I am curious about it, because I heard a lot of good stuff. I just haven’t played a Dark Souls game in forever.
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Around 35 hours into Horizon Forbidden West now. Think I’m in the beginning of Act 3, as I’m starting to get the ‘this is it! Are you ready?’ dialogue. Not quite sure how I feel about it. It starts out as more of the same, then grows to something a bit more engaging. With the novelty of the first game worn off, I’m not sure if there’s enough valuable additions to the actual gameplay.
There are a lot of systems, too many. Barely used the meals and vigors. Love the idea of vigors, but in execution I keep forgetting to check the meter. Meals 
I used one once on a hard boss? Great to see what they’ve done with melee combat so it’s a lot more involved and adds ‘target this part’ gameplay to human combat. Big thumbs up.
It takes the Mass Effect tact of ‘main missions’ that are purely the main story, with all the other big non-main story missions in Side Quests, and Errands are what you would expect a side quest to actually be. It’s nice to have the choice, but feels a bit clinical in execution.
The story is a tonne better than the first game at least. The different clans are all really fun to meet with their tropes. The voice acting is surprisingly good too.
Cauldrons, still amazing. Hacking robot dinosaurs and watching them fight, still amazing.
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While miserably stuck in bed, the day was markably improved by finishing off Zelda, which came to a satisfying conclusion. There’s still a ton of stuff I missed, but completing all the main story beats was good enough for me.
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Completed Horizon Forbidden West. It was alright A lot of the new additions were underbaked, leaving the game feeling like more of the same. Not much was made of the verticality as promised. The side missions were pretty decent, and the acting is great aside from a few annoying characters. By the end I just wanted it done though.
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My partner is playing right now and he visited a waterfall that we have seen iRL. It looks just gorgeous. That’s all I really know. He also said the new controller made shooting the bow so much better… with all the feedback from the vibration.
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Yeah the tension in the shoulder buttons are used really well, and the vibration is really nicely done. There’s a lot of really subtle vibrations to the point where the controller is probably vibrating about half the time but it isn’t distracting? Like if I focus on it, it’s vibrating a hell of a lot, but if I just play I couldn’t tell you how often it vibrates. It just kinda helps you feel the texture what you’re walking over in a natural way. Super high marks for that!
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Yesterday I discovered that Mario Kart is available on the iPad and I don’t foresee ever having any free time again.
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Last week I discovered Slay the Spire is available on the Switch and I forgot how lovely it is to play an actual video game in bed.
It’s lovely. Highly recommend, 9.5 out of 10, would Slay more spires.
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Took advantage of the free time I have thanks to covid and played some stuff with my partner for the first time in ages.
We started off by going through the various fighting games we have, which mostly involved me losing (I obviously blame being ill).
Mortal Kombat XL - First time we’ve ever actually played this. I was all right at it and managed to win a couple of fights. Interesting that my knowledge of special moves - earned by spending a whole week experimenting with the original game on the Master System - still has some value.
BlazBlue: Chrono Phantasma Extend - I’ve played this a decent amount 1p, so I’m not as terrible at it - at least when using characters I’m used to. My favourite of the three.
Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite - My least favourite. Mainly because I lost every match, but also because of the crap character selection.
Finished up with a run through Monster Prom, which is a competitive dating sim where you play monsters working out who to take to prom. The gameplay is pretty simple, but it’s very funny and a lot of fun to play with someone else.
Also, late to the party as always, I bought Hades the other day and have had one playthrough of that. Obviously, I’ve got “God Mode” on, because I’m rubbish at games. Lots of fun, considering I’m usually not a fan of particularly hard games.
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I finished horizon forbidden west at the weekend. My wife’s doing a uni course so my board gaming is taking a hit but my ps5 is getting well loved.
So anyway forbidden west. I’ve got opinions. It’s a good game. I mainlined the story as it definitely suffers from a lot of side quests and distractions which would normally distract me. It’s a good game with some strong mass effect 2 vibes.
The new mechanics are a mixed bag. There is a lot of bloat there that I simply ignored, valour surge… meh. The new parachute/kite is a welcome addition and the grapple hook is good if a bit underused. The combat is still the main attraction and I don’t think it added much that’s new in that regard.
Although if they add anything else that’s not a robot dinosaur in the inevitable sequel I’m going to cry.
So onto Elden ring, what can go wrong.
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Played a few hours of Elden Ring. I’ve not played a souls- game before.
I can just about handle the smaller enemies, but (even after collecting a lot of items and levelling a bit) the first boss absolutely smacked me into the ground 10 times. So that’s how it is, eh?
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Yes but so far Elden ring gives me the well I’ll run away and do something else option.
Rather than take on the first boss (who I lasted seconds against) I went for the beast dude in the cave as a warm up. Still took me about 10 try’s but I got there.
The only awful design choice I’ve found so far is returning from the round table via the map. That took me 20 minutes and a google search to figure out.
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I think the “first boss” is meant to be an introduction to the idea that you don’t have to do things linearly.
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Finally finished my 20 hour game of Stellaris and looked forward to playing something different for a change. Sat down last night to try something and found myself starting a new game of Stellaris.
Sometimes the first step to fixing yourself is admitting that you have a problem.
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I’m assuming the almost here is for The Outer Wilds, which had an ending so beautiful I immediately forgave all it’s flaws.
All I’ve been playing is Elden Ring. Over 100 hours now, not bad for a game that came out 5 weeks ago. Or very bad, not sure which. Absolutely phenomenal game which deserves all its platitudes.
I have so many people tell me how wonderful The Outer Wilds is, I really want to love it and feel I could but… but I’ve bounced off it three times now. I just struggle with the control system, I simply can’t get to where I want to go and I find it hugely frustrating and at odds with the peaceful vibe I feel I’m supposed to be experiencing.
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If you ever give it a fourth go just use autopilot. Until the endgame it’s all I ever used.
First time I tried it the autopilot flew me directly into the sun. But I have similar problems with the jet pack and just general terrain traversal. For some reason the controls are not intuitive in a way that I find frustrating. I’m sad because I know there’s an amazing story that I’m missing. Maybe I’d be better watching a play though of it.
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Some may regard that as an undesirable feature in an autopilot. Was it a Tesla, by any chance?
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In the autopilot’s defence, it was moving in a direct line to where I wanted to go. It just didn’t take account of the star between me and my destination; this is very nearly an Alfred Bester novel ‘The Stars not My Destination but they sort of got in the way’.
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