What PC games are you playing?

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Finally given up on WoW and uninstalled it as I was only really playing it to make enough gold for tokens to play to make more tokens ... so pointless to carry on. As I haven't played LoTRO for a while and that was my go-to MMO before I started playing WoW, I'm back playing that and levelling my original hunter.

Also bought Shadow Tactics - Blades of the Shogun: Aiko's Choice the other day so am playing that too.
We've given up on wow, it's just become too much rinse-and-repeat with everything they do... Oh wow, another big bad with a redemption arc inbound :rolleyes:

I used to play lotro back in secondary school during the MoM days! Lost my account though so started again but couldn't make a rune keeper without the expac :(
 
Soldato
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I used to play lotro back in secondary school during the MoM days! Lost my account though so started again but couldn't make a rune keeper without the expac :(

Thanks for making me feel old :p

I made a choice when LoTRO came out and became a founder so don't have to worry about expansion prices though I see Standing Stone Games only release the expansions for founders after the game's been out for about 6 months so they can try and convince you to part with more money, which I understand from a financial point of view but do think is a bit of underhanded tactic.
 
Soldato
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With the exception of possibly EVE about 10 years ago, I've not gotten into an MMO since Star Wars Galaxies. I hate how they all seem to be theme parks now and not Sandboxes. Still have fond memories of hunting Rancors on Dathomir and Krayt Dragons on Tatooine etc.

Currently not really playing anything, nothing is really grabbing my attention but certainly looking forward to next year's releases.
 
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Thanks for making me feel old :p

I made a choice when LoTRO came out and became a founder so don't have to worry about expansion prices though I see Standing Stone Games only release the expansions for founders after the game's been out for about 6 months so they can try and convince you to part with more money, which I understand from a financial point of view but do think is a bit of underhanded tactic.
You're welcome ;) must have been about year 10 at the time! Tried it with a group of friends as an alternative to wow but they all quit.

Now I want to spin it up again when the Valheim phase is easing up! I remember going back on a while ago and it looked very much like they've sold themselves out down the MTX route with their store
 
Soldato
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After finishing Solasta, I continued trying to make the most of my free Gamepass membership by downloading both Nier Automata and Yazkuza Like a Dragon.

Nier I was quite enjoying for 90 minutes or so, but then I started to find the trekking through the same empty environments for 15 minutes each way, moderately disturbed only by the same respawning enemies, just too off-putting. The combat is not entirely to my liking either, though I guess there's nothing particularly wrong with it. The minimap I find incredibly annoying too, leading to me going the wrong way frequently. Anyway, I was liking the story but not the gameplay very much, and there was one point I needed to schlup all the way back across the city and then across that huge empty desert and then across the next zone... and I just couldn't face it, so I decided to load up Yakuza: LAD to give that a whirl instead.

The next day disappeared somehow in nine solid hours of romping around a beautifully rendered Yokohama interspersed with some cool combat (though I think this might get repetitive over the game's whole playtime to be fair) and pleasingly bizarre sidestories. Loving it at the moment.

Yakuza 7 is very solid, completed it a few weeks ago, I still prefer the brawler combat though.

As for Nier, we seem to have pretty similar taste in games so I wouldn't give up on it:p

I had a similar impression during the first two hours and the world is empty, partially because of the aesthetic and partially because most of the already constrained budget went into the soundtrack and combat animations, both of which are out of this world:p

It turned out to be one of the best gaming experiences of the last decade, it just doesn't do instant gratification but what it does do is well worth the time.


Back to the topic, got into Tales of Arise and it's really fun to play. Keeps my attention pretty well considering I'm not too big on jrpgs. Interesting and visually impressive combat system as well, too early in the story to really comment on that aspect. Liking the optional banter between characters, seems like it'll be solid at least.
 
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Soldato
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Yakuza 7 is very solid, completed it a few weeks ago, I still prefer the brawler combat though.

As for Nier, we seem to have pretty similar taste in games so I wouldn't give up on it:p

I had a similar impression during the first two hours and the world is empty, partially because of the aesthetic and partially because most of the already constrained budget went into the soundtrack and combat animations, both of which are out of this world:p

It turned out to be one of the best gaming experiences of the last decade, it just doesn't do instant gratification but what it does do is well worth the time.

Yeah, I did leave it installed to go back to. I think partly it was my fault because I left the area I was in when I didn't actually need to, trekked aaaages back to the camp place and then realised I needed to be where I was in the first place. And it's that long schlup through the city and then miles and miles of basically just sand in the way. And then I had the thought that if I died to the boss that I guess was waiting for me, I would probably have to do the trek all over again as well. I just wanted something more engaging at the time. But I have been thinking back to some of the characters since I shelved it.

When is fast travel unlocked by, by the way? I was about three-and-a-half hours in before moving on to LAD.

Still really liking LAD. I don't get on with contollers, so this is the first Yakuza game I've played. I am not usually a fan of JRPG-style turn-based combat, but I like the way they make it feel more alive and fluid in this one (even if it a fairly transparent illusion of fluidity).

Nice to have Japanese dialogue/English subs in both these games too.
 
Soldato
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Yeah, I did leave it installed to go back to. I think partly it was my fault because I left the area I was in when I didn't actually need to, trekked aaaages back to the camp place and then realised I needed to be where I was in the first place. And it's that long schlup through the city and then miles and miles of basically just sand in the way. And then I had the thought that if I died to the boss that I guess was waiting for me, I would probably have to do the trek all over again as well. I just wanted something more engaging at the time. But I have been thinking back to some of the characters since I shelved it.

When is fast travel unlocked by, by the way? I was about three-and-a-half hours in before moving on to LAD.

Nice to have Japanese dialogue/English subs in both these games too.


Fast travel is unlocked very soon into the game, you should be close. You can also ride animals, lol.

As for Yakuza, the series is awesome, you can try some older games for the brawler combat. Kiwami 2 is really good, it's a remake of Y2 on the new engine.

I also like that I get to choose the audio and how Steam makes it easy for me to go full Japanese. Completed LAD for practice, Tales of Arise is a bit more of a handful sometimes due to the obscure vocab:p

You can try that game as well, pretty nice aesthetics and interesting real-time combat with some nice systems and dodging like in Dark Souls (requires timing because rolling doesn't cancel your attack animations so you can't just spam stuff all the time and you have limited number of moves before cooldown ).
 
Soldato
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Ha, great. I had no idea about being able to ride animals! :)

And yes, Tales of Arise is on my Steam wishlist, too. And Scarlet Nexus, which looks like it might be the same sort of game. With the bonus that's it's currently on Gamepass and so free for me.
 
Soldato
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Ha, great. I had no idea about being able to ride animals! :)

And yes, Tales of Arise is on my Steam wishlist, too. And Scarlet Nexus, which looks like it might be the same sort of game. With the bonus that's it's currently on Gamepass and so free for me.

Yeah, Nier has quite a few secrets and nods to the player, including joke endings and other stuff you have to pay attention to but I don't really want to spoil anything. It makes quite a few references to Replicant, though, and that game is even less about instant gratification but was also worth seeing through to the end with the new new ending they added.

Regarding Scarlet Nexus, I was meaning to try it but the general consensus was that Arise is a significantly better package so I went with that, too little gaming time:p I have GP till February so might still try it.
 
Caporegime
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I've been trying out Blood Spear (free on Steam) that someone suggested on another thread.

I'm not that well-read about these types of games but straight away it reminded me of Demon's Souls,
which I'm assuming was a heavy influence, as is, I'm sure, the other Souls games/Bloodborne.

It's quite an impressive looking game, IMO, and certainly brought my old card to its knees on the higher presets.
Thankfully, image scaling helped a fair bit.

There weren't lots of controls to map which is nice, though the actual gameplay does seem to be more so of a shallow,
one-dimensional experience compared to similar types of games.

I don't think it would keep me entertained for very long but what I did play was quite enjoyable.

I'll be quite keen to see what the creator(s) comes up with next or whether it will receive updates and so forth.

All in all, a good start! :)
 
Soldato
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Finished Halo Campaign and moved onto Ruined King: A League of Legends Story. Great game, by guys who did battlechasers which in itself was a gem IMO, plays largely the same so if you liked that, will like this one. Decent amount of content for the price
 
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