Civ6 report: oh dear, this morning it all turned to shit. The guy I started a war with said I ruined the game for everyone by “slamming us with optimal play”. After I had calmed down, I went for reasoned explanation of how things ended up as they did, emphasising that nothing was personal and how geography and circumstances lead to war, only afterwards realising he had already quit in a huff*. He then accused me of gaslighting, thereby taking the in-game conflict into actual conflict, again spiking my stress levels and souring everything.
(* I’m totally fine with resigning, it’s only the huff I take issue with)
So I finished Marvel Spider-Man, and honestly? Pretty good! A solid 8/10 kinda game. The ending was a little anticlimatic, but only a bit. And the Miles reveal was neat.
I had fun with it. Probably hit about 75% of all the unlocks? The MJ and Miles parts were the worst to play, but really interesting from a story perspective.
Solid job. Looking forward to the Miles Morales Spider-Man going on sale sometime.
Next up: finishing Star Wars Jedi Survivor. Basically Spider-Man with invisible webs, innit?
So I started another Civ7 game. (after accidentally starting Civ6…)
For the record:
My first game I was Isabella of Aksum in the Antiquity age. I don’t even remember my Civ for the Exploration age and in Modern Age I was the Qing. I focussed exclusively on economics and won via founding the Worldbank. On difficulty level 2 it was very easy to get ahead even though in the exploration age I failed to fully complete the economics Legacy quests because the game failed to explain how Treasure Fleets worked. I am sure I would have done much better if I had known from the start that I needed to found cities between resources that were actually noted as “Treasures”
This time I am playing one difficulty level higher and starting as Queen Himiko of the Khmer. I always choose expansionist civilizations and both the Queen and the Khmer are also focussing on Science. I think she would also do well with a diplomatic side-focus instead of expansionist… we’ll see. The other starting Civilization options didn’t suit me at all.
Keeping with the Himiko theme I have now adopted th Sun God religion
I am friendly with Hatshepsut of Egypt and Tecumseh of Missisippian. Ibn Battuta of Persia doesn’t quite trust me yet
I am trying to convince the barbarians of Painted Rock that I am friendly so they’ll stop attacking my town. (Eventually that means they’ll become a city state and if I keep at it for 22 turns or so they will become a vassal and with even more patience I can absorb them into my empire if I do so before the age ends… city states vanish between ages…
Ive discovered Gamepass, so have been churning through some games - so far have finished Little Kitty Big City (which Pip worked on!), which was a charming little sandoxy cat it up and Donut Country, which was suitably weird and interesting. Ive also done a little fooling around with Hi Fi Rush which is a novel spectacle fighter/rhythm game that i hope to finish and Another Crabs Treasure which is the most fun ive had with a Soulslike in ages.
Im now onto Avowed - which was the reason i opted in to Gamepass in the first place. Im only about a third through the first area but ive been enjoying it a lot, despite preferring my rpgs turn based in general. Its not as ambitious as something like Skyrim but has some echoes of that one, and is a delight to wander around and explore. Counter most suggestions, ive not gone into the admittedly impressive magic options that much and im actually going heavy into Ranger and arquebusing my way through things. Its not as text heavy as the core Pillars games but the lore and world are fresh and interesting, and the writing is decent, if not amazing. Definitely worth a look (certainly for 15 bucks!)
Playing Avowed on GamePass too, and only a few hours in but it’s fun. I think the Skyrim comparisons have harmed it, it’s not really that kind of game. But as an ARPG with top-notch art design, especially environmental, it’s a fun time.
The story and writing are whatever, but it’s definitely not as bland and soulless as reviews made it out to be. The world is amazing and there’s just stuff everywhere to explore. If you see something in the distance, there’s probably something there.
I also haven’t dipped into the magic, but it looks fun. Depending on how long it takes to beat this, I might even give it a second play through. Though, Monster Hunter Wilds releases next week, so good chance I never even make it out of the first area in Avowed.
Initially I was going to ignore this, I’m not actually the biggest fan of Obsidian games (except KOTOR 2), but then I saw a review comparing it to Drova which I picked up on a whim at the end of last year and absolutely loved even though it’s not really my kind of game, so I gave it a shot.
Drova is an “retro” style RPG so it’s pretty different, but Avowed does have the same quality of a world that’s a blast to explore because it’s just full of things to find. And they both have enjoyable ARPG combat and a story that’s kinda just there, though Drova’s self-imposed limitations being a retro game mean the story doesn’t ever get in the way since it doesn’t bog down with conversations.
Just completed my 2nd game of Civ7. (20 hours total playtime for the two games)
One bug is really the Queen of Bugs: moving around the map with WASD sometimes leads the game into a state where if you try to move that way you’ll always be stuck in one direction (mostly north). You can get out of the stuck with ESC but as soon as you WASD again… you get stuck. This usually happens after playing for a while. Reloading seems to fix it. But yikes … reloads are still THE WORST.
Other than that:
they just didn’t finish the UI.
Civ is supposed to allow micromanagement but all the UI necessary to do this just does not exist.
A lot of systems of previous iterations somehow exist but dumbed down (Religion, Cultural works etc.). I assume this is due to the age change system resetting everything twice in a game.
I have made my peace with the legacy paths… once you know how they work you can probably just do whatever with them and ignore the prompts. This should have been a tutorial and not an “always on” system.
on second thought… these paths are what amount to the victory conditions you need to fulfill and they are narrow and … too easy? I upped the difficulty from first game by one and I guess that is still too low.
Overall I feel like they have tried to “gamify” the game in ways that are probably supposed to appeal to all those kids who are only now encountering the series for the first time and feel like they need to get something to get better between games–so there is experience points and unlocks and what not… Civ though… it is not a rogue-lite and never will be. Why would I want that?
Am I old woman shouting at the computer because “Früher war alles besser?!” Maybe.
It mostly plays like Civ. Civ for the “modern gamer” what- or whoever that is.
Having played twice now and grokked what there is to grok… I think I’ll wait for further patches.
I’ve been playing trying out Atomfall - it’s basically Fallout/Stalker, but I was interested because it’s set in Cumbria, in the UK, not too far from where I grew up. I immediately felt at home.
Is anyone playing Blue Prince? It’s very boardgamish. Very much similar feel to a solo carcasonne (In terms of pulling map tiles to create good paths rather than theme or specific area maximising)
It’s very good, tough, frustrating and thoughtful.
Not sure if it’s been said but Blue prince is a great board game like rogue lite / gone home. Worth checking out it will indefinitely come down in price but is free on ps plus extra if that helps anyone.
I picked it up over the weekend and played a lot. Room 46 on day 13, now on day… 35(?) and trying to unravel ever more esoteric puzzles.
The core tile drafting thing should appeal to board gamers even if the more intricate puzzling doesn’t grab you. If you like really involved puzzles though… it has them in spades.
In about 8 hours a total modern official remake of Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion is going to appear. They didn’t announce it, but its existence got leaked and the release time was confirmed yesterday. It’s not just a “make this playable on current PCs” remaster, but an actual remake in a new engine. (Let’s hope they fix the levelling system. And faces. And other stuff).
I was playing that on my PS3 back in the day. Then the system malfunctioned and wouldn’t boot. Sent it off for repairs and got a different system back, so all my stuff was gone. Couldn’t be arsed to invest the hours and hours of time I had put into it before, so I never finished the main questline.
