for me at this point tends to be the absurdity of the setting, but I hardly think that's a qualifier. In fact, it's the quality of some of these Warhammer games that's made me interested in the setting at all. I did go down a wiki hole at one point. I have no intention of ever buying or painting pewter miniatures, however. They aren't gonna get me there.
But yeah I think Chaos Gate is just a good tactics thing even if you button past all of the dialogue and just want your space trucks to kill the snot demons.
@undeadpool: I don't really agree with this because part of being quippy is getting to the point and these characters WILL NOT SHUT UP. By the end of the game it was almost funny to me how every time a conversation reached its natural end there were still like 10 lines of dialogue to go.
"Well we better go stop the big bad now."
"Yep! It's time."
"I guess I'll go do it!"
"If anyone can, it's you."
"No if anyone can it's us."
"I never really thought of myself as a team player but you have really changed that. I believe in you."
"It's so great that you believe in me. That's really going to help us stop the big bad."
"As a team."
"Yes, as a team."
"What an amazing team effort it will be."
"We're all going to fight him together."
"Yep, okay, I'm heading off now."
"Talk to you later."
"Yes, we will talk later."
"I look forward to it."
It's truly awful. But not as awful as Captain America telling you how you inspired him as a leader and have become one of his best friends because you gave him some book when the two of you played cards together.
@sethmode You're missing nothing except that if you get to friendship level 5 with a hero there's some neat stuff that opens up. The dialog itself is all cringe except for a few characters (Majik is okay and Blade is decent.)
I actually really love the "it is my Charlie girl" line read because it's so weird it feels totally anachronistic. One of the few reminders in the game that the Hunter has been dead for like 300 years, since she doesn't seem phased at all by stuff like cars and computers and Iron Man armor.
Yeah like, I respect Firaxis for going out of their comfort zone on this one, but it's abundantly clear they aren't used to writing games like this. I genuinely think Midnight Suns would've been much higher on my personal top 10 if the Abbey stuff was just a menu and every other line of dialogue was excised. Just a little too talky for its own good (speaking of too talky, please look forward to when I eventually talk about Triangle Strategy)
One thing that it make me really curious, is if and how much of Midnight Suns might end in an eventual proper XCOM sequel...
I have a feeling the answer HIGHLY DEPENDS on how well Midnight Suns is received and how well it does sales-wise.
But also I don't wanna do fucking support conversations in an XCOM game. Full stop. That's what Fire Emblem is already for, and the world of questionable Fire Emblem imitators is something I'm already gearing up to talk about.
They seemed surprised I would recognize Hellgate London. For the record, I've never played Hellgate London, but I know a shitty 90s/2000s CRPG when I see one.
Nice list! I keep going back and forth on playing Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters. Maybe I will have to get around to it someday, if I ever find the time. Or if it ever gets Steam Deck support.
I also keep going back and forth on how much I like the stuff in between the tactics in Midnight Suns. On the one hand, it's not really good. On the other, it's just so goofy that it has an oddly endearing quality.
There's definitely a charming scuffed quality to all of the social interaction. Like, it's clear the writers did their homework and read some Marvel stuff, but I think the presentation angle isn't quite there yet. There's also just too much of it. Too much I say, too much!
I need to start a list of all the Warhammer games I need to play, because as it stands, I think I've only played two, and if you're recommending a tactics game as being the best squad game since War of the Chosen, then I damn well need to play it.
Also, good list. I expect that's all I'll be able to say for most these this year as I've played all of maybe three games released this year, but it's a great read as always. Hope you have a good 2023.
Oh the best part is I was initially going to not buy any new games for the first six months of 2022. I lasted about three. Then school started up again and, welp, here I am now with like ten honorable mentions. (I thankfully managed to stick through this semester and salvage it all at the last second like the executive function disaster human I am, but I do not recommend it.)
I LOVE War of the Chosen so that's high praise for Chaos Gate! I bought it during the Fall Steam sale so I'm excited to give it a shot as some point in the new year.
I think my Winter break will be very Midnight Suns focused as I'm only about 8 hours in so far. I don't mind the in between missions social stuff as much as you, but the card system and tactical battles are absolutely the stars. It reminds me of Into the Breach more so than anything else with the environmental effects and focus on positioning.
I'm very happy to see Pentiment so high. I'm not a history dork but I was super impressed by the attention to detail and felt like I learned a lot. It's so well written and I loved the characters; plus, there's a solid whodunit mystery behind the themes and setting. Really happy Josh Sawyer and Obsidian got to make that game.
Into the Breach is definitely a point of comparison for Midnight Suns. I don't find it as rigid, however, which was always one of my bigger problems with that game.
The idea that Pentiment is probably one of the more notable releases from fucking Microsoft makes me incredibly happy. Sure, it's mostly because all their other video games are still halfway through development, but I'll take this weird historical talk-em-up over whatever the fuck the next Gears game is going to be.
Look Arby. I love you and love the fact that you put Nirvana Initiative on your list.
But you and I are going to have a little chat about having two Warhammer games and Stranger of Paradise on here when Nightmare Reaper is absent.
Nightmare Reaper made an honorable mention! It'll probably get a full paragraph if I bother doing a full write up this year! It's a fun game, even if the procedural generation means encounters and weapons can sometimes be a clusterfuck.
So you're saying I should play Final Fantasy Stranger in Paradise?
Did you like Nioh and do you like the dumbest greatest fucking dudes being bros story in a Final Fantasy wrapper ever told. If both of those are yes, then absolutely play Stranger of Paradise.
Signalis is fantastic; definitely going to be on my top 10 list. Like, it's not just a decent survival horror thing, it also deserves credit for going beyond its influences and getting fucking weird with it. The fake-out credits sequence at the 2/3rds mark is a personal favorite.
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